High School Activities

     So, school is starting soon, and for me, that means constant stress. Because I'm an overachiever and also slightly insane (who am I kidding, I'm completely insane) I'm doing like 5,000,000 activities this year (ok maybe I'm exaggerating a little bit), along with attempting to find volunteer opportunities and keep up with the blog. This is all in the hopes of getting into an Ivy League college, and I only have 2 more years until I start applying. So, I've decided to make a list of all the things I'm doing (or hope to be doing) this school year. Both to inform you a little bit more about my life and keep myself organized. So, I invite you to read all about my hectic life and feel free to comment below if you have experience with any of these!

1. My School Musical - Anything Goes
1. So, I love acting. Like a lot. When I was going into 8th grade, I decided that I would do
   
   my school's musical, because I had nothing better to do anyway. Well, I immediately fell in love with acting. It gave me the opportunity to escape from my everyday life and just be somebody else for a while. This love continued to develop once I realized I was actually pretty good at it. I think I did 3 shows that year, and I loved them all. However, when I moved here, we only have one show a year, and that's during the school year (talk about stress during tech week!) This is my favorite part about the beginning of the school year, and last year I grew to love my cast more than my family (sorry *shrugs*).
2. Interact
1.      I don't know if this is a normal thing or something specific to my school, but Interact is a club that basically sets you up with ways to do community service. We have tons of options, and the only requirements are two projects a semester. We also have the chance to help set up school wide fundraisers or donations by working with the student officers for the club. 
3. Choir

1.      So obviously you know what choir is, so I don't need to explain that. But, I don't have choir as a regular class, but instead as a replacement for study hall. That means that instead of having a quiet study hall, I have choir every day for credit without taking up credits I could use otherwise. While I'm really happy to have this option, it also means I can't do homework during study hall and will have to take more home and do it in my rare moments of free time. 
4. Mock Trial
1.      The name of this is pretty self-explanatory. I have a lot of friends who did this last year and they all loved it, so I really want to try it. The only catch is that you have to try out, but I already know the coach (is that the right word?) He has also seen my debate quite a lot, so I feel pretty confident. This does take up quite a bit of time, but it stats right around the time the musical ends, so it shouldn't be as much of an issue. 
5. Newspaper

1.      I missed my opportunity to do this last year, but as you can tell, I like writing. I have a blog for goodness sake, I have to at least tolerate writing. I believe the the teacher that runs the club is also my English teacher, so that's helpful.
6. Yearbook
1.      I'm honestly not even sure what you do in yearbook club, but I'm hoping I get to help take pictures. Something you may not know is that I love photography. I try to plan all trips around picture taking opportunities, and in my humble opinion, I take some great pictures. Even if I do just use my phone, I can work my way around all the features in Instagram to edit them to look their best too (yes I edit the pictures, but only with blurring and to fix the colors.
7. Piano Lessons

1.      I love instruments, and I have a grand piano that I absolutely love, I just wish I could play it. I taught myself the basics and I tend to pick up music pretty fast, but I want a professional to help me. There are certain things I can't teach myself, like technique, that I need someone to help me with. Also, a teacher can keep me focused, rather than getting distracted or mad and giving up on a song.
8. All Honors Classes
1.      As stated earlier, I'm a complete overachiever, and will do anything for a college application. This includes taking honors in every class possible, even if it results in completely stressing myself out. Honestly, I can work more diligently than most people, so all honors isn't as hard for me as it is for most people. Also, most of my friends take all honors too, so we help each other in the classes we're best in (for me that means proofreading essays). I don't think I could do all honors without my amazing friends who I've learned to love, flaws and all.
9. Transition Team
1.      The change from middle school to high school is hard, everybody knows that. It's especially difficult in my school district because the eighth graders are babied, which creates a problem when they move up to the high school where we're pretty much free to do what we want. They go from spending their whole day in one room to having to switch rooms every class period, and having different people in every class. For this reason, we have transition team, which assigns every new student to the high school with a mentor to help them with anything they may need throughout their year.
10. BLOG!!
1.      If you've followed my blog for a while, you probably know that I'm horrible at
   
   keeping up with it. In my five years of running it, I've spent more time on break than I have actually blogging. This gets especially bad during the school year, when I just can't find the energy to blog. However, this year I hope to do better, and actually keep up with it. I'm not exactly sure how I'm going to do this yet, but I assure you I'll do my best. I think that my newly developed twice a week schedule makes this easier on me, because I usually feel pressured to post every day, which is unreasonable for me with my life being as hectic as it is. 

     If you've read this far, then thank you, I'm genuinely surprised. I'd love to hear about other people's school schedules! Please, I really need validation that I'm not completely insane and that other people can do this much stuff without dying. I already feel tired just thinking about all these activities and feel that I'm going to adjust to a 5 hour sleep schedule, but what can ya do?