Why Peaking In High School Is a Bad Idea (And Why I Didn’t Do It)

Believe me, this path was not intentional. I had no master plan to not be at the pinnacle of my high school’s social strata, though I think it turned out immensely better that I didn’t peak back then.

High school graduation invites have been peppering my mailbox over the last week, causing my mind to drift back downstream over 20 years ago to my days at Ottawa Township High School (go Pirates!).

The three main buildings of the campus sit squarely in a flood plain caused by the convergence of the Fox and Illinois Rivers. Back in those days, Asian carp were species reserved for decorative ponds and cat food. Smallmouth, walleye, sauger, crappie, skipjack, buffalo and all manner of native fish could be caught in good numbers at that fertile intersection.

I spent many algebra classes looking longingly through a window, over the football field to boats drifting with the current, sunlight glinting off monofilament as the occupants vertical jigged along downriver. I do believe this distraction could have been a contributing factor to average grades.

The point is, I was always more fascinated with life outside the halls of high school than I was with life within.

As a result, I never fully engaged in the kinds of pursuits that gain social standing among the clearly delineated levels of popularity. That popularity (from my perspective) seemed to correlate with access and license. If I wasn’t working at the local grocery store, I was fishing or playing hockey with my rag tag group of buddies (who also had little regard for climbing any perceived social ladder).

It wasn’t like I wouldn’t have killed to be well-known, or date cheerleaders (or girls in general). I wasn’t above any of those typical teenage desires, I just don’t think I cared enough to try.

At this point in life, I look back and see what’s become of those who seemingly had it all during those brief four years. What seemed so impressive then, in hindsight, now appears to be a single firework momentarily dazzling a dark horizon. Too dramatic of an image? Probably…but you get the picture.

My high school days on the periphery of social standing taught me valuable lessons about how to live and relate to others and perhaps even helped me avoid some wrong turns later in life.

No Gravitas

When you have no school-wide reputation, you have to work to earn respect and trust. Nothing proceeds you and even if it does, you don’t depend on it to simply coast into peoples’ lives. This principle held true for both fellow students and faculty.

Which causes me to wonder if stepping out into the bigger world beyond high school was a challenge for many who felt like they had been big fish. Soon at college, or the big city, or the plant where no one cared that you hung with the most select crowd in high school, was that a tough pill to swallow? Is that why so many remained in town rather than built their own reputation beyond the borders of the Friendly City?

True(r) Friends

Popularity attracts the same type of people that money does. When you have neither, you can pretty much guarantee the people you’re associating with are doing so because they value you, not the access or social capital you provide.

Sure, there were a few relationships that didn’t last, but my closest friends in high school I continue to count as friends today. We reconnect from time to time and it’s easy to see that those relationships were built on mutual admiration…not social utility.

These old friends are some of the dearest people to me because my current station in life is only of mild interest to them. They chose to associate with me at a phase in life that can only be described as developmentally bizarre. They have stories on me (and I on them) that are best kept between friends.

Some of those tales may involve a flaming Pepsi can filled with gas on a camp out, bottle rockets while catfishing, a homecoming date whose house smelled of cattle, a broken church window, or a false-alarm UFO abduction south of Marseilles…but who really knows at this point?

When you’re at the pinnacle of the high school world, how can you really tell that the people around you are there for the right reasons? That you’re not simply another rung for them to achieve before moving on to the next best thing? It seems like a person would have to be awfully discerning to know the difference.

The Good Ol’ Days

Remember Uncle Rico from Napoleon Dynamite? His good old days ended the day he graduated high school and while I understand he’s a fictional character, he’s an archetype of someone who had it all as a teen. As a result, he never really left high school in his mind enough to see that real life was passing him by.

I can remember times in high school that were absolutely terrible. Obsessing over having Guess jeans that cost more than we could afford and never really knowing how to be “in style” (as evidenced by the quotes around ‘in-style’). Wanting to ask a girl on a date but not having the first clue on how. Being made fun of because my last name contained too many consecutive consonants. Trying to convince classmates that I didn’t curl my hair.

At the time, those situations (and others I’ve probably suppressed) made me hope that something in the future would be better. High school was a ton of fun…sometimes. I made some of my best friends there, but it wasn’t so idyllic that I never wanted to leave. I hoped for something better in the future.

What happened was that with age, I became more comfortable with myself and realized, with a little help from a Clint Black song, that these are the good old days. Today. Now. Hold a certain fondness for bygone times, but don’t build your home there. When you peak in high school, how can a person have passion for the present…or the future? You can’t hope for anything better.

In Someone Else’s Shoes

The Crash Test Dummies song “Mmmm Mmmm” charted during my high school career. Bizarre as it was, it culminated with a kid “who had it worse than that.” Which was pretty much true in life. You can always find someone with a more difficult path to tread.

Having known what it was like to be on the outskirts (especially true when I moved to town mid-year during sixth grade), I tried to be friendly to kids who most either ignored, or really gave a hard time. One guy in particular, someone I had multiple classes with from junior high through high school, literally didn’t remember me, nor many classmates at our 20-year reunion. He said he had repressed so many memories from school that it was almost literally a blank spot in his life. So many students had been so brutal to him that each day only promised some new ridicule or humiliation.

The little taste of ostracizing I got in sixth grade made me resolute in doing what I could to make life just a little easier for these people. It’s amazing how far a little kindness can go to make the day bearable for someone. To this day I keep a protective eye out for folks who are easy targets. Had I been on top of the heap, I don’t know that I would have been so aware of the needs of others.

Welcome to the Future

As I draw to a close, I keep getting the sneaking suspicion that I’ve painted a picture of someone who knew better all along. That I was too cool to even attempt being cool in high school. I wish that were the case.

What I do believe happened was that I grew into myself. Slowly. Gradually. Eventually becoming a person who was confident enough to pursue the things that were important to me. To enjoy the things I liked. To be with people who I valued. To stand for what I believed.

Peaking in high school is a bad idea and makes the rest of your life a mere drudgery to wait out. There’s photographic and eye-witness evidence that I absolutely did not peak in high school. It was an important four years, but not the most important years of my life. Given a preference, I’ll take the trail with a long but steady rise to the summit.