Elementary school is one of the safest and most relaxing environments for kids to grow up in. Always happy, never sad, and in the end everything had been a-ok. That’s what Lakeland provided for me, a time of all sunshine and rainbows where life had been absolutely stupendous. We didn’t ponder about the dilemmas that will follow with the world to come the next day. I followed the typical elementary life, always smiling. And then middle school arrived. For many of us middle school is a place where you mature and develop who you are both physically and mentally. You’ll find some of your best friends who will stay through high school and maybe into college and if you’re lucky, for the rest of your life. A majority of middle schoolers have a secret crush and other hipsters go out and ‘date’. You see who you want to be, what you want to do in life! It’s a stressful, happy, puppy love filled time where you find exactly who you are, who you will continue to be. We go through phases, fads, and goofy hair styles. It’s a place where you’re judged and the final test is how to live on and make it to the next day where it repeats. It’s a full-blown level up from elementary where peaceful times were everywhere and the worst that happened was someone stole your cookie at lunch. But it requires something elementary didn’t, a transition, for you to become able to stand on your own two feet. Everyone has story to tell about their metamorphosis into middle school.
    My elementary experience being an extremely simple one didn't seem all that special. I made a ton of friends in kindergarten, most of which are still with me today. We learned to spell words, count to one hundred, do arts and crafts. All around a pretty good year, I didn’t realize it at the time but this is when I got into technology. We had a couple classroom computers where could play games on websites like starfall. Let’s just say a good portion of free time was either playing with building blocks or on the computers. The year went by fast and the summer even faster. First grade came around and so did my favorite teacher, Mrs. Abbot. Being just so kind and understanding it made it hard not to have a good time in the classroom, the year seemed to fly by. Second grade I had Mrs. Courson, one of the older teachers who is still there today. What I remember the most is her card system, every time you did something bad you moved a card. You started with green, one offense gave you a yellow and nothing happened, second offense and you got blue and you missed a little of first recess, third being red and you missed an entire recess. It seemed simple but it did ironically teach me a lesson. There exist punishments for anything and everything you do, if you think you will get in trouble you probably will. And that mentality stuck with me even now, to either get good at covering it up, or don’t do it. The next year we had Mrs. Davis, she was one of the teachers that just were an all around a positive impact. What I really took away from that year?, that it’s important to be kind to everyone you meet regardless of what they look like. That everyone deserves a chance but only you can give them that chance. It became one of the more impactful and powerful years that I experienced. Fourth grade did not teach me much except how to put up with teachers you did not like. My final year of elementary not much happened except for the fact that basically every week we had another project due. The projects were on top of all other homework they felt like assigning for that night. It provided me with a time in which to grow a work ethic that involved waiting and doing in all in one shot, it didn't really work out in middle school unfortunately. The things remember most were a couple breakdowns and meeting the kids from Mill Creek. We did a field day with them at the end of the year and more or less we got to meet our soon be to classmates. Now between the schools exists a little rivalry, the equivalent of the Michigan versus State but for small children. It became pretty entertaining making fun of the other school but once we were on the track and playing and running races we all became closer, I would not say friends because we only knew each other for an hour but there was no beef between anyone. The only two people I remember from my group being Garrison and Marlin. That summer was one that felt the longest, I actually got really anxious for middle school and to have that much more freedom. I became excited to meet new people and make a few more friends.
    When I walked in that daunting new set of doors and caught a glimpse of people eight inches taller than me I grinned ear to ear, because I knew that this would be a year to remember. For better or for worse this would be one of the most important years of my life when it comes to my personality and how I am today as a person. I walked in those doors to find the kids I had met briefly last year. Besides getting used to the new expectations of eight teachers not a whole lot happened academically. It started rough as a sixth grader but  paved a road for a year that is near and dear to my heart. Everything just got harder and more difficult to get through without a use of some sort of strategy. This happened to be the first big eye opener for me that I can’t brute force my way though this year. I had to finally attempt at school, a whole new concept to me after breezing through Lakeland. Math became challenging for once and reading had a decent expectation. Writing became a pretty fast favorite between Mrs. Gray's personality and the fact that we could finally pick our topic and write with no limits. School developed almost a honeymoon period for the first week or, so all easy going meeting new people and having a good time. Nothing major happened and everything fell into routine and the coast clear for a perfect year. What I expected and what I got  were two different things.
All ‘important’ things were out of school, such as the app Instagram. I had gotten an Apple ID the summer before and with that my own email. One of the first things I did once sixth grade started was make an Instagram. At first school went along pretty smooth sailing and it looked to be scarily normal, and then I met her. She was some person who passed on by and liked a photo, I didn’t have many followers at the time so I looked at the page, what I saw quite literally changed my life. All I can remember from the page was that they were really sad and depressed, and that more sad and depressed people were here too. It turned out to be the first time for me personally being exposed to this crowd. Now to an extent I could relate, in fourth and fifth grade I experienced a little taste of what I would call and self identity crisis. When a certain person returned to our school they more or less hung out with the people who I used to, and that resulted in me getting left behind in a social limbo. I had no idea who was really there because they enjoyed me as a person, not because I was the only one that was there consistently. I went back to the first people I made friends with, Gunnar, and Zach. I feel so indebted to them because even after leaving them they still welcomed my company like we were never separated, no matter what others say or think I know they will be with me for a long time. I cannot thank them enough for giving me a second chance. That was really the only way more or less I made it through that rough patch but that feeling of absolute powerlessness is something I wish I never forget. It reminds me what my friends mean to me and who I would be without them. Something that definitely gave me an insight to how some of the kids online felt. Just one person after another that I met that had one issue or another, sometimes a mix of multiple. I eventually turned that page into a full on center for these types of people, the anorexics, the obese, bingers, purgers you name it I welcomed them with open arms. Very early on I learned that these problems were something that I could not solve, instead of giving up I transformed the entire page into a place to come and relax, a judgement free zone. I made friends on Kik and got an insight into how the lives they lived. The absolutely terrible cards people drew from the dealer of life, what they went through on a daily basis. These people (while not bad) did start to have an effect on my school life, I became the happy, smiley kind of douchey person. At the time I was finding what I wanted to believe in, the god my parents gave me or find something on my own, the latter was my verdict. I looked into myself and saw that my life was dictated by my own sense of morals and logic, my own craft, mine, something I did by myself. What I decided to become on my own, and I found Atheism which is what I identify by to this day. But as a direct result of this I got into a few flame wars with classmates or tried to pull the science card on them. Those are some of my most regretted decisions to date, being rude to Tori and Nicole, having opinions of people I hardly knew and being totally wrong. The open mind I thought I inherited from science and Atheism was now closed and rejected any opinion that was not my own. At the same time I made strong ties with Caroline and Taiden. Which didn’t really help considering they really only supported my acts when all I wanted was to be proven wrong once, to feel powerless once again. This mentality carried onto the page and I became more involved than even talking with people until one A.M. Which in turn affected my school life, my family life and who I thought myself to be. I continued this lifestyle for months until I had a breakdown one night. Now to explain my breakdown simply, they happen at night when I have a bad day, it’s a mix of highs and lows and they last about an hour. It just hit me, Josh, you need to figure out who YOU want to be, what do YOU want to do. My response was simply “I want to help”, everything just kind of hit in a wave of regret, despair, and depression. I regretted being rude, I despaired that I could not right my wrongs and I was depressed at how blind I had been to not only my own problems but the issues I caused. That month I really just cut off the page, Caroline, Taiden, and worked on fixing things at school first. I knew I couldn’t apologize that doesn’t fix anything. I decided to myself that year, to be the best person I could be for the rest of my life. Not the best student or leader but the best human being I could be. I stopped being narrow minded and listened to my heart, no matter how cheesy it sounds that's what I did.
The start of seventh grade was much different, my classmates seemed more mature and I personally felt ready for change. I no longer dreaded going to school but instead looked forward to the next day seeing the people I would continue to see for the years to come. It was so much different and most of it for the better. I felt like I had received a blank slate and a chance to make up what I had failed to do last year. I took my vow to heart and turned myself into someone I was happy with mentally. Physically I had never been happy with my weight and didn’t really do much to take care of body until the end of seventh grade. But that's besides the point, I had finally become someone who was a friend to all at school and not just online. I was who I wanted to be and still am personality wise. The page taught me that I should be thankful for the people around me and help them in any way I can. It taught me tolerance for people not only to give them a chance to grow on you but understand why they are who they are. To deal with all of that emotion and thought process without going insane I really just became this laid back, cheery person. And it just fit me to a T, it became me and it felt natural. The breakdowns stopped and I, in general was much more positive though that pain of losing it all and being beaten to your lowest still reminds me of my purpose, to help. I picked up the nickname of ‘Frak’ from a Kahoot and it has carried me to this day and taught me of just how important the people in school are to me and how much I love and care for them and the last thing I would ever want is for anyone of them to be hurt. Mentally, physically, socially it doesn’t matter I don’t want to see it happen. I learned fast from Instagram what happens when we all turn on one of our own, nothing good comes from it. Learn to forgive and forget the things that have happened in the past. And as part of me wanting to help has lead me to do some things that I probably wouldn’t have done normally, I ran for not only NJHS president and won but Speaker of the House for MYIG. Both of those were a result of support from classmates and a little helpful peer pressure. Through thick and thin we are stuck together for another four years.
Through my entire middle school experience I have been through so much. I came back from an identity crisis I saw who was really there for me and who would stick around a while longer. I made a entire Instagram page to help those in tough times and learned to love better than any religion could have. I chose my own faith, and with that came a sense of pride and a basis for everything. I became who I wanted, and with that came who I was meant to be. I discovered my desire to help, and I plan to fulfill that silent vow to myself. The transition that we all go through when we go from elementary to middle school is a very important one. Because it changes you for the better, you need to persevere through any problems that are thrown at you. “It ain’t how hard you hit… it’s how hard you can get hit and keep moving forward. It's about how much you can take and keep moving forward!”- Rocky Balboa. No matter what the problem is whether it's depression, anxiety, cutting or even just an essay you need to get through it, but looking back on it all I don't regret all that much. I enjoyed the people I met, most of them were pretty down to earth and fun. Since I wouldn't redo or fix any part of that lesson,  I have accepted that I made many, many mistakes and I did some things right.