College Search Tension

      Happy Monday! Today was a typical Monday for me: I had to go to work, which was a long six-and-half hours, then my parents gave me this talk about how I need to be doing more for my college search process. I'm usually never the kid who needs to be told to get off their butt and do stuff, because I always do it on my own. So that was really weird. I keep telling myself that I can wait to start seriously thinking about college, that I have time. And for most kids my age, that's probably the case. But since I'm looking at some state schools, I have to apply by July 1st for housing stuff. I honestly don't really understand anything about college or the application process. No one has really told me what to do yet since my school won't seriously advise us until the fall, and my parents are just expecting me to simply apply to all these schools.
      If you're new to My Life as a Wallflower, let me fill you in: I go to a private school where almost everyone except me is very wealthy. They're looking at very prestigious schools all over the country and it's embarrassing enough when I have to tell them I have to stay in-state. Even worse, my parents are suggesting schools that I feel fall short of my expectations and the expectations of my peers. I appreciate the fact that I'm very lucky to go to college and some people won't ever be able to attend, but some of these colleges, I feel, aren't worth sixteen years of private school education.
      Maybe I'm so lacking in motivation and drive for the college search because my parents have repeatedly made it clear that my options are so limited. I hate when people at school talk about college at all because they get to choose wherever they want, when I've only got about three colleges to apply to. If money weren't an issue, I feel like I could also get into the schools my friends talk about, and I would be happy there. I'm just so scared that I'm going to end up in a school I'm embarrassed to go to and I'm going to carry that bitterness and resentment with me for the rest of my life because I could have done better. I'm certainly not the smartest in my class, but I'm just as smart or smarter than a lot of them, yet they're going to do more with their lives because of how much money their parents have. It's so hard for me to care about where I go when I've been told by all of my friends that the schools I'm looking at aren't good schools; that we're better than those schools. So why try? If wherever I end up isn't "good enough" for me, should I even care? Why should I try so hard for a school where most of the students don't know how to write a 3-5 paged essay? I wanted my college search to be so fun, like it is for most other seniors. I'll probably just be disappointed wherever I go.

Carpe Diem,
Brooke