They’ve gone dark: Afghans who helped the U.S. military, trained as American-style journalists and rode the wave of women heading to higher education are destroying the diplomas, transcripts and résumés that prove how they built civil society in the country that the U.S. has left behind.
Opinion: Worried about the future? Take a risk
Spring often finds students living in a future tense, worrying over end-of-year exams, college, finances, relationships, and life beyond high school. But too often that means avoiding experiences that could make the present much richer and more rewarding. From a student in Barcelona, here’s some advice on how to live now — as well as later.
By Alice Kouzmenko
American School of Barcelona
GSS Correspondent
Think about the life you’re living. You sit in classroom after classroom and listen to stories about what the world is like — the real world, that is. The people who lay their exhausted heads on the desks surrounding you are the same people you won’t remember the names of in just a couple of years. You tell yourself that you’re in high school and you’ve still got your entire life ahead of you. Countless possibilities lie beyond the walls of your classroom and bedroom, endless moments waiting to be grasped.
But, they’re not really endless, are they? And before you know it, the real world you heard all those stories about will be the one you are living in.
Think about it: The dream university you labored to get into will be nothing but a memory, and a blurry one at that.
Your life will have become an endless cycle of bills, banks and supermarket trips — all those things you used to hear adults complain about. You will realize that you were naive to think they wouldn’t happen to you. And in this not-too-distant future, you would do anything to rewind a little, to get back the moments that seemed to slip through your fingers. You’ll wish that you’d done things in a different way.
So, tell me, if you knew that this would be your future, would you take a risk now, and live life differently?
The fact is that this life you’ve been given – it’s just too short.
It’s too short to not go for the chances that make your mind whirl and skin tingle.
It’s too short to hide away at the mere scent of rain and it’s too short to search for shade at the sight of the sun. It’s too short to worry, to doubt.
So go up to that girl you’ve been thinking about for far too long, and tell her about the butterflies that flutter in your stomach whenever you hear her name. Tell her she’s consumed your thoughts. Relish her smile, the way her emerald green eyes dance.
Stop worrying. Don’t cry about one failed psychology test. Eat that last slice of pepperoni pizza your heart begs for. Forget what anyone else thinks. Just live.
Throw the word ‘love’ around as if it could never run out because, guess what? It can’t. Hold hands a little tighter, laugh a little harder; dream a little bigger than you ever thought was possible.
And, for once in your life, take a risk.
—Alice Kouzmenko is co-editor-in-chief of The Lynx, the student-run publication of The American School of Barcelona.
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