My Journey Through Cathedral Catholic

My Journey Through Cathedral Catholic

Ayla Grazier, Staff Writer

Cathedral Catholic is a different kind of high school. Students come from different parts of the county, different backgrounds, and different home lives, yet when they step onto the CCHS campus, all those difference don’t matter. At Cathedral Catholic, we are one family.

Unlike most, I came from a small public school in the middle of East County. Over the past four years, I’ve told people that I live in Santee, and they looked at me like I had just made up an imaginary place. Given that CCHS’s student population is so widely dispersed across the county, one of the hardest parts of going to Cathedral Catholic for me was that I was always in the car. Whether I was driving to school in Del Mar or my friends’ houses in Claremont, Vista, Point Loma, Carlsbad, or Rancho, I probably spent one- third of the past four years driving from one place to another.

When I tell people that I go to Cathedral Catholic, they often say something along the lines of, “Oh yeah, that private school with the really nice college campus.” I can’t deny that every part of that sentence is true. I remember the first time I saw CCHS, it was just a pile of dirt and cement blocks. My dad brought my sister, brother, and me to see where the new Uni was going to be built, but little did we know that that pile of blocks would turn into something reminiscent of Stanford.

The first day of my freshman year, in the midst of many other things, I remember thinking how lucky I was to go to CCHS. I did not think that I belonged at this Catholic school paradise, yet for some reason I was standing in the middle of it. At that point I knew exactly three people, and if it weren’t for those three people, I don’t know how I would have gotten through that dreaded freshman year.

As sophomore and junior year slipped by, I switched friend group twice due to pointless drama, joined the Drama department, and decided that I had finally found where I belonged. As the years passed by, so did the dances, school plays, football games, and classes. One day I woke up, and it was senior year.

A lot of people think senior year is easy and laid back. Well, all I have to say to those people is “GET YOUR HEAD OUT OF THE CLOUDS.” Senior year is a pain. You have to apply to college while balancing all of your normal schoolwork, apply for scholarships, keep your grades up so that colleges don’t revoke your scholarships, and deal with the fact that eventually you and all your best friends are going to be going in different directions.

But apart from all the struggles of senior year, it’s also the best year of your life. I can’t even count the amount of memories I have made this year with some of my best friends. My advice: don’t take one moment of high school for granted because, before you know it, you will wake up one morning and will need to get ready for the Jenny Craig Pavilion at USD – the site of graduation. So despite all the stresses, enjoy high school and remember that these years are the time of your life!