Do you know the people in your grade?

         

Clement          2

Kelsey Clement
Mrs. Stewart
English V/ Period 2
April 30, 2018

Do you know the people in your grade?

We see our classmates every day, and smile at them in the halls,
But do we know that some of us go to work immediately after school just to help put food on our tables to feed our siblings at home.
We see the cars that our classmates drive and talk about how they're too nice or run down,
But do we see how some of our parents came from nothing and rode their bikes to school thirty years ago and worked to give us better than what they had,
Or that some of our parents don't get out of bed in the morning or don't come home at night and the only way we could get to school was to buy what we could afford; which apparently was not much.
Do we know our classmates that we've been with for five years?
Who didn't think they would be around for those five years;
Who didn't think they would make it past freshman year... or sophomore year... or junior year... or senior year... or yesterday.
Our classmates who we see every day, who see us every day, who thought that some days were going to be the last days seeing us.
We see our classmates on snapchat and twitter and Instagram and we think we know what they do in between pictures and stories and tweets
But some of our classmates were raped in between their prom after parties and their 'good morning streaks"
Do we know the people in our grade?
Have we ever taken the time to ask them why their mom isn't ever at their soccer games or why their grandparents drive them everywhere or why they always ask people to sleep over on the weekends?
Have we taken the time to ask them why they don't believe in God anymore?
We think we know our classmates,
But do we know how their siblings broke their toys at the age of six and their nose at the age of twelve and their spirit at the age of sixteen.
Our classmates, who we see in happy relationships
But know that their boyfriend has been cheating on them and their best friend just forgot to mention that little piece of information
We think we know our classmates,
But did we know that some of our classmates are dating each other and that some of our classmates broke each other's hearts?
Do we know why they moved houses, or schools, or lunch groups?
... Some of us don't even know each other's names and some of us are referred to by names that are not ours.
If we knew our classmates, then maybe we wouldn't walk through the halls like were better than everyone else in our grade.
If we knew our classmates, then maybe we would not have talked about how gay people are disgusting and how mental illness isn't real and how "that girl is just so aggravating I wish she'd stop bothering me."
Do you know why we stay up all night studying for a subject that we probably won't ever use again?
Or why some of us wake up in the middle of the night dripping with cold sweat, reliving memories that we'd give anything to forget.
Look around the room, look around these halls, look at all these people who look at us every day.
These are our classmates; do you know them?