the herd

When I got to the outer edges of Westfield High School today, I couldn't believe my eyes.
Rows and rows of cars cramming and raring to drive into the parking lot of the testing grounds. Traffic like I've never seen before. I would like the traffic of SAT morning to Friday night football games. Actually, the former might even be crazier than the latter.

It was my first time ever taking any form of the SAT. Well, this was the SAT II for World History that I was taking. It went alright, I suppose. Not exceptionally hard, but not easy either. But I'd say the AP World History exam was harder. Anyway, I was pleasantly surprised today when I saw that two classmates of mine from CHS were in the same classroom as I. You see, the school (Westfield) I went to for testing today isn't my home school. (The slots were filled for my home school by the time I registered).

The designated time to arrive by was supposedly 7:45. I got there by 7:45 but the traffic was so bad that I was a few minutes late. By the time I managed to literally get my foot/body in the door, I was met with another traffic jam.

A HERD of students were swarming every which way of the hallways. I had never seen such pandemonium and felt this sort of effervescence in a school setting. Plus, it was so early in the morning...

When I was first making my way through the hallways, I was hailed by one of my best friends (Kathy) with a "Hey!" as I meandered my way along a snaking line of students. I gave her a fleeting greeting and hurried on to the cafeteria where they supposedly give you a sheet that tells you who your instructor is/your classroom number. That doesn't really help when they don't provide you with a map and nobody knows where the fuck R116 is.

Anyway.

While I was getting that sheet I was just speaking of, a classmate of mine (very distant--I hadn't talked to him since 8th grade, probably) noticed me and decided to tag along with me to find our classrooms, since his was R119 (only 3 away from mine). It made me less nervous, considering there were probably hundreds (no kidding) of unfamiliar faces swarming all around. Somehow we managed to find our respective classrooms. We didn't say goodbye. I don't even know why I'm even mentioning this bit at all. But anyway.

I arrive in the classroom, find my respective desk, and sit down. It takes about ten minutes for the classroom to fill in. The atmosphere is eerily quiet for a classroom. Finally, the girl who sits in front of me, who seemed very peppy (she smiles big--and very often, too) and outgoing broke the ice in the classroom by exclaiming out loud, "Has anyone taken the SAT II for Math 2 before?" and suddenly people just started talking. Diagonal from me to the left was a junior I knew from 9th grade, when I was still in Orchestra. Nice company. And to the far left of the classroom (the opposite side of where I was sitting) was someone from my English class this year.

Yay. I didn't feel as anonymous and bored knowing I knew people.

The SAT II itself was okay.

Keeping awake was probably harder than the test itself, actually.

And throughout the whole day, I've been feeling rather nauseous and my head hurts. Probably because I've barely rested since this morning's "intense" testing. And I'm dehydrated.