Ladies and gentlemen of the class of 2002: Eat Ramen.

If I could offer you only one tip for the future, Ramen would be it. The long-term benefits of Ramen have been proved by scientists, whereas the rest of my advice has no basis more reliable than my own meandering Govie experience. I will dispense this advice now.

Enjoy the ease and fun of your Junior year. Oh, never mind. You will not understand the ease and fun of your Junior year until you're an over-worked Senior. But trust me, in 2 years, you'll look back at photos of yourself and recall in a way you can't grasp now how much work lay before you and how strange you really looked.

You are as psychotic as you imagine.

Worry about college (and that paper that's due tomorrow that you haven't written and that English test tomorrow). And know that worrying is as effective as trying to solve a differential equation by scromping. The real troubles in your life are apt to be assignments that never crossed your worried mind, the kind that blindside you at 4 pm on some idle Tuesday, an hour after they were due.

Do one thing every day that scares you (i.e. attend class).

Scream.

Learn to dislike Hartsvillians (even if you are one). Don't put up with people who like Hartsvillians.

Scromp.

Don't waste your time on Life and Leisure. Sometimes you're passing, sometimes you're failing. The race is long and, in the end, it's only with yourself.

Remember A's you receive. Forget PreQUEST. If you succeed in doing this, tell me how.

Keep your old Big Sib letters. Throw away the old pizza that has been in your refrigerator for months.

Complain.

Don't feel guilty if you don't know the four points of Polk. The most interesting people I know didn't know at 22 what the four points of Polk were. Some of the most interesting 40-year-olds I know still don't.

Get plenty of rest (yeah, right).

Be kind to your books. You'll pay for them when they're gone.

Maybe you'll marry a Govie, maybe you won't. Maybe you'll have Govie children, maybe you won't. Maybe you'll buy porn and cigarettes when you're 18, maybe you'll dance the funky chicken at your 75th reunion. Whatever you do, don't congratulate yourself too much, or berate yourself either.

You owe everything to the Governor's School. So does everybody else. They own you.

Enjoy your common room. Use it every way you can. Don't be afraid of it or of what other people think of it. It's the greatest room you'll ever own.

Dance, even if you have nowhere to do it but in the Ass. room.

Read the English test directions, even if you don't follow them (Ms. Fields will fail you anyway). Do not read the Biology book, no matter how much Bhuvana tells you to. It will only make you feel confused.

E-mail your parents. You never know when they'll show up unannounced while you're participating in PDA.

Be nice to your Big Sibs. They're your best link to past tests and the people most likely to give you candy in the future.

Understand that $2.50 movies come and go, but the ones that suck remain in the theater for months.

Work hard at work service because the more your work service person likes you, the less you have to work.

Live on second floor once, but leave before it makes you too lazy to walk up stairs. Live on third floor once, but leave before it makes you naked.

Learn the Katie meaning of QUEST (Quality Uninterrupted Enforced Scromp Time).

Accept certain inalienable truths: You will get sick during crunch weeks. Work will always pile up. You, too, will get stressed. And when you do, you'll fantasize that at your old school you went to bed at a reasonable hour and you never had to study.

Respect the little Macs in the computer lab.

Don't expect anyone else to do your work for you. Maybe you'll have lots of old tests to study. Maybe you'll have a smart roommate. But you never know when either one might run out.

Dye your hair several times or by the time you go home, your parents will still recognize you.

Be careful what CD's you buy. Remember, Govies have CD burners and Napster. Record stores are a form of nostalgia. Going to a record store is a way of finding out what music you want, finding someone at school with that CD or mp3, asking them to burn the CD for you and enjoying it for less than it's worth.

But trust me on the Ramen.

Reproduced and Goviefied without permission by Copyright 2000.

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