Senior offers a few parting words for Notre Dame

Only 11 more days of my high school career left! Boy, where has time gone?

It seems like only yesterday I was sitting down writing my "last first day of school" column. Now I am registering for college classes, mailing out graduation announcements and preparing to say goodbye to everyone and everything that I have become so close to.

The realization that the end is near is a bittersweet feeling. I have to close this chapter in my life in order to start a new, more exciting one.

Closing a chapter in your life can never be easy. Saying goodbye to all my friends and family seems to be one of the hardest things I have ever done. My friends and I avoid the topic of graduating and moving on like the bubonic plague.

Maybe if we don't talk about it, it won't happen.

Leaving Notre Dame will also be hard. I have become so used to the familiar faces that I pass in the hallways. I have become comfortable with my teachers and the faculty there. I have a sense of ease every time I walk through the front doors of this building. I know that inside I will be safe from the mean, cruel, outside world.

This school was a wonderful place that has prepared me for life outside it. And for that, I need to say thank you.

Thank you to all my classmates for the memories they have formed with me.

Thank you to all my coaches for pushing me and guiding me in the athletic world. Without you making me wake up early to come lift weights, or making me stay after practice to shoot or run, I would not be as strong and ready for collegiate athletics as I am.

I need to thank all my teachers. Besides the education they imparted to me, they also taught me how to stay focused and only accept the best. Thank you for never giving up on me and always helping me when I needed it.

Thank you to my guidance counselors, who have helped me get into a good college and led me in the right direction when I was facing life's problems.

And I must say thank you to my principal. He has asked me almost weekly when I was going to write a column about how wonderful he was. And I kept assuring him that it was coming. But now that I am actually sitting here trying to write it, I realize how difficult it is to sum up everything he does in one column. He puts everyone above himself. Even when struggling with heart problems, it amazed me how concerned he was with his students. I owe him so much, and I am so grateful for all he does.

Instead of saying goodbye, I have found that it's much easier to say thank you. But as my final moments with all these people quickly slip away, I realize goodbyes are closer then they ever have been.

Amber Karnes is a senior at Notre Dame Regional High School.