My Freshman Year — The Fresno High Owlet Online

My Freshman Year was during the 2022-2023 school year. I was 14 at the beginning of Freshman Year.

My original schedule my freshman year was going to be 1st period Spanish native Speakers II, 2nd period Geometry, 3rd period Biology, 4th period English, 5th period Art I, and 6th period PE.

But the week before school had started, I decided “You know what I should do JROTC because I want to work out more”. So, the best decision of my life was made at that moment. I emailed my counselor and asked her if she could please switch me to JROTC.

Due to getting switched to JROTC I now had Geometry 6th period and JROTC 2nd period.

I honestly don’t remember the first day of school but what I do remember is that in every single class that day I sat next to people that I at least was acquaintances with. I had either known them from middle school or from elementary school.

Throughout the year a lot happened that has affected who I am today, I look back and think of it as a butterfly effect.

First, I made friends with people I still talk with 3 years later. I’m going to list a few people; my main two friends are Josue Cortez who I met through JROTC and Sofia Erese who I met through my Geometry class (Like I said butterfly effect). When I first met Josue, it was the first day of school and he came up to me in the JROTC classroom and was like “hey I know you”, and it was just really awkward cause I had no idea who this guy was (I later figured out we went to the same elementary school). When I first met Sofia, it was like a week after school had started and we were in new assigned groups by the teacher, Mr. Dunn, and I don’t remember too much to be honest, but we connected because I helped her with her math work, and we became friends that way.

Another friend that I also met my freshman year is Christopher Zuniga, he was someone I was acquaintances within middle school, so I sat with him in my English and Biology class.

In complete honesty I wasted most of my freshman year doing absolutely nothing and I regret it now.

Let’s see… The classes I hated the most my freshman year were biology and Spanish (no offense to them), I hated biology due to the number of projects we had, and the teacher didn’t really teach us anything she just kind of said read this and that and do this. And Spanish I don’t know it was just REALLY boring; it wasn’t too hard though.

In my English class my teacher was Mr. Vinuela, and he was really cool, and I liked the way he taught, he had like an I don’t care mindset, but he taught in a way that teenagers would understand and interpret the stuff without getting bored.

My Art teacher was the best, I think I had the most fun in his class, I sat in a group with a whole bunch of thugs (not really), which I later became friends with all of them. But in his class obviously it was art, which was fun since as long as you tried, and it looked alright you would pass. The group I was in would just goof around and make jokes while doing work, it was a win-win.

But the main thing that happened during my freshman year was that I went to my first winter formal at Fresno High School in January, and my experience was bad. So originally, I was going to go with Josue, but he bailed on me last minute because it was his mother’s birthday, and he couldn’t go. So brilliant me decided that I should just go by myself and see how it goes.

Let’s just say for like the first 30 minutes I was standing in a corner… (I cringe to this day thinking about this)

Thankfully, I had gone to a few wrestling practices at Fresno High School because one of my friends was in it, and one of the Juniors that was in wrestling at the time saw me and invited me to come sit with him and his friends and have a good time with them. So, I did and thank God I did because I don’t know what I would’ve done without him. The Formal was more enjoyable, but I didn’t dance too much and sat for the majority of the time. When the formal was over, I saw Sofia on my way out and we said hi and bye because I still hadn’t known her for that long and it was just awkward.

Another big event that I did that year was for JROTC. We had an opportunity to go to camp for JROTC and I did that. We had to wake up early in the morning and work out for a week straight at like 6am to 7am to even be able to go. That was super fun for me because the whole point of me joining was to work out more.

So, in mid-April I went to Fort Hunter Ligett, Josue also went with me. It was fun, THE FOOD WAS SOO GOOD, it was mind blowing, the chocolate milk there was the best. I went belaying, but down a wall. I think the wall was like 100 feet tall, it was adrenaline inducing because you feel like you were going to fall but you don’t.

The last main event that occurred my freshman year was that I decided to join the Fresno High Water Polo team. I really loved swimming since I was younger, and the coach of the team was Mr. Vinuela. Again, a win-win, one day in class he mentioned that they were going to start summer practices the following week and invited the boys in his class to go and try it out, most people didn’t want to even try it out. In the end, me and Chris were the only two that went, and we went because we were both going to go together and it wouldn’t be as nerve-racking. I really enjoyed it, so I stayed in Water Polo and I’m currently still doing it.

My Freshman Year was a lot, but my sophomore year is a lot more than this.