With the first week of school out of the way, is it official that school is back in “sesh”?

Oddly enough, for myself, that initial week of school felt like anything but the first week back to school.

Sure, we all went through the tedious introduction of different syllabi and classmates; however, there was something different about stepping back on campus and returning to our daily school lives. It felt all-too-natural this year.

As I wondered throughout the week, what could possibly be the cause for my lack of usual anxiety, multiple reasons emerged.

Maybe it was simply the fact that summer has literally become shorter. Or I had just enjoyed summer all too well, that it went by in the blink of an eye.

Perhaps it was a mix of all of those reasons, but I didn’t feel satisfied with those answers. This summer had felt just the same as all my past summers, so why did it feel so oddly normal to return to school?

As the week wound down to its end, it hit me that school was officially returning to a complete, normal state. The worry that seemed to follow the years before, post-social-distancing, had entirely vanished.

The adjustments and precautions made to accompany the virus were no longer a relative memory, but a distant past.

I believe it took these past three years, post-COVID, to completely return to where we are now. This new era was really the main contributing factor to this feeling.

Instead of feeling that usual nervousness that prefaces the daunting “first day of school,” I slept quite soundly that night before school.

Although it feels somewhat strange, being so accustomed to school and its predictability, it also feels almost comforting. The school environment this year is filled with a sort of calmness.

It’s safe to say, I can walk with ease — within six feet of my friends as well).