As I sit and reflect upon the past four years of high school, I am overwhelmed with emotion. Don’t get me wrong, I am so grateful for all that Enloe has provided me, but it has also brought a lot of stress and pressure into my life. The past few months have been stressful to the say the least, and I’ve found myself focused on the following things: Charity Ball, school, and college applications.
While filling out my most recent application, I stumbled across a prompt that set itself apart from the rest. It went something like this: Ernie Johnson defines blackberry moments as “the sweet moments that are right there to be had but we’re just too focused on what we’re doing …that we neglect them.” Tell us about one of your “blackberry moments” from the past five years.
This prompt was different from the other open-ended questions that seemed to be typical of supplemental essays––it made me think, remember what I value in life, and reflect on things I wish I had done differently. As I did so, my mind flooded with memories from last year’s Charity Ball and my experiences at the Oak City Outreach Center (OCOC). Last year, I found myself in the all too familiar situation of getting too focused on raising a lot of money, making a big impact, and taking on more responsibilities that I somewhat lost sight of the beauty of Charity Ball. As I reflected, I realized that I had quite a few blackberry moments, and now I wish I had put more value in the interactions I had with the people I met rather than becoming so focused on the logistics of it all.
Sure, the money in the end is great (it’s hard to argue that!) But in hindsight, it’s about the people you meet while serving hot chocolate in 30 degree weather on a Saturday morning, learning that you aren’t very good at the game Spot It! while playing with Suzanne at IGNITE, and hearing Mrs. Schroeder talk about rainbows and unicorns for the hundredth time. Charity Ball is a movement, a fluid work in progress. We’ve had our hiccups, but it’s about the 80 high schoolers coming together because of the passion we have for what we do that makes me so proud to be a student at Enloe and serve on Student Council. Though I have some things I wish I had done differently, I embrace these blackberry moments, and continue to grow through them.
As I await college decisions and try to decide what I want to do with the next chapter of my life, the uncertainty kills me. But though my time at Enloe is running out and I realize that I won’t be around next year, this sense of security and a plan that lies within my superficial fear of the unknown is a privilege. People often take this for granted, failing to realize that many don’t have this same path to fall back on. I am inspired by the work that the IGNITE program and the Autism Society of North Carolina do to provide support for the deserving individuals in our community so that they are given this same sense of security and reassurance. As the year unfolds and through whatever I end up doing, I am proud to understand the impact that Charity Ball has and will continue to have in the lives of others.
Hadley Brugh
Executive Publicity Officer