The summer of 2025! It was one of my favorite summers of my life. 

I dormed at Cal State Long Beach, I reconnected with some of my old friends, and I even got a job as a receptionist at an eye doctor in Santa Monica. I approached these new occurrences that showed up at my door with an open mind and ears filled with music. 

The beginning of my summer was okay, nothing out of the ordinary. It included bed rotting, drowning in my thoughts about the chapter of my life that just ended, and a bit of Harry Styles. 

I cut my bangs wanting something different, thrifted clothes that overfilled my closet, and kind of discovered who I wanted to be. I was in my head these past months. I thought, “This is it.” 

This was the last summer before everything changed. I’m a bit dramatic, but so what?

Sometimes I got too far into my head and I wouldn’t come out of it. Questions left and right about colleges, scholarships, and essays overwhelmed me to the brim. It suffocated me thinking about these topics.

So to ease my way into what will be one of the biggest changes of my life, over the summer I attended a college ready program that helped me get my thoughts together. It was a once-in-a-lifetime type of thing. 

As I was ready to take over the world, I began by closing the door to my mom’s car and tripping over the ripped up Converses I’ve had since the eighth grade. That did not stop me from bumping into the door on my way in and confidently strutting toward my future. 

Ms. Grace and Ms. Jimenez were some of the most attentive teachers at the Upward Bound program. They helped me with the worries I had and introduced a whole new world about college applications and due dates to me. 

 I freaked out, to say the least. I am currently sixteen years old and worrying about grown up stuff? No way. 

Growing up was always scary to me. Leaving the nest and flying to whatever dream I could think of just because I could. This was my life and I could do whatever I wanted. So I started by putting my headphones on and muffling everything that stopped me from doing so. 

Music is very important to me. It is a form of expression. It lets you listen to words you wish you could have said in that dumb argument, or even feel cool jumping over fences late at night with your friends. 

Best Coast ran on and on during my summer beach days. This band kind of embodies what it feels like to be a 2014 twee teenage girl rummaging through the ups and downs of figuring out who she wants to be. 

Their 2010 album Crazy for You is an abundance of palm trees, the bright California sun and tides flowing between your mind. It was a collage of my days after work: picking up my sister and waiting until the sun set to hang out with friends at bonfires while wearing my favorite white thrifted 70s-style dress. 

   Fleeting Joys, on the other hand, followed me through long nights of worrying. This band found me at a hidden record store somewhere in the cracks of Downtown. When everything got too loud, I pushed play on “Kiss a Girl in Black” and let it eradicate all the thoughts.  

Being the one who decides your future gets overwhelming when you realize everything is up to you. I think I missed being a freshman, when the only things on my mind were hanging out with friends at the nearest shopping plaza and wondering if my presentation was colorful enough. 

High school is structured. When I dormed this summer and got a breeze of college, it was so freeing to be able to make my own schedule. It was awesome to share restrooms with my hall of other girls without raising my hand for permission to go. 

 I met some new friends this new school year, and some happened to be grades below mine. They asked me the questions I asked my friend Angel about his high school years. Now I had freshmen asking me what I could’ve done differently during mine. 

So I resorted to music I listened to back in the summer going into high school. While I got ready in the morning to take the bus to work, I turned on “Fool” by Cavetown and went about my day. 

The things I wished I was doing when I was younger were the things I was doing now. My life was changing, and I had no power to stop it, as I craved newer things. 

I made a playlist called “Kool” and added songs like “So Much for the Fourth Wall” by the Ladies, “Sorry” by Galaxie 500, and “Title Track” by Death Cab for Cutie when I felt like kicking rocks on the side of the pavement waiting for my mom to pick me up from work.

One Direction made its way in for a flick of nostalgia, and so did Tame Impala.

I often played this playlist, as I felt it kept me grounded. These songs were ones I listened to when I was changing mentally and physically. 

This summer I didn’t find a “Champagne Coast” or a “Tumblr Girls,” but instead I found myself. This was the summer before my life would change entirely, and I was ready for it.