Hello! Nice to meet you. I’m Vivek. I see you in class meeting every week, and I wanted to know your name.

Pretty random, I know. Please, don’t get the wrong idea. You see, I’m on a quest to meet everyone in the senior class. Why? Long story.

I joined Harker in 9th grade, and it seemed like everybody knew everybody else. The community was a giant jigsaw puzzle, and I had to choose the right spot to fit myself into. I found a circle of friends to spend my time with and was satisfied – but slowly, the circle turned into a bubble. Beyond the initial spate of introductions and satisfied with my social life, I stopped trying to meet new people.

During the homecoming rally of my sophomore year, I looked through the sea of drowsy, glazed-over eyes and hunched shoulders, meeting the gaze of countless strangers whose names I did not know. A year into high school, I still felt like “the new kid.” That had to stop, and so I decided to simply get to know everybody.

Don’t worry — I don’t keep a hit-list or plaster the walls of my room with the portraits of my next “targets.” I know, however, that there are clusters of people to whom I still have to introduce myself to, such as the entire Performing Arts department. An imperfect memory doesn’t help either — I can remember names as well as I can stomach Snickers (I’m allergic to them).

I imagine that one day, decades from now, I’ll encounter somebody from this class by pure coincidence – maybe at work, or at a bus stop when the bus is running 20 minutes late or at a swanky New York masquerade ball. And I worry that despite having spent four years of our lives studying in the same classrooms, working with the same teachers, and hanging out with friends common to both of us, neither of us will have anything to say to each other. I don’t want that to happen. In fact, I’m making sure that it won’t.

Maybe that person is you. So it’s been nice talking! I’m sure we’ll see each other around somewhere. Who knows when our paths will cross again?

In this repeating guest column, we encourage all student writers from around the community to share their memorable experiences while at the Upper School.  Please email all column ideas to [email protected].

This piece was originally published in the pages of the Winged Post on August 31, 2015.