For the ephoebus senioritis, better known as the high school senior, the first three months of the second semester are tremendously distressful. 

The senior must deal with the natural stress inducing agents: homework, group projects, assassins targets, and all while dealing with the predisposition to do anything besides binge watch “It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia.” 

But for the senior, the worst experience will be, without a doubt, rejection from colleges. 

Rejection is sent directly to the senior’s mailbox in a nicely wrapped package that reads, “Congratulations, you’re a disappointment.”

From here, the senior will experience five stages of intense emotional response.

The first stage is denial. They look for signs that their fancy letter of disapproval was feigned. They check their own mailbox once again. Finding nothing of note, they will break into their neighbors’ mailboxes, looking for acceptance letters addressed to them. 

They consider vivisection on the neighborhood dog who is  infamous for dumpster diving, but they will settle upon laxatives.

But at the end of the day, they will realize that this is indeed the truth: they have been rejected from their dream school. They are indeed a disappointment. 

The senior then enters the second stage of intense emotional response: anger. 

They do not wish to take responsibility for their own actions, so they will blame the people around them. 

They blame the teachers they had junior year for giving them a dreadful GPA. They blame that one proctor of that one SAT test for distracting them all throughout the test with his petrifying death glare.   

Enraged, the senior will pledge to sacrifice their first born to Baphomet, so those responsible for their rejection suffer. 

The senior makes a swift transition into the third stage of emotional response: bargaining. 

If they wish to tempt fate, they will have to acquire currency to bribe colleges.

The senior will proceed to do anything for money. They will work odd jobs like 3 a.m. shifts at McDonald’s or playing Wonderwall on the guitar in the streets of San Francisco while selling fresh baking soda and homemade brownies they got from that one guy in a dark alley.

After people refuse to buy their organic goods, the senior gives up. All hope is lost. The light, dim as it may have been, has been extinguished like an insignificant birthday candle. Not even the fancy candles in the shape of a number, just a regular candle. 

After moping around for a couple more days, the senior finally reaches the last stage of intense emotional response: acceptance. 

Reazling the irony that rejection would end with acceptance, the senior recognizes that there are plenty of other fish in the sea.

Yes, the world is full of colleges. The senior realizes that eventually, hopefully, a college will take the senior under its wing and the tremendous distress will be blown away with the wind. 

Afterall, one school’s disappointing trash is another one’s mediocre bare minimum.

As the senior lounges away accepting his fate, he hears the postman come by. 

The senior notices that he has mail: another letter from another college. 

The senior enters denial once again.