Theodore Roosevelt once said, “a man who has never gone to school may steal from a freight car; but if he has a collage education he may steal the whole rail road. ” Even though we have a while to get a collage education, we’ve made it here, to the end of 8th grade. Just like a rail road the train has to be set on a good track, just like our education. So far for this 8th grade class our tracks have been fantastic ever since we first started our journey.

Our first stop was at kindergarten, where we thought school was just a place your parents dropped you off to get you out of their hair; which, I still believe. We weren’t informed that every year the school work got harder, that there where no more letters to color in, or numbers you could count on our fingers, or even that some of the teachers got meaner, but through all of that we came along the best nail in the track, which is best friends.

In elementary school you counted someone as your friend if you shared crayons with them, but now we share secrets, but who knows we still share crayons to throw at each other. We may not have grown up in the inside but on the outside we have. Just like the other day I gave a pair of my old boots that didn’t fit me no more to my dad. My mom said that it use to be the other way around, I use to put dads boots on and stomp around saying I was dad. Then I realized, I remembered that, it seemed like just yesterday. That the years have flown by.

That it was just like yesterday when I was in fifth grade sitting next to Maddie thinking we were so cool we could remember the whole lyrics to the newest song, or wishing we where like the older kids, and joining sports. Or third grade with Caroline and having a crush on someone was the biggest deal. Or even first grade with Morgan and if you did something wrong in the class and you had to flip your card to different colors, and some of us got upset when we missed recess or the little prize at the end of the day.

Elementary school we don’t remember what we learned, we just remember the people we hung out with or field trips we went on, but when it was time for middle school we started growing into who we really where, we started wearing the newest clothes, not shirts with the Disney princesses, or hot wheels. Its when you had to start working for your grades. Its when we meet kids from the other elementary schools, whish started new friendships to form.

I’ve noticed that this class of 8th graders have been close, sort of like a family, and yes there’s always that one in the family that’s trouble maker but they still fit in. most of us took an effort to know everyone, and not let someone be caboose on the train. Of course, were not old enough to have too much memories but we’ve had a lot and the track we had to take to get here, I would not trade for anything. When I was writing this speech I thought of the song “Don’t blink” by Kenny Chesney, because I was thinking of memories I had leading up to this year and it seemed like it wasn’t that long ago.

If you’ve ever watched a train they go pretty fast, you see a freight car with graffiti wrote on it then you see a different freight car, and you just remember the one you saw before with the graffiti, and before you know the train’s passed, unless you get behind that one train that causes traffic jams; but however, my point is its like Kenny Chesney says don’t blink just like that you’re six years old and you take a nap and you wake up and your life’s passed by.

It makes me think, even though were not old enough that we’ve made that big of changes to our life, but that we should want to look back when we’re older and be proud of what we see like I do now, that I am proud to be in the class with all of you, but how do we make sure we will like what we see? How do we know we’ll be the person with enough money to buy the rail road? We need to remember how proud you where when you won that spelling bee, or won that first football game, or even the friends you made when your where young. You need to encourage your self to be who you want to be a day at a time, and to remember the good ole days.