Oh, Libertyville High School. As four years come to a close, I reminisce about all the things that I’ll be missing as I make my exit. The sound of my alarm blaring in my ear at 5:45 a.m., my classmates and their incessant gossip, class Facebook page debates, and more than anything, my backpack.

My backpack and I have been together since I was dropped off at the front entrance of the school in August of 2012. At this point in its life, the fabric on the shoulder straps is withering away after being hoisted onto my back countless times for the past four years. Two zippers now fail to close completely, and god only knows what’s been trapped in the front compartment since freshman year. I’ll miss everything about it, especially its weight.

Somehow, my backpack has only gotten heavier over the years. Or at least, it seems like it. Probably full of all the knowledge I’ve gained. I’d like to say I never suffered from Freshman Backpack Syndrome, or schooliosis as I’d call it, but I’m sure past grads who saw me in the halls would say otherwise.

You can picture it, right? A hundred pounds of anxiety and academic frustration, weaving through the hallways to reach the next class — and that’s just the backpack. The student attached is scampering while trying to balance the equivalent of a human body on their back.

Don’t get me wrong. I’m all for academics. We come to class, we listen to the teachers, and we take home assignments that further enforce what we learn. But do we need to be exhausting the printers of LHS with all this extra paper? Do we need to be exhausting our bodies by shoveling in more and more worksheets and packets and syllabi? If only there were some way we could take all of this information and digitalize it. Instead of adding all this weight with paper that only stacks upon itself after time, we could be putting all of our work into something portable. A computer? Wait. We have those now!

At the beginning of the year, we were all gifted with our beloved Chromebooks. You heard every teacher reassure you, “your backpack will definitely be lighter now! Less paper.” Unfortunately, the Chromebooks have only added weight along with paper. Paper that explains how to be implementing your Chromebook into assignments. “Here’s a sheet explaining how you should be using your computer for an electronic assignment.” Ironic?

After a few months of Crossfit, I have successfully worked my way up to benching half of what my backpack weighs. Something most of the strongest people in my class probably can’t even do without their arms going to jelly. Benching the full weight is unthinkable… something the pros probably can’t even imagine. Although I’ve noticed some intense shoulder pain since I arrived at LHS, it can only be from getting older, I suppose.

I actually found a workout online called the “heavy backpack challenge.” The task is to add a little bit of weight every so often. Stress, responsibility, and of course schoolwork, textbooks, and binders add up, and thus, you have enough weight to make it difficult to carry it around. Eventually, you’ll probably get so tired of carrying it around that you start ditching some of it just to give yourself a break. Kind of sounds like high school, doesn’t it?

Schooliosis affects us all. Freshman to senior, athlete to actor, and every student in between. The next time you hoist your backpack up to walk to class, think about it this way: we can save trees. We can save space. And we can save our spines. If we just lighten up on our backs.