So whenever I see posts about teens and young adults complaining about how much they hate school, there's always that one "out in the real world" grown adult that says "you ignorant child, school is the best/easiest part of life," or something to that extent. Now I get where they're coming from. Those adults are saying "you don't have to worry about rent/mortgage, utilities, car payment, groceries, and other responsibilities of living on your own; or to a much lesser extent." While that is true, me thinks you're forgetting an even better time in your life. You see, those school kids don't want to live in the real world, they want to live in a much easier time; summer vacation.

Now I'm a college student, full time. I haven't had to live on my own work, yet. But I've had experiences, and I'm young enough to remember the fun times. So all you "grown adults," listen up, because I'm going to remind you of the magical time of summer vacation, and remind you that while school doesn't suck AS MUCH as the real world, it still sucks pretty hard.

So, what is "the Real World?" Aside from a stupid reality show on MTV, it is the world of working 40+ hours a week to make money to provide for yourself. To provide for oneself, this is what's required from my observation:

• transportation to and from work
• food for sustaining life
• shelter in the form of a house or apartment
• electricity and water
• taxes
• a connection to the outside world
• and a job of some kind to pay for all of this.

Now while these are annoying realities of the Real World, allow me to remind you what school was like.

High school

• forced to sit in a room all day and have some adult lecture you about things you don't care about
• spend half the evening doing homework on the material from that day that you don't care about
• spend the other half of the evening doing activities to help get you into college
• wake-up at a time you are not biologically wired to be awake at
• navigate all the social hierarchy of high school
• optional bullying
• spend your weekends doing homework and projects
• and not get paid for any of the work you do

College

• for 3-5 hours a day, sit in a room with 100 people listening to an expert lecture you on abstract things for an hour at a time
• rush from building to building to get to your next class
• spend 6-8 hours a day working on homework from the lecture, and you don't really understand it
• spend your weekends doing homework/projects or working to pay for college expenses
• worry about scheduling for the next semester
• worry about tests and projects that determine if you wasted your time and money
• and pay big money to do all of this, sometimes burying yourself in major debt.

School ain't all fun and games grown adults. Want to remember what is all fun and games? Summer vacation. This is what summer vacation is all about:

• wake up whenever you want
• see whatever friends you want to see
• do whatever you want to do
• waste time, have fun
• don't worry about anything
• have no commitments
• relax, there is no stress
• no homework, no tests, no bills, no responsibilities.
• there is no free labor, or paying labor.
• if you chose to get a paid job, that money goes to whatever you want

School is NOT easy. It might be easier than the real world, but it is not objectively easy. Real life is hard mode, school is medium/normal mode, but summer vacation is the real easy mode. The real world may be a lot of work, but school also has a fair amount of work. Summer vacation is the only time where there is no work. So the next time you see a young person complain about school, don't tell them "it's the easiest/best part of life," because that's a lie. They don't want to go to the real world, they want to go to summer vacation. "The Summer of 69" is a song about how summer vacation was the best time of his life, and why it is. He's been through real life and school, and realizes that what he gets really nostalgic for is summer. No, school is not the easiest part of life, summer vacation is the easiest part of life.

Well, this has been Pokematic, signing off, and bu-bye.