Let’s state the obvious: no matter how many motivational speakers you listen to or how many Red Ribbon weeks the school holds, people are going to do drugs and drink alcohol. I hate to be blunt about it, but honestly, it’s an issue.

I don’t care if people want to drink alcohol or do drugs. I don’t care where they rank their priorities or what they spend their time doing; it’s their life. I could not care less if people choose to get wasted or high on Friday nights, because it doesn’t affect me.

The problem lies in the aftermath. Not when people are trying to sober up, but after that: the following week when they come to school. If I’m not smelling smoke on the clothes of the person walking in front of me, I’m hearing a group of people talk about their eventful weekend with their friends.

I understand that getting drunk or high serves as some people’s escape from their problems in the real world (though I can’t say I know the feeling), and who am I to judge how people cope with their issues? But still, bragging and boasting about these activities doesn’t make you cool. There’s a time and place for everything, and the school parking lot is not one of them. Besides, don’t people realize their teachers (and the drug dogs) can smell any traces of smoke, alcohol breath, or drugs on them?

The bottom line: nothing that an adult influence says will change how curious high schoolers are to experiment with alcohol and drugs. However people may choose to use (or abuse) these vices is fine with me as long as they can keep if out of the places where people like me come to learn. Regardless of the exception that some seniors are at the legal age to smoke, I still don’t want to be around that.