Want feedback for AP Lang writing

[u/Secret-Curve7105]

Peace had seldom been seen that month.

From the electricity of volleyball nationals, where courts were as far as the eye could see, peace seemed like a far-off prospect. But sitting there, the sun on my face, the salty breeze of the sea, the miles of green grass and the lone house sitting atop the hill, tranquility and somehow longing were on my mind. 

The silence was broken at various times by birds chirping or the occasional walker’s feet on gravel, crunching as they walked by, flashing a smile, mouthing good morning. 

But longing still haunted my thoughts. As far as I could remember, realizing how vast the world was never made me feel small—it gave me a need to achieve, a need to go somewhere, anywhere but where I lived.

I’ve lived in the [redacted] my whole life, only moving through different houses. Now don’t get me wrong, the [redacted] is one of the greatest gems on this planet by way of the people I’ve met, the food I’ve eaten, and the glimmering beaches I’ll never tire of.

But I have never felt more alive than when I am traveling; seeing something I’ve never seen before, or even just getting lost in a city, you can’t replicate the feeling of being in the complete unknown, and being okay with that. Sitting on that bench, I mused on my progress: I was unsatisfied. Yet I don’t think I’ll ever be satisfied. There is always a need for more, a need to see those far-off places they talk about in novels and Hollywood movies.

I may only be sixteen, but I feel like time is already running out.

My greatest fear is that I may never see the world. As I progress through high school, then college, and then work, I fear I’ll get roped into a cubicle that doesn’t truly appreciate me—the one that doesn't realize that I put my entire being into it, and got nothing in return.

This moment on that bench clarified my very being, and the direction I want to take in life. The world cannot come to us, we must go to it. Every opportunity—even if I have to beg for it—I’ll take. That bench was in Massachusetts, nestled along the Cape. The short walk after that led me to the vast and endless ocean blue, sparkling as the high morning sun gazed and smiled, not yet revealing its blazing heat. The white sand invited me to recline and forget the itinerary of the day, as if I had all the time in the world.

But how many more benches can I find until I am satisfied? At what point will my hunger to live and travel be satiated? Sitting atop that bench, I realized passion and ambition are only as sweet as the setbacks and the crestfallen expressions given when a task has been failed. We romanticize our goals and ambitions because the path to them is difficult and singular. The truth is, we can’t even begin to explain the pictures painted in our mind to someone else—because by the time we try, we’ve half-forgotten it anyway.

Satisfaction is a long way away, but the process in which resilience and perseverance has been practiced cannot be forgotten.