Last Sunday, I took a break from my homework and enjoyed an installment of the weekly Sunday Movie Series in Kemper. The movie, titled “The Unbelievable Truth,” asked two questions all Andover students want answered: is there life after high school? If so, what will it be like?

Shortly after the movie begins, the lead character Audry learns that she’s been accepted to Harvard. For most high school students, this would be a moment of “pinch me, I must be dreaming.” Not so for Audry. It’s 1988. Reagan is president. But Audry mourns America. She fears a nuclear war is about to end history. She thinks everything is hopeless. She is simply too apathetic to be excited about Harvard.

History is changing for Audry, but not in the way she thinks. Nuclear war isn’t imminent. But the end of childhood is rapidly approaching for her, just as it is getting closer for us every day. Whether we are Seniors like Audrt suffering from senioritis or freshmen just beginning our Andover careers, our childhoods will terminate abruptly. We will all understand Audry’s anxiety only too well before we graduate.

Like Audry, we face the future with nervous uncertainty. Except for Seniors recently graced with early acceptances, the college admission process is a riddle wrapped inside an enigma for most of us. We’re not sure what college we should attend. We don’t know what college we will attend. Should we enter the lottery otherwise known as the admission process to the Ivy League and hope for the best? Or should we, like Audry, search for green pastures elsewhere?

And what should we do when we get to college in these tough economic times? Should we turn our education into a commodity by following a pre-professional course of study in college so that we can become doctors, engineers or investment bankers? Or should we regard education as good in and of itself and major in subjects we love, even if that decision means saddling ourselves with a student loan debt that we may struggle to repay if we join the ranks of the underemployed or unemployed after we graduate from college?

The movie does not solve these problems. But it does suggest where we may find our answers. As the movie ends, Audry and her boyfriend embark on a trip to discover the world. Audry stops and asks, “Did you hear that?” as she seemingly strains to detect the sound of a nuclear bomb exploding, but there isn’t a mushroom cloud in sight. And the only explosion is the silent one of her childhood ending. There will be life for Audry after high school. She will discover it on the open road.

I doubt our graduation from Andover will be so eventful. Most of us have already left home to go away to school. And each of us experiences college-like academic demands every day. So, hopefully the transition to life after high school will be less traumatic for us than it was for Audry. However, when the rubber does eventually meet the road, none of us will know our ultimate destination. Like Audry, we will have to navigate our own path, as we move along the journey of our life.

Eric Meyers is a new Upper from Miami, FL.