Being a second semester senior in BBYO is genuinely something that has been creeping up on me since I joined. This period of time has a stigma, it’s when people don’t really “care” about their chapter anymore, and burn out. I like to think I haven’t burnt out yet. When I first joined BBYO and started to figure everything out, I made a bucket list for things I had wanted to accomplish before I became “old and irrelevant” in BBYO.
I made this list because I wanted to see how much I could do with the time I had. I joined December 7, 2016, so my three year anniversary with BBYO was just a little while ago. Honestly, when I first made this list three years ago, I didn’t think I’d accomplish most of these things. To write this article, I had to find this list in the depths of my computer and retype it because it looked all warped with bad handwriting. However, looking at what I wrote, I was pleasantly surprised with myself and how much I had accomplished during my years in BBYO.\
When I first wrote the list, it was not organized in any way. When I updated and went through the list I broke it down into sections. These were things I have done once (highlighted in yellow), something I have done more than once (highlighted in green), and things I have not done (not highlighted). An example of a situation that would be highlighted yellow would be “Become a chapter/regional/international inductee” since that’s something that only happens once in a BBYO lifetime. A green bucket list item would be “Go to a convention,” which I have done plenty of times by now. Something that is not highlighted is something I was not able to accomplish.
An example of this is going to CLTC. The summer I that I wanted to go to CLTC, I was going on a college program and going to sleepaway camp. There was simply no time to go on CLTC.
One of my favorite yellow-highlighted items was going to ILTC at Perlman this summer. Those three weeks I spent there, becoming an international inductee, a bat mitzvah, and a better leader truly will be one of my favorite memories of BBYO. It showed me what it means to be a leader in my chapter, region, and in the order. I enjoyed making friends with people from all over and forming connections that have already proven to help lead my chapter and region.
Jessie Budin is a BBG from Acharit BBG #2543 in Gold Coast Region #51 and she had her Bat Mitzvah at Perlman Camp.
All views expressed on content written for The Shofar represent the opinions and thoughts of the individual authors. The author biography represents the author at the time in which they were in BBYO.
