I used to believe life got better as you got older, but now I realize this is untrue. I could mention to them that high school mediocrity is no impediment to leading a happy life. I was an extraordinarily mediocre student. I did not graduate in the top third of my high school class. I submitted nine pieces to my high school literary magazine during the course of my years there and they were all rightly rejected. But I don’t think this message would go over well with the current faculty, or with the younger brothers and sisters in the audience—or at least their parents.

David Brooks, in David Brooks and Gail Collins, “Advice for High School Graduates”