SOUTH LAKE TAHOE, CALIFORNIA

This is the way the world ends--not with a bang but a high school diploma. If you went to South Tahoe High School, in South Lake Tahoe, Calif., you grew up in a place so beautiful, placid and secure that you can make the extraordinary statement of Cinnamon Roach, Class of '97: "I've never known conflict." It can't be easy to put a place like that behind you, but something tells you, "Go, girl."

As it turns out, you don't have to grow up in a postcard place these days to feel agreeable about the world as you find it. In a TIME/CNN survey of graduating seniors in 13 high schools along Highway 50, very few of them sounded like Marilyn Manson (rock bogeyman). A few of them sounded like the Brady Bunch (holy innocents). A lot of them reminded us of Lisa Simpson (cartoon goddess--aware of life's shadows, inclined to make for the light). Three-fourths hold the sobering belief that we are pulling apart as a nation rather than coming together. But 81% said this is a good time to be starting out in life. Even more, 86%, thought their education had prepared them well for life after high school. They like their parents; they like their teachers. To misquote Sally Field, they like things; they really like things.

Dig a little deeper and you discover the great contradiction of a teenage satisfaction: it's unsatisfied. Over and again the kids will tell you: home--you gotta love it and leave it. Only 49% thought the towns they live in are excellent or good at providing opportunities for young people. Since 64% of the seniors think that living in a place with good job opportunities is more important than having family nearby, 68% say they would like to settle someplace else. But if good launches make for happy landings, we should, on the whole, be encouraged. Any day now, Highway 50 will be filling with these young people, en route to the rest of their lives.