I was reading the last chapters of Looking For Alibrandi again yesterday and came across this song. Apparently, people learn the truth at seventeen. I'm half way past it. Why am I still so ignorant about life?
I was in year nine or ten when I read the book for the first time. I remember thinking, why is it such a big deal? HSC is just HSC! Why would people commit suicide for it? Why would others need a support network just because of a set of exams? Why would anyone feel nervous at all?
I think I can relate to Josie a bit now. Her life and mine are slightly similar.
Seventeen - Janice Ian
I learned the truth at seventeen
That love was meant for beauty queens
And high school girls with clear skinned smiles
Who married young and then retired.
The valentines I never knew
The Friday night charades of youth
Were spent on one more beautiful
At seventeen I learned the truth.
And those of us with ravaged faces
Lacking in the social graces
Desperately remained at home
Inventing lovers on the phone
Who called to say come dance with me
and murmured vague obscenities
It isn't all it seems
At seventeen.
A brown eyed girl in hand me downs
Whose name I never could pronounce
said, Pity please the ones who serve
They only get what they deserve.
The rich relationed hometown queen
Married into what she needs
A guarantee of company
And haven for the elderly.
Remember those who win the game
Lose the love they sought to gain
Indebentures of quality
And dubious integrity.
Their small town eyes will gape at you
in dull surprise when payment due
Exceeds accounts received
At seventeen.
To those of us who know the pain
Of valentines that never came,
And those whose names were never called
When choosing sides for basketball.
It was long ago and far away
The world was younger than today
And dreams were all they gave for free
To ugly duckling girls like me.
We all play the game and when we dare
To cheat ourselves at solitaire
Inventing lovers on the phone
Repenting other lives unknown
That call and say, come dance with me
and murmur vague obscenities
At ugly girls like me
At seventeen.
Friday, October 31, 2008
Tuesday, October 28, 2008
My Updated, Upbeat Life
My final year of high school started out of nowhere about three weeks ago. I am still adjusting my eyes to the bright light at the end of the tunnel, which is something like Medicine in UNSW. And the lesser bright light next to it spells out M-E-D-I-C-I-N-E-,-U-W-S. If I can’t get their fast and qualified enough for the brighter one, I wouldn’t mind taking the second way out. The problem is that I might not get their in time for that one either. Quoting Scarlett, “I will think about that later.”
Year twelve is nothing like year eleven. The work is much harder, comes in bigger loads and has to be done faster. The worst part is – all of it counts towards determining how realistic my dream of successfully reaching the end of the tunnel is. If I screw up once, it’ll be a big, fat, permanent black mark on my newly cleaned record. But – I will think about that later.
My new timetable is so inelastic to my demands, no matter how much tax I impose on these, they won’t budge. The bad things about it include:
My extremely ignorant and boring economics teacher.
My incredibly annoying maths teacher.
Morning classes – twice a week.
Monday afternoon maths classes, when the rest of the year 12s get to go home.
I am so disadvantaged that I really should be given the right to apply for extra points. And then there is the added problem of travelling so far away. And then... and... And etc. Yup I should be able to get a 99 by scraping past 80.
I wish.
Ohhh. The good news is – I am studying Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close as an Area of Study text! I was so, so happy to see it on the list I could’ve cried. Dear Oskar would be back to me and I would be back to dealing with fictitious characters’ depression and coming up with amazing ideas and theories and feeling quite smart for doing so. The bad news is – I threw out last year’s notes.
Maths isn’t that bad either – apart from Ms Trotter. She literally trots!
(I just looked up ‘trotter’ in Encarta Dictionary Tools.
trot·ter [tróttər]
(plural trot·ters)
n
1.
food pig or sheep foot: the foot of an animal, especially that of a pig or sheep, when used as food
2.
horseracing trotting person or animal: somebody who or something that trots, especially a horse that has been specially trained to trot in harness
LOL!)
I am trying to like her attention on me. I figured, the only way I have a chance of ever getting my way with her is if I sit at the front and nod and smile enthusiastically at everything she says for five minutes. It’s working. She feels loved and therefore does not mind if I don’t pay attention for the rest of the period. I can’t help it! She even makes extension 2 look boring!
Steven makes my week complete every Friday with extension 2 and I am guaranteeing it – this subject is probably the most interesting one I’m doing. In the past two years, I never thought I would associate ‘interesting’ with ‘maths’, but Steve simply and easily made this impossible concept possible to bear. I wish I could tell him how great a teacher he is. Even though I’ve only been his student for about a month, I can already feel the change within me. My competitive nature for solving problems is finally emerging again. The last time I felt this ‘fresh’ about maths would probably be year 6. I even dreamt about maths twice in the last three weeks!
(I’ve just read over that paragraph and I sound crazy. Enough about maths.)
In the midst of this chaotic year, I’ll be going to BD inshaallah – exactly 40 days later. I have a things-to-do-before-I-go-to-BD list somewhere, which includes many things like ‘lose 10 kilos’ and ‘get rid of accent’. I haven’t done any of them. I keep extending the last date for ‘lose 10 kilos’. Right now, I’m giving myself the excuse of HSC. Everyone gets fat during their final year, so I might as well stay this way. With that thought out of the way, I am increasingly getting excited everyday. BD changed me a lot last time I went, and I wonder if it’ll have a similar effect on me this time. I hope I change to be better, instead of coming back with a little bit of my innocence gone, again.
Here you go, dear Miss Emu, an update of my life. Now you have no excuse to not know that I will still be at school for one more year. :P
ps: I met an apu recently who hated maths in high school. Now, she is studying accounting and married to a mathematician. I love irony when its to do with other people’s lives.
Year twelve is nothing like year eleven. The work is much harder, comes in bigger loads and has to be done faster. The worst part is – all of it counts towards determining how realistic my dream of successfully reaching the end of the tunnel is. If I screw up once, it’ll be a big, fat, permanent black mark on my newly cleaned record. But – I will think about that later.
My new timetable is so inelastic to my demands, no matter how much tax I impose on these, they won’t budge. The bad things about it include:
My extremely ignorant and boring economics teacher.
My incredibly annoying maths teacher.
Morning classes – twice a week.
Monday afternoon maths classes, when the rest of the year 12s get to go home.
I am so disadvantaged that I really should be given the right to apply for extra points. And then there is the added problem of travelling so far away. And then... and... And etc. Yup I should be able to get a 99 by scraping past 80.
I wish.
Ohhh. The good news is – I am studying Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close as an Area of Study text! I was so, so happy to see it on the list I could’ve cried. Dear Oskar would be back to me and I would be back to dealing with fictitious characters’ depression and coming up with amazing ideas and theories and feeling quite smart for doing so. The bad news is – I threw out last year’s notes.
Maths isn’t that bad either – apart from Ms Trotter. She literally trots!
(I just looked up ‘trotter’ in Encarta Dictionary Tools.
trot·ter [tróttər]
(plural trot·ters)
n
1.
food pig or sheep foot: the foot of an animal, especially that of a pig or sheep, when used as food
2.
horseracing trotting person or animal: somebody who or something that trots, especially a horse that has been specially trained to trot in harness
LOL!)
I am trying to like her attention on me. I figured, the only way I have a chance of ever getting my way with her is if I sit at the front and nod and smile enthusiastically at everything she says for five minutes. It’s working. She feels loved and therefore does not mind if I don’t pay attention for the rest of the period. I can’t help it! She even makes extension 2 look boring!
Steven makes my week complete every Friday with extension 2 and I am guaranteeing it – this subject is probably the most interesting one I’m doing. In the past two years, I never thought I would associate ‘interesting’ with ‘maths’, but Steve simply and easily made this impossible concept possible to bear. I wish I could tell him how great a teacher he is. Even though I’ve only been his student for about a month, I can already feel the change within me. My competitive nature for solving problems is finally emerging again. The last time I felt this ‘fresh’ about maths would probably be year 6. I even dreamt about maths twice in the last three weeks!
(I’ve just read over that paragraph and I sound crazy. Enough about maths.)
In the midst of this chaotic year, I’ll be going to BD inshaallah – exactly 40 days later. I have a things-to-do-before-I-go-to-BD list somewhere, which includes many things like ‘lose 10 kilos’ and ‘get rid of accent’. I haven’t done any of them. I keep extending the last date for ‘lose 10 kilos’. Right now, I’m giving myself the excuse of HSC. Everyone gets fat during their final year, so I might as well stay this way. With that thought out of the way, I am increasingly getting excited everyday. BD changed me a lot last time I went, and I wonder if it’ll have a similar effect on me this time. I hope I change to be better, instead of coming back with a little bit of my innocence gone, again.
Here you go, dear Miss Emu, an update of my life. Now you have no excuse to not know that I will still be at school for one more year. :P
ps: I met an apu recently who hated maths in high school. Now, she is studying accounting and married to a mathematician. I love irony when its to do with other people’s lives.
Saturday, October 25, 2008
Sincere Attempt at Sincere Poetry - stuff straight out of my heart
Do you know how much I love you?
My heart breaks every time you shout at me.
It leaps out of its cage every time you hug.
My lips tremble at your exhausted, bitter, slashing words.
Yet, my nose does not want to stop smelling you.
It hurt a lot when you pulled my hair.
But it hurts more when you want to cut off the invisible string that ties my heart to yours.
I know you love me more than I can ever love you.
Do you know exactly how much I love you?
I know this all seems empty to you.
Empty words with empty letters in empty envelopes in empty post office in the empty city of my empty, non-existant heart. Right?
Right.
I am empty.
Without you.
I love you, this much, and much more.
23/09/08
The day you told me you always thought I would be the child closest to you, but I broke your heart by not being her. I hope you know - I love you, this much, and much more.
My heart breaks every time you shout at me.
It leaps out of its cage every time you hug.
My lips tremble at your exhausted, bitter, slashing words.
Yet, my nose does not want to stop smelling you.
It hurt a lot when you pulled my hair.
But it hurts more when you want to cut off the invisible string that ties my heart to yours.
I know you love me more than I can ever love you.
Do you know exactly how much I love you?
I know this all seems empty to you.
Empty words with empty letters in empty envelopes in empty post office in the empty city of my empty, non-existant heart. Right?
Right.
I am empty.
Without you.
I love you, this much, and much more.
23/09/08
The day you told me you always thought I would be the child closest to you, but I broke your heart by not being her. I hope you know - I love you, this much, and much more.
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