oh my god, she meant a lot to a lot of fools

Every day this week I have come home and either:
A) burst into tears
B) taken a nap
C) Both!
The answer is C. I started sophomore year last Monday. I was not expecting to hate sophomore year, though I was not excited about starting school as I have been in the past. Spoiler alert: I hate this year. I half of my teachers, 90 percent of my classmates, and 75 percent of my classes.
My classes this semester are Civics Honors, English 2 Honors, Journalism, and Spanish 3 Honors.
Today, in Civics, we had to continue 'translating' Patrick Henry's 'Give Me Liberty or Give Me Death' speech. Already, it's an idiotic assignment. Apparently because it isn't written in modern English, it's COMPLETELY IMPOSSIBLE to understand. Or so thinks my Civics teacher and my entire Civics class. And it's not like this is fucking 1200 or something. We aren't at a fucking Renaissance festival learning fucking Old English. THIS WAS THE REVOLUTIONARY WAR YOU STUPID FUCKS.
Everyone is terrible. Our Civics teacher gave us 40 minutes yesterday to complete the assignment. The speech is 2 pages long. I've written longer blog posts. I finished it in ten minutes. Today, he gave us 45 minutes. At the end of class, today, no one was finished. That's 95 fucking minutes where apparently everyone is so goddamn stupid that they just sat there and drooled on themselves the whole time. I just don't understand how that is even possible. I just don't fucking understand. And, of course, too stupid to use the fucking internet. Or ask our stupid fuck of a Civics teacher who sat there, the entire class, on his fucking laptop. I swear to god, the entire fucking time. The lazy fuck didn't answer one question. Meanwhile, I'm trying to read my fucking book. Today in those 45 minutes I swear to god I answered 40 questions. Some of the most memorable:
"What are chains?"
And, near the end: "Wait... is he talking about the British?"
Both of those questions happened, today. I just don't understand how this is something that happened.
So, imagine this experience, but every day. For the rest of your high school career. Which happens to feel like forever. And, hey, don't get me wrong here. It's not like I expect people to not be stupid. I just expect teachers to not be lazy fucks. And maybe. Just maybe, if all teachers would actually teach the entire class, people wouldn't be so goddamn stupid. BIG IDEAS.
Every year when I start school my main motivation is not, like normal people, the desire to get good grades and go to a good college to get a good job. My goal is to impress my teachers. This probably suggests that my parents didn't love me enough when I was small or something. I guess it's just a matter of thumos. BUT ANYWAY, I've found that it's nearly impossible to do this because a great majority of teachers just don't give a fuck. None of my teachers give a fuck, except for my journalism teacher, who reminds me of John Green and is amazing. My English teacher is always a person I particularly want to impress, but somehow they always end up hating me. It remains to be seen whether that will be the case this year, but I can say that my English teacher definitely has a streak or five of not giving a fuck. Though one thing that was good was that on the first day, I wrote a thing about how one of the things I value most is my sense of irreverence, and somehow I was forced to read that, and he seemed to like it quite a bit. I'm willing to cut him a little slack for not showing that he gives enough of a fuck because this is his first semester teaching, but I am going to be annoyed if this goes on the entire semester. He's definitely a step up from last year's English teacher, so I guess that's a bit of a plus.
Journalism is quite a bit of fun, though I don't imagine that I'll be able to do it again because, in my never ending quest for valedictorian, I have to take the most challenging classes available. I like journalism, though. I just wish it was a club or something. And I also wish that there weren't so many kids that did it last year in the class, because they all seem to think that people who are new cannot possibly write well, and that everyone who took it last year is THE BEST FUCKING WRITER. When actually, some of them are really quite shit. But hey, I don't really give a fuck about what they think.
And then Spanish is a complete clusterfuck. In 8th grade, we had this Spanish teacher who was completely crazy in five senses of the word. All her worksheets are completely disorganized. Her "instruction" consists mostly of her shouting at us the entire class period, and her lesson plans are non existent. She likes to spend some of the class talking about her divorce/her dog/her son, Pablo/her greencard/generally innapropriate information about her personal life. And to top it all off, she actually has an extremely poor grasp of the English language. So of course, the high school would hire her, and she is now my Spanish 3 teacher. DISASTER.
Also, there is kid in there who apparently feels the need to get a teacher to verbally approve every word that he writes on his paper; every move that he makes. I spend much of the class hoping that our Spanish teacher will someday flip the fuck out on him and he'll cry. I genuinely hope that happens. And he is also one of those types who constantly feels that he has to respond to rhetorical questions out loud, or even just general statements that a teacher might make to the class.
I realized today that the ways that I deal with my problems generally fall into the categories of:
-bitching
-being a bitch to other people
-crying like a bitch
I wonder what that says about me?

you be the book, i'll be the binding

I go to this summer camp called TIP every year. I got back last week. That's why there was such a long hiatus. Anyway, you go for three weeks and stay in a college dorm and take a class. I enjoy it. I don't think I enjoy it as much as other TIP kids, though. Some of them say things like, 'We're all nerds, so we all love each other.' Which is bullshit, of course. I've encountered some of the most unlikable people on the planet at TIP. I've also met some pretty great people, but it all varies. Just because we're all smart doesn't mean we all like each other. I think people say this kind of thing because perhaps they haven't learned yet that intellectual companionship is not the only way for a friendship to be fulfilling. I know this is something I grappled with when I was younger, around 4th to 6th grade. I loathed people who weren't as smart as me, which was nearly everyone. I'm substantially happier now that I don't live in a little tower of intellectual superiority. It's absolutely imperative to understand that people who aren't as sharp are often quite marvelous people. I think it is, perhaps, the overwhelming need to feel special that causes these really smart kids to eschew people who are not as smart. They view intelligence as the most important personality trait because that makes them the best.
Some people who go to TIP think, 'Wow, I'll never make friends like this out in the real world. TIP is the only place where people really understand me.' For me it's kind of the opposite. Going to TIP makes me realize how lucky I am to have the friends that I do in the real world, partially because a lot of TIP kids don't have real, close friends at home and partially because I have never made real, close friends at TIP. I have made fun friends, kind friends, interesting friends, but never intimate friends. It makes me realize how rare friendships like the ones I have are. My best friend and I will have been best friends for 10 years when school starts later this month. I bought her a card. I was thinking I might write, 'Cheers to another 10.' but then I thought about it. And in 10 years, we will both be working or in graduate school, somewhere (hopefully) far away from here. And I'm excited for my future, but at the same time it's sad to think that we will inevitably grow apart.
I tend to feel a bit out of place at TIP. Everyone, it seems, is from a nice neighborhood and an exceptional school. I live in an okay neighborhood, and I go to a crappy school. The amazing thing, though, is how everyone who goes to good schools looks down on mine, like, 'Oh, you should come to Georgia,' or, 'Oh, why don't you just transfer?' And it pisses me off. I thought about that a little bit because I call my school shitty all the time. And I think it's something like the way some people view their family- I can make fun of them all I want but if somebody else does, I take it personally. And I do, take it personally. Because I have lived here all my life. I love here, I love the people here. I used to think I only like going to school here because I'm the best. And I am, I'm second in the class and I'm fairly confident that by next year I'll be first. But more important than that are the people. I love my high school, and I don't think I want to leave it for somewhere that might be better. I feel safe at my high school, even though maybe, yeah, we have some crime. I don't know if I would feel that way if I went somewhere else.
We walked through the city and everyone in my residential group was scared of the homeless people, or the traffic, or something else stupid. I have never been afraid of these things. I have always thought- these people are living their lives and I am living mine. If I don't fuck with them, they won't fuck with me. This philosophy has served me very well. Sometimes you read about how teenagers think they're invincible. I have never thought myself to be invincible. I know that I could die at any time in an infinite number of ways. I was thinking, though, and to some extent I do think I'm invincible because I have never been afraid of people or places. I can walk through any city, any dark alley or seedy club. I can walk by homeless people and drug dealers and crackheads and evangelists without feeling afraid. I'm not sure if this is a good thing or a bad thing. It feels good to not be afraid, but maybe sometimes I should be. I know, though, that being afraid of everything wouldn't do me any good. I don't feel brave, really, but I don't feel like a coward, either.
Maybe thinking about my future a lot is a form of imagined invincibility. I have a very set idea of how things are going to go. I know that there is a very real possibility that my life will be cut short before I've managed to do everything I think I'm going to do, but at the same time I don't live every day like it's my last. Perhaps that's good, though. Because then if I actually do make it into old age, might I look back on the way my life went with regret? At least with a plan, I can never admit to myself that this is not what I wanted. Because I dreamed of it ever since I was little. I don't even know. I guess I just think I should live a bit more in the moment if I know that my long-term life plan might not happen. So maybe on some level I am not aware that I am not invincible.
A lot of teachers at my school are quitting. Including our quizbowl coach/english teacher, who I adore. It kind of crushes me, I think partially because I hate not being able to say a proper goodbye. It's probably due to my deep fear of change. I know that when I go back to school, it won't be quite the same. I'm a very nostalgic person, and I am prone to yearning for things that have passed even though perhaps at the time they didn't even seem that good. I feel that way about my childhood as a whole. Interestingly enough, I have never lost anything of significance, but I can't help but miss the way things were, even though I am very happy now.
I feel bad for not writing for so long. I know that when The Peter doesn't write for a spell, I feel a bit confounded. This is perhaps because I often find that his writing makes transparent things that previously mystified me. It's kind of like a window to his thoughts.