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do you miss me, miss misery?
Dec. 6th, 2003 01:38 amI forget sometimes, how horrible I thought HS was. But I was thinking today about "Brave New World," and it reminded me. I read it for the second time my senior year for AP English. And I remember writing a paper on it, arguing that it wasn't a dystopia, it was a utopia, because everyone knew their place, and furthermore was happy in it. And those that weren't happy in it, got sent off to an idyllic little island to have fun.
I remember being really, truly confused as to why people thought this was dystopic. I got a bad grade on the paper, but most of what I remember is looking out at my class while I presented the paper and having them stare blankly back at me. I still can't bring myself to really believe that it's dystopic. I'll give it lip service, but I think parts of me, possibly very large parts of me, still really wish that I could just *know* where I belonged in life and be happy in it. It's not the knowing so much as the being happy in it.
And it's funny, because HS wasn't really that horrible. I had friends. I'd had enough practice over there years that I was able to ignore most people who didn't like me, and by and large my teachers liked me and while it was really boring, I did fairly well in school. I just remember this huge gap between me and the rest of the kids I had classes with--most of them were doctor's children, the rest were college brats, and almost all of them had more money than I did. In 9th grade my mother made 16K. With the money from my dad for child support, it was 21K. Poverty level for a family of 4 then was 22K. It wasn't like we were starving, or I had to get a job or anything--my dad bought most things we needed, like new clothes and such, and my mom put a lot on credit cards, which she's still paying off in one form or another. BUt I was always worried, and she got very depressed and didn't pay her bills for vast stretches of time, and it never felt fair. Everyone else I knew, when their parents got divorced, their moms married someone with *so* much money. My mom dated a prison guard (this one I really liked, but he was an alcoholic, and my mom couldn't handle that.) and a teamster (on, off, on, off, on, off, on, off) and a professor who was married at the time, and thus we never met him, or really were supposed to know he existed even, and another prison guard who I never met while she was dating him who was something like 400 pounds. When she used to argue with me about not dating people, I'd make her list positive relationship models in my life. Even the ones that lasted aren't really anything to write home about. And this wasn't where the post was supposed to go at all, so I'm ending it now.
I remember being really, truly confused as to why people thought this was dystopic. I got a bad grade on the paper, but most of what I remember is looking out at my class while I presented the paper and having them stare blankly back at me. I still can't bring myself to really believe that it's dystopic. I'll give it lip service, but I think parts of me, possibly very large parts of me, still really wish that I could just *know* where I belonged in life and be happy in it. It's not the knowing so much as the being happy in it.
And it's funny, because HS wasn't really that horrible. I had friends. I'd had enough practice over there years that I was able to ignore most people who didn't like me, and by and large my teachers liked me and while it was really boring, I did fairly well in school. I just remember this huge gap between me and the rest of the kids I had classes with--most of them were doctor's children, the rest were college brats, and almost all of them had more money than I did. In 9th grade my mother made 16K. With the money from my dad for child support, it was 21K. Poverty level for a family of 4 then was 22K. It wasn't like we were starving, or I had to get a job or anything--my dad bought most things we needed, like new clothes and such, and my mom put a lot on credit cards, which she's still paying off in one form or another. BUt I was always worried, and she got very depressed and didn't pay her bills for vast stretches of time, and it never felt fair. Everyone else I knew, when their parents got divorced, their moms married someone with *so* much money. My mom dated a prison guard (this one I really liked, but he was an alcoholic, and my mom couldn't handle that.) and a teamster (on, off, on, off, on, off, on, off) and a professor who was married at the time, and thus we never met him, or really were supposed to know he existed even, and another prison guard who I never met while she was dating him who was something like 400 pounds. When she used to argue with me about not dating people, I'd make her list positive relationship models in my life. Even the ones that lasted aren't really anything to write home about. And this wasn't where the post was supposed to go at all, so I'm ending it now.
