Oh, What the Hell…
Hey, it’s my second entry in as many days. Perhaps I’m a better blogger than I thought. And I am pushing 40,000 words, so…half a book? As if any of this is really worth publishing. Maybe in the future when people are trying to look back and see what people thought in the past. Still, I’m no Anne Frank. (For many reasons, this is a good thing, such as the events that occur on pages 130 and 142 of her diary.)
The real reason I’m writing now is that a great weight has been lifted from my shoulders. Today was the day I set aside for the completion of a project for English. This project, a model of a theme in the play, “The Glass Menagerie,” was one of the hardest I have ever attempted to accomplish.
First of all, the play was nothing special. It was about a dysfunctional family in the 1930s, and how they all conspired against each other to make their lives miserable inadvertently. Second, my teacher, Mrs. Kulinski, had to go to meetings all day on Thursday and Friday, so we had a horrible substitute who knew nothing about what she was doing and was unable to operate the telephone-controlled VCR. I also got pulled out of class (thankfully!) by Mr. Trapani that period to help him with…something. I don’t remember what it was anymore. So I missed most of the movie, anyway. Then on Friday I put on my sweet, goody-goody smile and was able to get the substitute to let me borrow a “Menagerie” book and read the end. Like I said, it sucked.
Friday was spent doing an incredibly time-consuming study guide, which I was able to complete by working on it in math, social studies, biology, and Spanish. It’s amazing that my grades are so high with the amount of times I completely ignore my teachers each day. Last week was all about preparing for finals, anyway, so it wasn’t anything major to miss. I just did the worksheets and study guides and found a book to keep me occupied. I was able to get through two just by reading during my spare time during school and on the bus last week. Not bad.
Back to the story about the project. Anyway, Mrs. Kulinski was gone, and I didn’t really understand what I was supposed to do. I could have e-mailed her, but I didn’t…for some reason. (Thought: How could I have forgotten to e-mail her?) So I was confused, and I started working at about 2:00 today. I finished at 7:30. Five hours, once you take out dinner. Ouch. And all throughout that time I was worrying about whether or not it fit in with what my teacher wanted, which was kind of vague. At the end, I think I actually got it right. Sure, the workmanship is nothing to be proud of, but I think it represents what I want it to represent. Hopefully it will be better that most other people’s projects.
Did I do anything else today? No. No, because I had that stupid useless project to do. I’m not as angry about it as I was. I need to work on my church’s website, which has been in limbo since sometime in October. I just don’t have time anymore.
Again, it’s ironic that I should become so busy right after complaining that I had nothing to do. Now, though, it’s all downhill until Christmas break, and I’m thankful for it. For me, finals are easy. I have an uncanny ability to retain useless information, therefore I can remember everything I learn in school. I’m even better at remembering things when there is some kind of defect associated with it. I might remember a quote if I find a typo in it, or I might remember a theorem if I used it on a proof and got the question wrong. Things like that. Imperfections and flaws. I’m lucky that humans aren’t perfect.
I’m lucky for other reasons, too. Sometimes I wonder if I have God (or Buddha, or Mohammad) on my side. Things just work out, sometimes, when it looks like I’m doomed to fail. It’s usually just little things, like once in second grade when the whole class was talking (myself included) and the teacher told us all to pull a card (card-pulling was the discipline system) except for me. I should have said I was talking too. But I didn’t. I take advantage of stuff like that.
Then again, maybe I make my own luck. I’m a good student, most of the time, academically and behaviorally. Perhaps teachers cut kids a break if they have a history of being good and quiet in class. Maybe they understand that even the good kids make a mistake every once in a while. I think that must be it. And I attribute things to luck that were really my own doing. Is that some kind of extreme modesty? Maybe. I think I just lose sight of what I have accomplished since I am forever thinking ahead to the next task.
That brings me to another thing: when is it the right time to stop? How do I know when I’ve worked enough, when I should just enjoy life and get out of the house and do what I want? Will that time ever come? Most Americans already work until they’re at least 62 1/2, so that they can retire with government benefits. After 57 years of school, college, and work, can those retirees now enjoy life? No, because they’re old and can’t do most of the things they would have done if they were younger. Retirees go from being a slave to their job to a slave to their age.
It’s funny how we say that we abolished slavery after the Civil War, when slavery is still around today. Except now, we have something stronger than the tyrannical slavery that was practiced in the 18th and 19th centuries. We have social slavery. Is it not true that people are slaves to their own lives? Is it not true that people are forced to do what they should do, not what they really want to do? People are slaves to their jobs because they need money. They are slaves to money because they need it to buy food and material items to help them flaunt their wealth and “live better.”
Because society as a whole seems to be focused on accumulating possessions and wealth, we are, in turn, each slaves to each other. This is no longer social contract theory, where everyone must give up certain rights to society as a whole. This is fascist contract theory, where everyone must give up all their rights to society as a whole, whether they want to or not. People who try to break out of the rigid social system end up publicly humiliated or in jail. Now, public humiliation really doesn’t sound that bad, if it means freedom from the shackles of society. But in truth, public humiliation is society’s greatest weapon. The brave extremists who do risk this punishment are the Michael Jacksons of the world.
No, I don’t think Michael Jackson is innocent. Nor do I think what he did to all those little kids was right. But I question the authority that made his acts of homosexuality “wrong.” I’m not gay myself, but I’m no homophobe. Let people do what they want. The only reason people are so vehemently against such things as gay marriages is that they don’t want to be labeled gay themselves. And they don’t want to be labeled gay because they fear that they will be oppressed and ridiculed like so many gays are. For this same reason, many homosexuals won’t admit their sexual preference, even to those closest to them. It all comes down to the fact that they are crushed by the overwhelming threat of humiliation by society. Like I said, the most powerful weapon of our culture.
I don’t approve of homosexuality. But I don’t really want to get into that. I do, however, applaud those who go against the flow, against the trend, to stand up for what they believe is right. These are the people that have made our society what it is today, molding and shaping it into its current form. Arguably, our culture is in dire need of improvement right now. But at least the brave ones who stood and fought, from the Revolutionaries to today’s Greenpeace and PETA, made a difference. As a final question, I ask: What point is there in living if you make no difference in the world during your lifetime?