As promised, I'm going to spend a few minutes ranting about school. It started on Monday, and I already hate it and am working on switching my classes. If you're reading this, Jamie, don't worry--I'll fill you in in person. But for the rest of you who don't have any other way to hear me complain, here's what's going on right now.
First of all, here is my schedule. It is severely messed up:
Precalculus (not honors?!?!?!)
Biology II (not honors, not AP...why???)
English (everything's good here)
Government (not much i can do about that one)
Spanish 4 (I was originally going to take this, but now I might drop it to be replaced with something else)
Band (ME GUSTA MUCHO)
I seriously almost threw up on the first day of school when I saw what they put me in. I am aware that this makes me sound like a major snob, but I've never not been in an honors class before and it was a very unwelcome surprise for me. I also hang out with a lot of very intelligent people who are all in exclusively honors classes, and, though I love them, some of them are the type to look down on me if I am not also a brilliant supergenius freak. I actually am a genius (the stupidest genius EVER, if you ask me, but whatever, that's a different rant) but in this world it's grades and classes that seem to define how intelligent you are, not how intelligent you actually are.
The honors deal is not the only thing that sort of threw me here. In fact, I could live with that and with being judged by my friends if I did not feel so strongly that this is not what is supposed to happen to me this year. I don't know if that makes any sense or makes me sound like any less of a jerk. What I mean to say is that...well, it's hard to explain unless you know about the kind of "unorthodox" (for lack of a better word) things I believe in, but to put it simply this schedule is not part of my game plan. I could settle for it and be just fine, but I WOULDN'T be just fine because this is not supposed to happen and it must be changed!
I don't know if any of you have ever felt an overwhelming sense of wrong, especially about something as silly as classes that the school signed you up for because you were to dumb to turn in a class request form, but this is wrong in a deep and unsettling way. I know that sounds ridiculous, but...again, hard to explain, but I know what I'm talking about. Or at least that's what I'm going to continue to pretend.
Anyway, I'm fighting hard to switch my classes to some unlikely crap. I want to drop precalculus and take journalism instead, I want to get rid of biology even though I like it and take physics and somehow magically get additional credit instead of it being just like I'm retaking the class (working on that...probably not going to happen at this point, which is to be expected), and I want to replace Spanish 4 with an independent study period in which I will take calculus online. So there.
"Why," some of you may exclaim, "That sounds ridiculous! How irresponsible you are! Are you not aware that your senior year is the last chance you have to prove yourself in high school?"
I am aware of these things, and they are noted. But for once in my life I am going to get what I want, goddamn it! I refuse to be pushed around by my mother or the system or myself. This time I am doing my life my way, because it's mine and I am in charge of where it goes and I think I deserve even the small happiness of enjoying my education. I will still be able to get into college and achieve my dreams if I grant myself this one, short, school year to LIKE WHAT I DO. I am so tired of waking up in the morning and dreading school. Education is a wonderful thing and I love to learn, so I don't see why I have to hate something I love when it is SO EASY to fix the problem. I do not believe that changing these classes will damage my future. If I am mistaken in thinking this, well, I'll damn well find out, won't I? And I will accept those consequences. But at least I will have tried, and I will never regret that.
Sorry to make such a big deal out of high school. It's not a big deal. At all. But me standing up for what I want kind of is. So wish me luck.
-Iridian
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