Smarty pants...

Many moons ago, when I was in high school, I had two thoughts –

1. What am I doing here?

2. Fuck, I don’t know the answer.  

I never saw the point of high school. I never knew anything and most of my time there was trying to bunk off sport and go work at McDonalds so I could get  money to travel to the UK - or keeping a low profile so no one could ask me things like math or science questions. Religious education?  Ah no, Mum agreed I could be removed from that because I considered it a load of bollocks and there was that incidence where I may have expressed an opinion to a religious type who took it badly. Phys Ed? How is running around a school sports oval going to do anything but piss me off? Actually, I was only thinking on my morning run, this morning, that when I was 12, and playing netball at school, we had this Nazi as a coach. She was an uncaring jockette who made us run and run and frigging run. I enjoyed being last on each of her runs because I’d already worked out a shortcut and never, ever, did that bitch work out I never ran the full way. But I digress…the main point of this ramble is today someone asked me a general knowledge question about the kings and queens of the UK and I rattled them off one after the other in succession. They were amazed. How did I know this stuff? By reading books – and not history books – Jean Plaidy. Really? Yes. Remember her? By reading her stories based on the lives of the Tudors and Plantagenets etc, I learned to love history and accept textbooks.   

My point? Wanna be a smarty pants? Sometimes the road less travelled when it comes to education is the best.  

        

I remember you...

So, I stumbled across an old school friend. We both attended Centenary Heights High School in the 80’s – stop counting on your fingers – I’m 47. I saw something about this high school on facebook which connected to another page and a bunch of people I remembered but only a couple I would want to see again. High school was never important to me and I’ve always said I could have gotten along just as well without it. The only thing I learnt at high school was how to ditch Wednesday arvo sport without anyone realizing it for the two years I didn’t bother to show up to it. I worked at McDonalds on those afternoons and that money got me overseas when I was 19 which was a way better education.

Anyway I came across a name of someone who wasn’t at the school long and left before I did and I thought I’d like to see what she’s up to. So I sent a note of ‘do you remember me?’ She did and we chatted on email and will catch up via phone and when I’m back down south. So what this tells me about high school – nothing other than if you’re lucky you’ll be simpatico with one person at school and the best way to bunk off sport on a Wednesday arvo is do it out in the open because that’s when people least expect it.

School of life…

I was flicking over someone’s facebook page and they had a reunion type page and for some reason I decided to type in the name of the last high school I attended – I went to a few schools – and up popped all these names I had not heard of in years…and pictures of the pukeable school uniforms we had to wear. What memories. Some were bloody ghastly ones and others were okay. Looking back over those names and those awful uniforms I realized how far I had come and once more how I never saw the point of high school. I never learned anything of any value. I have always believed the best lessons came from real life and not the rarefied atmosphere of socialized institutions designed to repress spirit and free will. But yes, memories have their place. In this case? The girl I was in high school is the woman I am now. They just didn’t get that then.

Hypotheticals....

From Gone with the Wind…
Scarlett: Cathleen, Who's that?
Cathleen Calvert: Who?
Scarlett: That man looking at us and smiling? The nasty dark one?
Cathleen Calvert: My dear don't you know? That’s Rhett Butler! He's from Charleston, he has the most terrible reputation!
Scarlett: He looks as if he knows what I look like without my shimmy

This morning when I got up I was reading blogs, as I do, and some were quite interesting because I had no idea what the writers were talking about other than they were talking about people they did not like. If I was smarter or knew the code I would have worked it out but for it was 4am…so, my question to you - someone says they hate you. What do you do? Do you take it to heart? Wonder what you have done to incur such hatred? Curl into a ball on the sofa? Demand answers from said ‘hater’? Or do you think so what? Out of the nine-thousand-nine hundred-and-ninety-nine problems in my life at this moment your opinion is nine-thousand-nine hundred-and-ninety-ninth on my list of things to worry about. What happens when that person then puts all over the internet that you suck? Do you defend yourself through litigation? Write vicious letters to the person to retract their comments or do you just raise an eyebrow and wonder when high school will ever end?

Don’t you just sometimes feel high school never ended? I was talking to another writer the other day about a ‘high school’ situation that had happened. Remember the cool girls that the boys all liked? Some of the ones I went to school with never lived past their 20’s because drugs were cool and ‘everyone is doing it.’ The ones that lived are looking a lot less than cool now because I believe that were never prepared for high school to end when they married the ‘cool’ boy. I know ‘ugly girls’ that have outshone everyone because they had a quiet dignified, determination that others could not see behind the second hand, torn school uniform, braces, ‘awful’ hair and the wrong shoes. I also know quiet, gentle beauties who were considered cold, when they were really just shy, who have gone on to do amazing things because they learnt from a young age that looks aren’t all that important and understanding is.

So what is my point? My own personal belief is words can only hurt you if you let them. High school, although a long time ago for some of us, is over, yet others never let it go be it through fear or jealousy or the need to be a part of something. And no, surprisingly, I am not the most loveable person on the planet. Anyone who shoots from the hip isn’t but that’s okay because I know the consequences of my actions every time I open my mouth. I can handle whatever is dished out. I also believe if you put yourself out there in any form you have to be prepared to take some knocks. I am always saying that to be a writer you have to be thick skinned. To me that’s rule number one. Just because you use words for a living doesn’t mean people cannot try to tear you down with their own words.

So, how thick skinned are you? Is someone’s hatred only important if they mean something to you? Do words either verbal or written upset you or do you move on? Would an internet attack scar you or if managed, with careful thought, bring people to you? Can reputation really damage a person? Or due to the pace of life will wounding words be the proverbial fish and chip wrapping tomorrow? Can you live without worrying about a rep and be true to yourself? And if one person attacks another due to their own inadequacy does any of this really matter? Ah, the stuff you can ponder early in the morning.

Rhett Butler: With enough courage, you can do without a reputation.

Sad news…Colin the whale is dead. See here for more He was separated from his mum. People fought hard to keep Colin alive. We all hoped he would live. A one stage he followed a boat thinking it was his mother. What is it about whales that makes people so passionate to save them? Maybe because we have stuffed up the environment so badly for so many years that too late we are realizing what treasures we have…poor Colin….actually just heard Colin was a Collette…still sucks either way.

www.amarindajones.com
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/AmarindaJonesNewsletter/
Go ahead: Live with abandon. Be outrageous at any age. What are you saving your best self for?