I rant pages 46-50
Parents
In the above rant (last page) I mentioned what I'm about to say here, I've eluded to it more than twice I'm certain but it has apeared nowhere on this web page. Why is that? Oh a variety of reasons most of them involve the computer crashing and it just not comeing out right. Shrug. Well we will just have to try again now won't we? Over the years I have heard alot of bizzarre behavior out of parents. Parents blameing teachers for poor grades, parents blaming the media for thier kids, parents holding book burnings stuff like that. For the most part when a teacher would tell us about a parent yelling at them I took it with a grain of salt, because well I figgured parents weren't that stupid...after all they are parents. Then I whitnessed it for myself during a parent teacher confrence between my Algebra 1 teacher and my Step Mom. No actual yelling went on...but I could tell that she laid my failing grade compleatly upon his shoulders. None of this was my fault, even when I tried to stick up for my math teacher because I paticualry liked him she wouldn't hear it, it was all his fault. I didn't know what to make of all of this, so I started observing her reactions to my teachers, other parents reactions to teachers, and the storys teachers tell. Eventually I came to the following conclution, it's guilt, on a sub conseince level I asure you, but that is the only way I can describe it. One day they realize that the little child they have been neglecting suddenly needs aid. Because it is the child they have been neglecting they don't think that it is the childs fault and they pounce upon the easyest and most identifiable target. Alright I need to back up what I'm saying a bit because I was in debate and it's kind of a habit. Alright we all know that meaningful conversation spent with parent and child is something like 2 minuts per week. I think it's much less than that but even 2 minuts is horribly low and I know that number is not over ten. Also in a poll conducted by a few of my teachers it turns out that maby 5 students in a class size of 35 eat dinner 5 nights a week with thier parents. The rest are either doing things of thier parents are to tired to cook them something and the student is simply sent out to eat. In the odd case when they do eat together almost no real conversation happens. Our family included we always eat together but we might as well eat in seperate rooms for all the good it dose. Parents don't do as much parenting as they used to. In their defense they always say that they are to busy working...in order to provide for them. I used to buy that defense hook line and sinker I mean it makes sence dosn't it? However when you look at it another way it just looks like they are pointing a nother finger away from themselves. It's guilt, guilt that they are realizeing that they have been shitty parents and thier offspring has bvecome messed up from it. Lets look at another example of this. Probley the most valuable thing my step mom has taught me through out life is that nothing will ever be given to you for free. You have to work for everything. Also just because you work for something and fail dosn't mean you should expect any sort of reward. The same goes for when you suceed at something. So at the end of the year I was quite suprised when she told me I at least deserved a D in algebra 2 because I showed up to class every day. This little coment compleatly goes back on just about everything she has ever told me. She was also willing chosen her work over her family. I don't know maby I'm compleatly off track but the guilt theory answer more questions than it asks. And the questions it asks can be answered using the guilt theory. So maby...maby I'm right just this one. On a side note not all parents are like this and they are the ones that are raising the hope for the future.
Working
I really only have one thing to say on this subject, people were not ment to spend day after day in little card board boxes doing the same thing over and over again for the rest of thier lives. Do whatever you can to avoid the situation.
Child/Adult Veiws on the World and How They Change
Well after reading the title of that it feels like I should say something extra smart right here. Oh well sorry just my usual old drib drab what not shannaigans and nonsence. Ahem about the title I do have something to say about it. Over the summer I volenteered to take a night skool class to help me out with my math (more on that next rant). It's a pretty good class, a lil basic but we are just now getting into some skills I could use help with so it's all good. Anyway one night we were reveiwing the order of operations. Now the way I and most other things my age learned the little saying Please Excuse My Dear Aunt Sally...or Please Excuse My Dumbass Sister, depending on who your teacher was. These helped you remeber what you should do first in the problem, P stood for parenthasis, E stood for Exponents so on and so forth. Now when out teacher first heard that little rhyme from his highskool kids he thought wow this would be a great thing to help out the adults. That evening when he told the adults at night skool about this one of them got up and said, "What the hell would I want to remeber all of that for...PEMDAT" and that was that. I'll let you draw your own conclustions.
Night Skool
For thouse of you that read the previouse rant I think you can guess what this is all about. If you can't then...you're beyond my help sorry. The class I'm takeing is Elementary Algebra, the class lasts from 7:55pm to 10. In reality we are let go at 9-9:30 or so and anyone that wants extra help can get it. The class is filled with a variety of people, there's everything from an elderly chinese woman, a middle age professional, to the collage student that just wants out of BCC(Broward Community Collage). It is the most depressing collection of sadness, and thin desperation of hope that I ever did see. Last night people were tradeing storys about how they wound up in such a class. Everyone had a story to tell. Possibly the saddest one was the woman who was sitting next to me at the time. The was about to get her AA which meant she could move out of comunity collage and into a university. Then she moved to florida, I never caught the reason why, it must have been a good one though. She basicly had to start collage over again...we have some stupid laws in florida which screwed her over big time. She basicly had to start over, that coupled with her weak math skills has left her in a collage in her early thirtys. On top of all that I went to skool with her kid. He will graduate in the class of 2002, he's doing the same math she was. Other people were in there because the councilers at BCC screwed them over. Memories of highskool counsilers flooded my mind. When I brought that up they said that the BCC councilers were worse. Still others were takeing care of an infant son at home. Then all eyes turned to me and asked my story...actually they asked me what my major was. I told them my story. There was a general murmer of suprise...then class started again. It's sad how some people get second chances time and time again, while others get shafted the first time around.
Chinese Food
Sitting in front of me is my dinner. It is a plate of Lo Main noodles, chicken lo main to be exact. As I sat there and stared down at it I began to wonder, how do I know that this is good? I mean I look at a burger from Mcdonalds, and then one my step dad has just freshly made for me on the grill and I can point to the better tasteing of the two. (The freshly grilled one for all you idiots out there) But if two plates of Lo Main were set before me I wouldn't be able to tell which one is better. One could be made from a 5 star chinese food restuaraunt and the other could be made at...JOE's vetinary hospital and eatery, and I dunno if I would be able to tell the diffrence by looking at them...or even tasteing them. I dunno it bothers me that I'm so ignorant on the subject.
Movies and Films
Alright there is a diffrence between movies and films. You may not know the diffrence but by the end of this rant you might think that you have a somewhat murkey idea of what that diffrence might be. Movies are movies that are made for sheer entertainments sake. They do not break any new ground in the industry, they do not challenge you in any way what so ever, and they do not expand your horizons in anyway. They are there so people can stumble into the theater sit down put your mind in nutral and just chill. A film on the other hand forces you to think and challenges your personal beleifes. Well that's that I don't think I'll muck it up any further. What is a movie to one person is a film to another...and vice versa, it's all very personal. One thing though some movies are universaly recognized as films because of thier greatness...I can't think of an end to this sentense so I'm gonna stop now.
"I have a son that is only 9 years old and he is worried because he dosn't know what he wants to do when he grows up" Joseph Heller, speaking through the voice of Bob Slocum in the book Something Happened.
Ahem. I have an amazeing amount of restect for Joseph Heller, for many of you that name only rings faint bells of familiarity. Yes he is the guy that wrote Catch 22. The thing is though is that he wrote several other books as well. many people don't know that, they aren't as widly read as Catch 22 but they are still there. This bothers me. In skool we will read a book by an author, sometime the book will be good, other times it will not be. However during the time we read this book no mention of the authors other works are ever made. For the mostr part these people have written many other wonderful and enlightening books. However they are never mentioned, never given any publicty. The way these books are taught at skool you would think that it is the only thing that the author has ever written in their entire lives. Sometimes the name of the author isn't even know at all and only the book's title lives on. These things bother me. However that's not really what this rant is about it is about that quote above. So go back and read it...NOW. Good job. One of the many problems faceing america's youth today is that they are being forced to grow up to fast. Let's contrast this quote with a scene that has recently happened in my everyday life. But first some background. I am going off to collage in a month in a half at the time of this writeing. My little sister is very curiouse about all of this because everyone except me is treating it like it's a big deal. Recenlty she started to talk to my step mom about collage and what should she do to prepare for it and what not. My step mom started to tell her...not just the general studyt hard and do good, but giveing her detailed stuff. You have to get into the gifted program, make sure to take algebra in middle school...she is only ten years old. She now has the beleife instilled in her that if she dosn't do this little list of things she will be a failure and die alone in a dead end job. So it goes. At ten years old she should still be running around and playing with her freinds, not worrying about collage. It gets worse. Awhile ago while I was walking home from skool I saw a buntch of kids playing basketball on a driveway, they couldn't of been older than third graders, 4th at the most. It was a lovely day out, not to hot for once and I was ambleing myx way home at a leisurly pace while I did I heard them talking. One kid acused the other kid of dateing some girl. The first kid vehimatly denyed it because he was dateing some other girl, untill he dumped her just recently for someone else. The way he said untill I dumped her had a viciouse and premeditated sound to it that is most commonly heard in high skool. After I heard a third grader talk like that I gave up hope for the youth of amaerica.
pROGRESS
Ahem this is where we were, "Patty Keene flunked English during the semester when she had to read Ivanhoe, which was about men in iron suits and the women who loved them. She was put in a remedial reading class , where they made her read The Good Earth, which was about chinamen." Breakfast of Champions, Kurt Vonnegut
In my 10th grade english honors class we read The Good Earth, Ivanhoe was never mentioned in high skool. This is how far we have come...my what great leaps we are makeing.
Competitveness
or however the hell you spell it….
You know for a time now there has been a firey debate rageing within me. I has no hints of ending, slowing down, or even of ever movie fowards. Right now it is the debate of competitveness. Competion is everywhere in our lives, it is something that I feel has been overstressed for generations. I was always told (when I was younger) that I had to stay on top in order to get into collage. That only the competive will get in. I’ll confess something…listen. In 12th grade I was only in algebra 2. Allmost my freinds that were a grade below me were in pre calculouse. Most seniors were in pre calculouse, people who I am smarter than were in pre calculus. It seemed like the whole world that was going to move up and on were in pre calculus. Execpt me. I was in algebra 2. I spent the entire skool year in a quiet terror that no collage would except me because I was only in algebra 2. I would spend the rest of my life in some remedial job because of this, it didn’t matter if I got straight A’s or F’s in that class because it was already to late. I wasn’t in pre calculus. I honestly beleived all of that, sad isn’t it. This was all told to me to help foster my needs for competion. I had to stay competitve in order to get anywhere in life. The fact that I got into every collage I have appied to proves this wrong and I smile. Still it is taught. For many many years I always thought competion was bad. It makes people destroy their body in sports, it takes a normaly fun harmless activity and turns it into a struggle. The need to prove to others is an ultimatly self defeating one, because lets face it you will never be the best. I shouldn’t say that, but oh well. I found sports fun with out the seriousness of cometion, I find games fun when they are played just for fun. I don’t like to enter contests or atempt to win anything really. I never try to be better than anyone else. It has given me a pretty good life so far. I have a great group of friends who I have to prove nothing now, and they have given me the confidence that I don’t have to prove anything to anyone. Ahem, this whole rant has been set off by something I read in the book Something Happened by Josheph Heller…for your reading pleasure here is the quote that inspired all this writting, "…I try to give him a will to win. He don’t have one. When he’s ahead in one of the relay races, do you know what he dose? He starts laughing. He dose that. And he waits for the other guys to catch up…" Just to set the scene a bit, this is the elementary skool gym teacher talking to the young boys father about his lack of competitve spirit. For just about as long as I lived I always thought the world would be a better place if we stopped, slowed down and let the others catch up during relay races and what not. If we concentrated more on having fun and living our lives, doing our jobs, being parents, and the like instead of trying to be better than anyone else I think the world would be better for it. Or at least I used to. Listen. Next year in my little sisters elementary skool a new gym program is being developed. This gym program has removed ALL competitive activitys and they have been replaced with some sort of non competitve mishmash of self esteem building activitys. I am dead set against the skool teaching us about self esteem activitys. Skools go about teaching self esteem building activitys much the same way our nation goes about the war on drugs. My thought process was this if kids don’t learn how to loose gracefully in a hormless game then they will have to learn to loose when they are older, full of rageing hormones and have acess to guns and other impelments of death and destruction. Am I being dramatic? Not really when you think about it. Because this means they will loose for the first time in middle skool, right when we as people are at our most unstable point in life. All my passionate arguments against competion flew out the window as I pictured the gym class of the future where cometion isn’t allowed. So right now I’m stuck not quite knowing what to think. So it’s time to compromise. We do need less competion in life, it’s stupid and like I said self destructive. However I believe our skools hamfisted destion about gym class is wrong. About the only thing that class ever taught me was that looseing is no big deal. I think teaching children self esteem should be left to the parents and if they don’t have time well then they shouldn’t of had the little brat in the first place. I think some cometion is good, in apropriate places and at apropriate times. So…ummm well I guess that’s that. Now the real trouble comes in, where do you draw the line of when it’s to much? That is when it really begins and your beleifs are put to the test.
