he is happy, and I let him. . ."
Entertaining Your Father in the Netherlands
Katrina Vandenberg
"Doesn't high school go by quick for you?" one peer asks of another.
"Sure," comes a response from behind me.
"It's so cold in here; my nipples might freeze and break and fall to the floor!"
All I can think is: Yeah, sure. Quick as molasses.
The teacher announces we need our books today, a rarity despite the fact that we've been instructed to bring them consistently. People scramble towards lockers; the boy in the cowboy hat claims he doesn't have one.
The girl sitting behind me requests I twist in my seat to share mine. I don't want to share, and twisting in my seat would be an inconvenience on top of this. I suggest she sit beside me instead.
Maybe it's the way I say it. This is all I can conclude as she responds, clearly offended.
"Okay, little girl, you don't have to get all butt hurt..."
Words coat my throat.
"Gosh," she is saying to a friend, "that bitch. I hate people. I hate people."
"I hate people, too," I say, just loud enough to be heard. "Not specifically, but in general."
"Am I one of them?"
"No." My dislike of people lies mainly in the fact that I don't understand them. I don't hate her, not really.
I feel sorry for her. I feel sorry for her and her snotty group of friends as they pick apart those they despise in lieue of schoolwork. My palms sweat to think of the sweet, sweet English teacher they shred to pieces and lick up clean from their niche behind me. My stomach finds itself in knots over the fact that these people will soon enter adulthood thinking that it's okay to publicly pull people apart over waist size or choice of romantic partner.
I am clearly a hypocrite, and maybe I do hate them a little bit.
"Good." She turns in her seat to share with a group behind her.
Pressure makes a quiet home in my chest. I scribble on sticky notes and press them against a loose page in my binder as my government teacher leads a one-sided discussion on the Presidency.
I have to believe in people.
Some days are harder than others.
I love you. A lot. Also, the way you write does things to me. Please be writing a novel. Or something.
ReplyDeleteI already stopped believing in people. It is sad listening to them and their ideas of life and how it is okay to destroy others for being different.
ReplyDeleteI have definitely had my fair share of giving up on people days. High school is a pretty big motivator of that opinion. Sometimes I think that I've turned into a total misanthrope.
ReplyDeleteBut then I remember that there are so many truly amazing, wonderful, lovely people out there. :) And some of them are even in my life. And as frustrating as dealing with people can be sometimes, it's usually worth the trouble in the end. :)
Anyway, your writing is beautiful, as always.
I believe in you.
ReplyDeleteRight now I'm working on an assignment for one of my classes. I'm having a really hard time with it. I'm giving you this assignment, too. And, obviously I'm not your professor and you don't have to do it, but I think it could be interesting to CONSIDER.
Think about the one person in high school who you just could NOT stand. Write a poem from their perspective wherein they reveal something that you never understood about them.
This is hard for me, because I disliked almost everyone so it's hard to choose just one. (Ouch. That sounds awful.) And because I've spent my time out of high school trying to forget it, and trying to become the sort of person who doesn't carry around so much DISLIKE. But this assignment is also hard because part of me still has all of those IHATEYOU feelings; part of me doesn't want to become the person I disliked, to see things from their perspective. I don't want to justify their jerkiness, or to explain away the things that made me dislike them. But already, in this process of resisting the assignment, I think I've learned a lot about myself, and about all those people I disliked.
So, maybe, just CONSIDER, even abstractly, stepping into her persona. Maybe you'll find something underneath her facade?