In many respects I had a normal highschool experience. I mean, I attended from ages 14-18 just like everyone else. I went through grades 9-12, just like everyone else. I went to football games, pep rallys, and dances... just like everyone else. But unlike a lot of people, I couldn't stand it.
I felt like I had been born in the wrong decade. I should have been going to high school in the sixties or early seventies. I saw wrongs everywhere, but no one heard me... I think they were too busy listening to Duran Duran or Eddie Money. I wanted to be different and I succeeded... in becoming just like every other rebel girl who had ever walked before me. HA! So I got kicked out. A lot. I hated math and science... it seemed so pointless to me back then. (Actually, it does to me now unless you want to go into those fields, but if you are a teen, DO NOT tell anyone I said that!) Why couldn't I read ahead in my history book instead of doing a boring assignment? I was soaking it in, it fascinated me... why did I have to answer questions that were so bloody boring and pointless? Why couldn't I study psychology in a math class I was failing anyway. I loved psychology and anthropology and all my english classes. Why make me go to classes I was never, ever going to pass?
A lot of my rebellion ended when one of the most popular cowboys in school moved out to where I lived in the boondocks and we fell in love. THAT rocked everyone's world... What does he see in her? Honest to God, I actually heard that question in the halls as I walked past. But the class of 83 was nothing if not apathetic, so soon I was just one of them. Redmond, Oregon had a hell of a rodeo team and I began traveling with my boyfriend to rodeo's around the state. Now that was an experience for a hippie girl. I had a horse, but I rode bareback... Big dif.
So that basically was my highschool years. Not really successful and my views on education are still radically different from the norm.
And no, I'm not going to give details on why I got kicked out each time... I am a young adult writer, afterall. I don't want to give the wrong impression. Which is why I have a hard time imagining myself going in and talking in a high school... the last thing teachers want to hear is an adult empowering kids to take charge of their own education. To own it and make it theirs, because they're the ones who have to live with it for the rest of their life. Besides, I still get the heebie jeebies walking into my daughter's high school for conferences!
It's a delimma!
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5 comments:
Oooh, thanks for the inner journey of your high school years! I was one of the math and science people and couldn't stand the history and english parts. Kind of ironic now.
So what happened with the cowboy?
It's all just YA fodder...ya know?
And what is wrong with Eddie Money? Hm?
Thanks for sharing, Teri!
I wish more kids would be encouraged to take charge of their own education. The 1.5 years my youngest spent in public school has completely ruined him in this respect. That's what we're working on now...him taking charge of his learnin'.
Personally, I wear my sunglasses at night. *;?)
Okay, so you will have to tell me sometime (at the IPP?) how to customize MySpace. And I call myself a techno-geek....
OMG... I'm from the East coast so forgive my naiivete.... but they really have rodeo teams? Can I use this as an idea for a story?
Annie Melton
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