Fs were commonplace for me in high school. I loved not living up to my potential-- it was a lot of fun. I had friends who complete the square for me and who gave me notes for a book I didn't read but had to write a report on. It's a wonder I passed at all, and I lived in perpetual fear that I was going to get kicked out. No joke. But it was fun. I had fun. And maybe that was short-sighted and myopic, and maybe I'm paying for that now. I don't care. I took classes I wanted and enjoyed them! Novel idea, right? I took drama twice, photography twice, and won an award at the LCC film festival for the PSA I wrote and edited in tv production. I lay out in the middle of Konia field with my friends, ate sandwiches in Midkiff.
Since returning to college a couple years ago, I've been a model student with a 4.0 GPA. That means I've earned As in all my classes, including the ones with which I have a rocky relationship, like Biology and Psychology. I work hard, I push my way through classes like a bull, I wrestle difficult concepts and make them my bitch. Because I get As and have a 4.0 GPA and this is what I've come to expect of myself.
This is my last semester at KCC, and I was all set with Ed classes, accelerated Spanish (101 and 102 in one semester!), and a geography lab. Over the summer, I had a huge burst of confidence in the form of a superawesome English professor and decided I would stick my tongue out at Education and major instead in English. I dropped my Ed classes and picked up Creative Writing. I thought Spanish was going to be the problem child this semester, but I was wrong. This English class is a tangled mess that I can't seem to navigate my way through, even though the assignments are straightforward and easily accomplished. I spend hours working on a poem or short story, and by hours, I mean hours a day over a span of days, and still I get a grade I'm not happy with. I bang my head repeatedly against the wall, and if you can believe it, have yet to attain an answer. What's going on?
It's not so much that I expect to get all As on every assignment, but come on. The mediocre grade I receive on a poem I put a lot of effort into really does not motivate me, especially when that grade is not accompanied by any notes. There are no suggestions, no observations, just a number. What does this number teach me? That I can put a lot of effort into something, something I can kinda feel proud of, and then get shit on.
So, I'm lacking the ability to stick my middle finger at it today, and it's bumming me out. It's not just the poem that I've received a weird grade on, but it's the most recent and right now, at the end of a long fucking week, I don't have the strength to protect my heart from the blow. As an educator, I would never tell my students, "Hey, if you're having trouble reading now, you may as well give up. You've tried to read this book three times already and you still don't know that word? Loser." And that's how this grade makes me feel right now.
Why am I telling you this?
Because I've decided I don't care. I remember playing in the middle of Konia field with toys Lani Girl stole, people giving us confused looks because Konia field is only good for walking across. I remember spending hours in Midkiff basement, sewing together our AIDS PSA. I remember giving oral book reports to Dr. Whiting for Independent Reading and quoting poetry to Mr. Slagel in the halls of Konia. School was fun! Learning was fun! And I had teachers who also seemed to appreciate the fact that I enjoyed their subjects even if I didn't score the best grades or, you know, always complete the assignments.
I'm telling you this because instead of trying to write for my teacher so that I can get that fucking A, I'm going to keep writing for me. Because I can't make him happy with my writing, and writing to try to suit him doesn't make me happy. It's not that I don't think I can't learn anything from him-- there's much I can learn and I'm sure he's quite knowledgable and talented. But it doesn't feel right to me. I feel like I'm bending in uncomfortable ways simply to meet someone else's criteria only to fail at it. It's depressing and ends with me hiding myself away in my dark room watching depressing movies about kids falling in love only to be torn apart by cancer. And dying of cancer. Because I don't necessarily want to be cheered up, I just need to remind myself that there are bigger problems out there.
I'm telling you this because I'm making a pledge to myself and to you. From here on, I'll write to complete my assignments, but I'm going to do it my way. I'm going to listen to my stomach and heart and whatever other body parts screaming at me. I'm going to write for me. And granted, that might not even be the best idea, I don't know, I'm no expert. I just want to be happy and do what makes me happy.
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