Lowlight of 8th Grade English

I found, also, the poem I wrote describing my depressive episode during the winter of that year.

Down


You feel down,
Down so low it feels like there isn't any up.
It feels like the hurt
Of all 6 billion people in the world
Has been dropped
On your shoulders,
And it's weighing you down,
Even though you don't know what it is.
You cry and cry,
For no reason, no reason at all, it seems.
You stand on the wall and look down.
You are sad, but somehow can't feel a think.
A voice in your head says jump,
Fall from this wall that you stand on so high
Above a world that can't understand you;
Fall from the people who never even try to listen.
You run from the voice,
But running from yourself you can't get very far,
And it follows you,
Taunting that you are too stubborn to ignore it,
And you are scared,
'Cause even though it says jump you don't want to,
But you wonder,
If you listened,
How long would it be before someone realized you were gone
And that you were never coming back?
You look down at the water,
And your heart says walk until you are gone,
And the voice says let go of everything,
But a little tiny piece of you,
The piece that is the real, lasting you,
Says stay,
Stay in the world that hurts you so much,
Because it's all that you have.
So you sit on the wall,
And cry until it feels like you've cried forever,
Like you've cried out your brain and your heart and everything that is you,
And you turn around and leave.
Go back to your room,
Pretend nothing happened for a little while,
Because you are smart,
And your brain is good,
And nothing can be wrong with you.
So you hide it,
Until you can turn around and cry again,
Because you are scared of yourself,
And you think,
What if I took that razor over there and dragged it across my wrist?
Would I feel better, then?
What if I pushed this hammock so hard that I fell and cracked my head into a
Million tiny pieces?
What about then?
And all those thoughts,
of ending it now,
Freak you out so bad that you can barely think,
But you can somehow still feel the weight of 6 billion frowns on your shoulders.
And you bite your hand,
So hard that your teeth hurt,
And the mark lasts for days,
Because it makes it all go away.
The real pain, the kind you can feel, makes the hurt stop inside,
And you can breath again.
You're still down,
But somehow
It's better now.
It hurts later, but what else can you do?
'Cause the pain makes it better,
So you can stand back up,
And go on until your next down,
When you need to get back up again.
And who knows what will happen then?
Who can say how far you will go,
And how much you will be able to hold back,
Next time?
Next time,
What if it really is
The End?



This was the poem that got me temporarily kicked out of school for being a danger to myself and others.

I wrote, to accompany the poem (and so as to avoid the mess that occurred the last time it was seen), a letter to my English teacher.

The letter is as follows:

This poem is a part of my past. I am no longer afraid of the downs mention in it. I did some therapy and all that, and I am better now. I am no longer a threat to myself. However, the down part of my life is as much a part of me as the good times with my friends and the embarrassing moments in and out of school. It is something I must look back on, not fondly, but as a lesson. That's why I chose to write a poem about it. It seemed like an event that needed telling. Because of the experience, I am more afraid of things (blood, height, and deep water) but it also makes me more aware of myself. The poem is me, but it is not me. I am not "Girl with a Problem," I am myself, I am my life, and "my problem" is no longer even mine. I now handle downs the normal way, with chocolate and a friend (which, by the way, works much better!). Don't worry. I've already been signed off (twice!) as a normal teenager (assuming you don't count my genius, gorgeosity, and sheer superiority*). I hope that you will not judge me for what I used to be. I am the same person you have known all year. Thank you for understanding.


Sincerely,
Tea


*I hope you understand that was sarcasm. I was demonstrating the typical teenage belief of the world revolving around me. Plus, I couldn't resist being so self-congratulatory. Sorry.

Highlights of 8th Grade English

One of the fun parts of packing for college is that I've been going through every thing I own. This includes schoolwork, straight back through 8th grade, when I first started saving things. I guess I get sentimental about anything I pour that much time into, which, in my opinion, certainly makes sense.

I found a brief graphic memoir from that year. The scanner isn't exactly functional at the moment, so y'all are going to have to cope with me transcribing the visuals as well.

Frame 1: "MOON" [image of a crescent moon, identical to the one in Starry Night, which was above my desk even then], "By Tessa"


Frame 2: "Gym class: it's some people's favorite time of day, but for others, it's a NIGHTMARE! "(Nightmare is written in squiggly, scary looking letters)

Frame 3: "I am a member of the second group"

Frame 4: [Figure labeled 'me' is in a push up position, with lots of wobbly lines around her arms. A male figure is next to me, also in the pushup position, with no squiggly lines. A teacher stands nearby, labeled "too fit teacher"]. The teacher is saying "Down! Up! One!" I'm thinking "But I can't get up!" and the other student is thinking "this is FUN"

Frame 5: "You'd think I'd at least have friends to complain with, but no! All I had was Barbie!" [I'm sitting with my knees drawn up to my chest while a ponytailed girl, presumably Barbie stands angrily next to me, arms folded. Two other girls are standing nearby with their arms around each other's shoulders]. "Oh my god! Did you see Tessa's shorts? Eww!" says the speech bubble for one of the friends. Barbie is saying "Gosh, Tessa! You only ran 5.8 miles! You were supposed to run 5.86. I'll have to tell Mrs. M!" "The teacher's pet was my new BFF," reads the caption at the bottom.

Frame 6: "I asked the guidance counselors to switch my class." [Three heads, in imitation of the gifted students's counselor, the general 8th grade counselor, and the one counselor I was actually comfortable talking to, were interspersed with the following text] "no no no no no no NO no no NO!"
"I was stuck." (the last is in a nested frame at the bottom right).

Frame 7: "So one day in March" [Mrs. M stands with a basketball under her arm]. Her speech bubble reads "Run around the really big field!"

Frame 8: [An aerial view of the field is shown. One fast person is out front, indicated by a circle with a bunch of lines trailing behind it. The rest of the class is in a large pack. Barbie and Me are both labeled near the end]. Barbie's thought bubble snakes out behind her and reads "Gosh, Tessa, I <3 Mrs. M. Do you think she'll give me an A+?" My thought bubble reads "AHH!"

Frame 9: [I've caught up to the rest of the group. My thought bubble reads "Yes! I lost her." There's a trio of boys immediately in front of me surrounded by the words "Do it!", "Dude!", "Yeah!", "Dude!". In front of them, the pair of mean girls from before are surrounded by "giggle!" and "hahaha."]

Frame 10: "Then, the guy in front of me moons me! (and everyone else behind him)." [the three boys have turned to two. One of them has the waistband of his gym shorts below a behind that has been censored by a black starburst]

Frame 11: "My poor eyes!" [An eye is illustrate]. "That was something I NEVER wanted them to see!"

Frame 12: My face turned bright red [a blushing girl with shoulder length hair (the same me I'd drawn the rest of the time) is shown]

Frame 13: I jog past the two boys. My thought bubble reads "Maybe if I run fast enough they won't notice me." The friend of the mooner, though, has the speech bubble "Man! Did you see her FACE?" Nested in the bottom right of the frame is "Oh well."

Frame 14: "I got back first. Mrs. M hadn't even seen. Not that I said anything--I was too embarrassed."

Frame 15: "The image had been seared into my brain. I was scarred forever." [a thought bubble of the butt, still censored]

Frame 16: "I told the kids on my bus after school." [My younger sister, my friend, and our neighbor with his emo haircut sit listening to me. I look despondent.] My speech bubble reads "And then...he mooned me."

Frame 17: "The thought it was FUNNY!" [Five giggling heads are scattered around the frame in various directions, including Mr. Emohair. They are surrounded by a very large number of "Ha"s]. "They were rolling on the floor."

Frame 18: "No one understands my traumatic experience." [I stare out the window of the bus, grumpily]

Frame 19: A small image of a crescent moon on a dark background.

Particle Physics Careens Towards Boringness

I went to SHP today and, for the most part, completely ignored my class. I tried to pay attention, I really did, but then I decided to take a break to do a math problem, and by the time I was paying attention, the lecture had advanced so much that I no longer could follow it.

Whoops.

The train ride there was relatively boring. It was just Helga, Archie and I. I sat between them, and we managed a little bit of conversation before Helga pulled out her book, I untangled my ipod, and Archie fell asleep. At one point, Archie actually started to snore. I could hear him through the music, so I started cracking up. Helga laughed a bit before returning to her book, which was for English and, according to her, incredibly boring.

Interestingly, both Helga and Archie are looking forward to the end of SHP, whereas I am dreading it. How utterly fascinating, how different people can experience some of the same events and have such entirely different reactions.

I had originally planned to meet up with Rube for Mariokarting, but he had done badly in something and requested a raincheck (Allana was actually confused by the whole thing, which is kind of odd, but, hey, I get by). I texted Helga when there were about 10 minutes left in class to ask where to meet, and she and Ariadne were already outside, so I met them there.

Archie was still in class, they had no clue about Mario, but Ariadne had texted him, so he, of course, called me. To be perfectly honest, I'm still not following that logic.

We as a group had a horrifically large number of awkward silences. It's really remarkable how it's easier to avoid them when with just one other person than when with four. I think that with one person, you feel pressure to actually carry on the conversation, but when you have a lot, you typically let someone else handle it, and when nobody does, it just kind of dies.

I'm going to relate a couple of conversations, but be aware that both are interspersed with a considerable number of unpredictable and unnecessary pauses.

Archie: Middle schoolers are nasty.

Mario: Sorry, what?

Tea: He doesn't like middle schoolers. What was the phrase you used?

Archie: They're awful.

Mario: To who? Us? Each other?

Archie: Everybody.

Tea: This is true.

Helga: Middle schoolers are just nasty. I mean, looking back at it, people were so mean.

Tea: It makes high school look better in comparison.

Ariadne: I hate high school.

Tea: Really?

Ariadne: Yup.

Helga: It's so short, though.

Tea and Ariadne: But it feels like forever.

Helga: Really? It seems like it's only just started.

Archie: Agreed.

Conversation Two:

Ariadne: So, where do you want to go to school? Like, a city or a country?

Tea: I don't know. Somewhere other than here.

Archie: Not a suburb.

Helga: Definitely not a suburb.

Tea: How would you define school suburb, then?

Ariadne: Yale.

Tea: I believe New Haven is a city.

End Conversation

You may have noticed Mario's lack of participation. This stems from the fact that I'd given him my math packet #4 and requested help, and he had been staring at factoring problems (no writing implement, just staring) for about twenty minutes. I then spent the entire forty minutes in which we were standing because the entire train was packed, passing him various math problems, watching him stare at them, and then listening to his explanations.

Once some seats freed up, we moved over there and spent the remainder of the trip trying to determine the number of possible ten-unit strips that could be created out of green three-unit rectangles and red one-units. We had to do out all of the possibilities, and it took a ridiculously long period of time, but we eventually arrived at the correct answer, with minimal weirdness on his part (ex: "It's odd that we arrive at the same conclusions at the same time." "What?" "Never mind." "Sure. Where did you get that 6 from again?" "I divided twelve by two." "Oh, right. That makes sense.").

We had just moved onto the collinear candles when Helga had the decency to remind us that we were at our town's stop, so we disembarked.

The funny thing about staying the same size is that nothing ever goes away

I stumble to the closet feeling as if I should be putting my pajamas back on rather than getting dressed. I smash my hand against the wall until I found the light switch and, squinting, I survey the overflowing buckets of clothing I started using a few years ago in order to keep my closet neat and tidy.

I take off what I’d slept in, a baggy tee from a middle school choir trip that had been worn to bed so many times that the conditioner from my hair had left a large white patch about the neckline. I don’t dwell on where the shirt had come from, don’t bother to send my mind back to getting whiplash on a rollercoaster and drinking myself sick with soda. It is far to early for reminiscing.

I reach into the drawer I keep my bras in, a drawer that is so full of underwear, underwire, and swimsuits that it no longer closes. I dig through it, searching for the practical skin-tone I bought last week. I skip past a bright blue bra, the first one I went to a store and bought, that, miraculously, still fits, despite its somewhat wretched appearance. I run a finger along its limp strap and considere walking into the store with my mother, blushing over the half-naked mannequins and trying to reason out why nearly every item in the store was emblazoned with the word “pink.”

I find the bra I’ve been looking for and put in on. I reach up for the t-shirt bin. I fumble through the softened cotton of the pink v-neck that I'd bought specifically to match the long lavender skirt I spent all of sixth grade dreaming of, the fuzzed print on the shirt that my sister and I both have, that we would wear together while bumping hips and laughing, and the thicker, double-printed fabric of the pink shirt I bought before freshman year, the shirt I was wearing on the day that I lay out on the grass in the sunlight, seeing words and hearing music, and noticed that, surprisingly, I was actually happy.

Happiness is nice, but, after handling the bra, I don’t want pink. I switch to the next bin. I reach past the stiff, ribbed fabric of the long sleeved white shirt I had on when I was sent home from school for being a danger to myself and others, a shirt that I defiantly wore regularly for two years before the memory had receded so far that the defiance was no longer needed, and I saw the shirt was so ugly I didn’t want to wear it in the first place. I discover, then, the thin yet fluffy fabric of the shirt I wore the first day of my freshman year, a shirt that my mother bought me for my thirteenth birthday simply because I said I liked it, a shirt that, every time I look in the mirror while wearing it, I still see my fourteen-year-old self reflected in the mirror in my grandparent’s bathroom, wearing the swirling blue shirt, trying to determine why it was that my grandfather, when looking at me, seemed only able to see that I was everything his favorite was not, with all of the intelligence that could get me to the places my grandfather dreamed of for him, but that he would never be able to reach. I resign myself to his ignorance and take the shirt out.

I reach up for a short black skirt that always brings me back to my first day of sophomore year, sitting in Music Theory, the backs of my thighs frozen against the too-cold seat, wishing that I’d had the foresight to wear pants, or leggings, or anything that could have kept the creeping cold from stretching all the way to my bones.

I remember this and open up a second drawer, this one with two pairs of tights. The first pair is flamingly red and so thin that I avoid touching them for fear of creating runs and destroying a gift from my grandmother. The second pair is gray; I got this pair for Christmas last year, and fell so madly in love that I spent the rest of my holiday vacation running about the house in them. Holding them, I can feel myself sinking back into the comfortable chair in front of the fire, watching the flames as Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer danced from the radio.

I sniff both pairs, testing for cleanliness. The grays have the same scent of laundry detergent the rest of my wardrobe does. Then I bring the reds to my face, and I am suddenly back in my grandmother’s house, standing in her closet, trying on the crazy old clothes, all my size, and dancing before the mirror. Then I am younger, every inch covered by her scarves, scarves that smell of the same closet and home and woman that the tights do, and I am twirling with my sisters to the music produced by a spinning record, and my grandmother is laughing and moving and twice my size, with her eyes whole and her hair long and her heart open to my own.

I slide my left foot into the tights and began to roll them up before I realize that, if I wear them and wash them and sweat in them and fill them with memories of my own, they will no longer be my grandmother’s tights. I remove my foot, roll the tights up, and return them to the back of the drawer.

I put on the gray tights, the short black skirt, and the tee-shirt that I loved freshman year. I put on the crumbling black sweatshirt that still bears the snags of adventure camp, that is still the only item I own that lets me feel fully protected from the little tiny pinpricks of mosquito legs that I still feel crawling beneath my skin in every dawn and dusk and wood. I slip into my piano flats, a pair that I wore for each performance of Beauty and the Beast, that I wore for every recital until I discovered that I could, in fact, pedal while wearing heels.

I pull the tights out one more time, inhaling the overwhelming sense of home, before leaving the closet behind.

Libros Para México

I'm working on lining up seven posts for the next week, so you won't have to miss me while I'm gone. This "planned posts" thing is really ingenious.

For now, I'm lining up books for break. I'm bringing twelve. Dad says I'm insane, but I think it's important to make certain I have enough with me.

Pride and Prejudice and Zombies, by Jane Austen and Seth Grahame-Smith: a retelling of Pride and Prejudice that involves zombies. The first sentence in this book is "It is a truth universally acknowledged that a zombie in possession of brains must be in want of more brains." This is vastly superior to the opening of the original, which reads, "it is a truth universally acknowledged, that a single man in possession of good fortune, must be in want of a wife."

Impossible, by Nancy Werlin: This book has the all-time most beautiful cover I've ever seen. It's got a girl, I think she looks Asian but her face is covered so I don't know, in a blood red dress, standing in a marsh, with these huge, gorgeous mountains in the background. The cover quote is by Gregory Maguire, who wrote Wicked and is awesome. It's based on the song Scarborough Fair, which I love, so it should be good.

A Fine Passion, by Stephanie Laurens: The Baron has come home to intrigue, duplicity and peril . . . and the only woman in all of England who sets free his hidden passions, reads the caption on the inside front cover.

I Thee Wed, by Amanda Quick: Another romance novel. It's heroes are Edison and Emma, and I think that's so adorable I just had to read it.

The Forgotten Legion, by Ben Kane: Ben Kane is a solid name. This one is Ancient Rome, from the perspective of the scum rather than the leaders. If it's any good, I'll probably loan it to Gretchen, as it seems like her sort of thing.

The Goose Girl, by Shannon Hale: Princesses, princes, animals, and magic. Exactly the sort of books I was devouring in middle school. I couldn't resist the urge to get just one more.

Remember When, by Judith McNaught: another romance novel, but this time set in the modern era, but with all of the same silly ideas about marriage. It also has an extremely unscandelous cover, so can be easily hidden.

A Summer Affair, by Susan Wiggs: These protagonists are Isabel and Blue. Again with the wierd names. It's about a doctor and a fugitive. Should be horrifically exciting.

Suite Scarlett, by Maureen Johnson: A fun book about teenagers from the woman who wrote 13 Little Blue Envelopes. Should be a good read.

The Hundred Thousand Kingdoms, by N. K. Jemison: This one is coming out February 25th. I got a pre-publishing copy from the school library, and it looks to be an exciting bit of fantasy. Weirdly, I got through the first chapter and thought to myself "this girl feels black," and proceeded to read the next chapter with that as my mental picture. Turns out the author is African American, so she probably imagined the hero as such. I'm still not sure how I got that out of it, though.

Harry Potter y la cámara secreta, de J. K. Rowling: Opino que sea apropriada si leería una novela en español cuando estoy en México.

City of Ashes, by Cassandra Clare: the second book of a series that is very, very good. However, the fact that the main character is named Clary by an author called Clare is a little bit weird.

Song to Nick Jonas

By A Middle Schooler Near You (well, Tea after she got out of the shower today, because she was entertaining herself. In the shower. And by entertaining herself, I mean writing bad musical-theater-y songs, not whatever you were thinking of, Kathrya)

(Sung kind of to the tune of "A New World, for some of the bits, and kind of to the tune of Ocean Avenue. No, I don't know why)

Nick Jonas

I love you I love you I lo-o-ove you

Nick Jonas

When you ask me to marry you I'll say I do

Cause you're all that I want

from 3000 to forever

and you're all that I need

when I'm burnin' up this world

It's Nick Jonas forever, with the hair and too tight jeans

my Nick Jonas

I saw you

in concert last month and you almost touched my hand

you smiled

at somebody else but I know it was meant for me

Cause you love me right now

with the heart that you have

and you wish you could be here

and not on your dumb tour

it was Nick and me forever, just the two of us, no more,

Nick Jonas

I think we need to talk

I wrote this song last week

and some things have happened since

I've changed

I've grown

I've moved on with my life

Because, you see, Johnny

Johnny from science class

he has hair that's just like yours

except it flips counter-clockwise, way to the left

And Johnny

with his eyes so blue that the sky gets jealous

told Eric who told Laura who told Darby who told me

that Johnny

Thinks that I'm cute

and it made me kind of excited

So, Nick, you're all that I wanted

from 3000 to forever

but I have grown

you've gotten old

and it's time to move on

Because last week in science class

while he was burning methane gas

Johnny tore his eyes from the flame

and he looked at me and said

"movie? friday?" and I said "what movie?"

and he said "whatever you want."

So on Friday, Johnny and I saw New Moon

and a new light dawned on my life

Nick, dear, I loved you once, but better days have come

I can't marry you now

It's not you, it's me,

There's someone else

You're too distant

My heart now belongs to

Taylor Lautner

It's doesn't quite fit but you're really more cute

Taylor Lautner

You've taken my heart so you'll have to commute

You're all that I want

For today and for forever

You'll hold me close

And ditch Taylor like bad weather

Because Taylor

I lo-o-o-o-o-ove you.

Nerds Don't Get Any

This is, as we're all aware, a sad but true fact. And it only makes things worse to hear about all of the people who we considered totally beneath us in middle school, back before we moved to the higher level classes where one could, potentially, find a room in which the only person who's had sex is the teacher, are out there hooking up and doing god knows what else. (Forgive me the run-on sentence. Incomprehensibility seems to be my buzzword for the week). For instance, take Grant, who apparently hooked up with a girl and then called her "Isabel" by accident. I personally don't know anyone named Isabel, so who knows what he was thinking, but regardless, I think I'm going to break into another round of pouting along the theme of what-do-they-have-that-I-don't.

This should make for a highly enjoyable evening.

The whole bit about nerds not getting any is a stereotype. It's a true stereotype as far as e the nerds I know go, but it is a stereotype. This week in Health, Kathrya, Nia and I are making a public service announcement about stereotypes in which we film a representation of a stereotype, then demonstrate how this person subverts it. For nerd, Kathrya got all dolled up in high-waisted cords with a TI-85 in the pocket, a tucked in, baggy white tee, and overlarge glasses. We were debating what subversion to use while Nia got the camera working. My vote was for an STD. Kathrya, however, didn't respond favorably to my pleas to tell the health class that she has gonorrhea.

A few minutes later, Mr. Booth walked by, and Kathrya and I both waved and said hi. He walked over to us.

Mr. Booth: So what are you doing?

Tea: We're making a public service announcement for health.

Kathrya: I'm dressed as a nerd. I don't normally look like this, I promise!

Mr. Booth laughs before saying: Nice calculator.

Kathrya: Haha, thanks.

Mr. Booth: So what is this about?

Tea: Stereotypes.

Kathrya: We're dressing up as them and then subverting them.

Mr. Booth: So how are you subverting nerd?

Kathrya: We're not sure yet. Tea wants to say I have STDs, but-

At that, Mr. Booth's entire head, including the top of it, turned red, and he covered up the his face.

Tea: Honestly, it's health class, I don't see what's wrong with it!

Mr. Booth: It really doesn't seem like the best idea.

Nia: Maybe you party a lot or something?

Mr. Booth: Or she could play sports. You still have the whole jock divide, right?

Tea, musing: What sport, though?

Mr. Booth: How about chess club. Would that work?

Tea, puzzled: No.

Kathrya: Probably not.

Tea blinked a few times, confused.

At that point, Tawny emerged from the bathroom in hippy regalia, and we had to end the conversation to go film her.

Questions

written on spiral bound notecards from god-knows-when. (middle school, I think)

How do people get green eyes?

How do people get red hair?

Why are some people so good at puzzles?

Is there such a thing as a professional puzzler?

What is bigotism?

Who can I get to answer these questions?

Why do computers make so many mistakes?

Why are some teachers better than others?

Can good teaching be taught?

What do the 3 recycling answers symbolize?

What does Hallelujah mean? Why does it have so many different spellings?

Why are some lights brighter than others?

How do the genes work for different hair textures?

Why are grades so important?

How do electric keyboards make noise?

How are shoes made?

Why are some of the lights different colors?

Why is the earth round?

Should I override into Honors Biology?

How does a Punett square always work?

How is a punett square made for height?

Who is right, Discover or my science teacher?

How, exactly, are albino's genes different?

Why are some people more stubborn than others?

Him

I think I saw Him at the beach today.

Funny, isn't it, that I still think of Him with capital letters. That stupid douchebag who has barely even spoken to me since eighth grade still manages to send me into full on panic mode. I've blocked out most memories of him, but I still remember my eighth grade gym teacher forcing me to help him with his rock climbing harness, and him using his usual awful innuendos that seemed to never cease, and me mostly just wanting to cry, and that dumb bitch (I don't use that insult lightly) saying, "if you show him your tits, he'll go away."

It probably wasn't him anyways. He probably wouldn't have been at the house of another guy from our grade. He probably wouldn't be doing some strange provocative salsa dance to the music blaring from the house. He probably wasn't looking at me with that sick gaze that makes me afraid. I didn't have my glasses on, after all, so it probably wasn't him, but I still wanted to run away crying.

I almost wish that he had actually tried something at one point, simply because then I'd have a good reason for hating him, instead of this irrational fear and hatred.

Sorry for the anger, Vicky, my wonderful reader, but I really just wanted to send out a "fuck you" to Mike.

Imagine a scientist...

The past few days, I've been, to say the least, rather busy. This evening however, I decided to take a few minutes to catch up on the blogosphere. I was reading this post on Female Science Professor, and I saw a comment that said:

However, I do remember going in to do a simple physics experiment with my Mom's 1st graders many years ago, back when I was in grad school. My Mom had them draw pictures of scientists before I came in. Lots of white coats and weird hair, and all men. They had a hard time believing that I was a scientist when she introduced me.

-Cloud

This reminded me of an assignment we had in sixth grade. For the assignment, we had to draw a scientist (it was my first homework assignment in middle school). If I remember correctly, and it could be I'm not, I drew a woman in a lab coat with long brown hair, standing on a tile floor next to a table with some beakers on it. Now that I look back at it, I was probably projecting my own interests in science by creating a persona that resembled myself, buy it's interesting that I immediately thought of a woman scientist. I wonder if my ability to picture myself as a scientist stems from this lack of inherent bias, or if my interest in science is what allowed me to see it as a gender neutral profession.

Homework

I swear to god, all this work is eating me up. I'm on my sophomore year- it shouldn't be this bad! It's ridiculous that to find classes that are challenging enough for me mentally, I'm basically forced to give up my emotional well being in favor of the endless stream of homework assignments. Yes, I could, theoretically, take easier classes, but I've done it before, and it generally leaves me both bored and ostracized. I made it through middle school- I do not want to experience anything remotely like that again.

In marginally better news, one week and two days until the first day of the Science Honors Program, and I am so excited. Yes, the fact that I am psyched to ride on a train into new york and learn science is incredibly nerdy, but according to Newsweek, the girl nerd is 'hot', so me and my 5'9" of gangly limbs are ready to prove them right, I suppose. If I could just figure out how to put on eyeliner...

Chilean Teenagers

Did anyone else read this article in the times today?

Basically high-school aged kids (well, my age, but whatever) go to parties and try to hook up with as many strangers as possible.

I could see having one random hookup, but four or five? Look, I'm as horny as the next chick, but even I don't really want to go to a huge party and hook-up with people I don't know. I'm more for specifically directed lust than this sort of general longing. Of course, this is today, while I have my period and am crampy and pissed off. There is a fairly good chance that in a few days I would love to be getting me some unknown boy's ass.

But actually related to the teenagers, if they want to do this, I don't really mind, but I feel like if all these kids are doing this, they're missing out on actual relationships. And it's slightly creepy with the younger kids.

For instance the girl in this pic. Here's the description "Maria Paz, 13, waits with her friends to enter an afternoon party in Santiago." Thirteen! That's in middle school! When I was in middle school, I thought boys were cute, sure, but wasn't that, um, sexually aware. She reminds me of those little girls caused by the Lolita Effect. (good book. I'll talk about that later, I think)

whatever