On Dividing Rooms for Rome

As I walked out of classroom 1, in which all 11th grade girls had been dividing rooms for Rome and I just had been standing in the other girls’ way neither knowing whom to share a room with, nor thinking I’d find anyone, I seriously thought over my position in 11th, and actually always since 9th. I’m not teased, like I was in 8th. No-one actively ignores me like kids, including me to others, used to do on elementary school. When teachers nag about me having to find a partner/group or propose strange things like me having a dialogue with myself for French (Van O. proposed that), some folks will ask if they can cooperate with me. But for a long while I’ve been certain no-one would want to share her room with me, even if I complained about not having a group (like I heard Sietske did, who’s now sharing her room with Lisanne and some others). I think some people are nice and I can talk with them for a while when we encounter each other (very stupid talks these are always, centering around school subjects and university), but I notice they don’t appreciate it when I go up to them to have a chat.

I feel I’m having some type of “status quo”. The others don’t openly criticise me (which they do with others), but I notice they don’t like me in any way. They seem not to care and I don’t really care either, or at least I don’t let it show. Of course I’d rather have a circle of acquaintances than being like the idiosyncratic outsider who “should” be left alone (not ignored, I feel), but I can’t easily change that – even if I were able to follow up the things I’d listed under (un?)realistic on my SMART. I’m not feeling particularly lonely, I was just feeling totally embarrassed and it made me think over these things. I was only standing in people’s ways and everyone could see I wasn’t coming to divide rooms. After five minutes I left, feeling I’d better not come, cause I didn’t know what I was doing there and I didn’t expect to find people to share a room with – then I’d been living under a rock over the past weeks, cause everyone’s been arranging rooms unofficially during the past weeks. I don’t really care – I know the folks expected me to find roommates but I’ve known for weeks that I wouldn’t get to find them -, but it was (and is, I still will have to share a room with some folks) just another instance that shows my idiosyncrasy and unsociability and makes me feel terribly embarrassed while I don’t know what to do about it.

Astrid

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Updates on French1

Wow, I haven’t been writing in a relatively long while. A lot has happened lately, but I’m not sure whether I can write pretty often now, cause I’m very busy getting my homework done.

At first, I find I ought to give an update on the French1 issue. Last week, Mrs. Van O. told me to think of a creative solution to the units five and six correction thing. I didn’t know and I pretended not to care. The hext day, Mrs. Van O. said to me that during the V-periods I could ask her to help me correct the things. That day was a V-period, but then it couldn’t because someone had to retake her reading test, and the next Friday (V-period for the 10th-graders, but we’re allowed to attend as well) there was also someone taking a reading test. Not that I felt myself able of asking Mrs. Van O. to help me sometime, but still. Today was a normal class (actually V-period but everyone had to come cause yesterday the class was cancelled) and I didn’t ask Mrs. Van O. when she had time to help me with the correction. She called everyone’s name and checked how far we’d come. When she asked about my units five and six I said I still didn’t have them finished. She said I could “make use of her services” and hadn’t come to her to make an appointment. Yeah, that was true. Then she muttered something I couldn’t understand. At least she finished her statement by saying that what I’d said wasn’t correct. I didn’t and still don’t understand why it wouldn’t. Maybe she misheard my saying, but usually when she’s not sure about what someone says she asks to repeat it. (Is it us talking softly or she hearing poorly?) Maybe she did hear me correctly, but somewhere in the things she said that I couldn’t understand she said what she meant or her logic is just quite complicated. As everyone, including me, had begun working or correcting, I felt very weird. This time, both Carol and Jane found I was being stupid. Jane for the usual reason of me always being stupid if I can’t do the same things everyone does without adaptations or extra help, and Carol because I didn’t ask Mrs. Van O. to help me correct the work. Last Friday and today (oh that’s Tuesday btw), when I’d planned to ask her, I was feeling the weird “kept from” (should be “held back” cause “keep from” requires an ing-form, but I don’t care) feeling again. I really hate that feeling. In this case, I do know what to do – go up to Mrs. Van O. and ask her when she’s time to help me correct the units -, bust still some weird thing is keeping me from actually doing it. It is about the same feeling as I have when I’m expected to do a really complicated thing I don’t see the structure in: I don’t do it at all. Sometimes, I do things like this, but in a very odd way. That’s when I’m not sure how to act, but can get myself to do something at least. This time it’s driving me crazy: just a very simple thing this should be, and still… All the semi-fictional stories I’ve written lately deal with this kind of situations, the first two being stories I actually wrote as a means of explanation of this issue to my tutor. None of the stories is clear – they all tell vaguely about not being able in the right way, not being allowed or feeling kept from doing something. And actually I don’t mind getting to understand what kind of feeling this is, I wish I knew how to get over it.

Anyway, Thursday I plan to ask Mrs. Van O. about the thing. I don’t know if I’ll actually do it, but I hope so. Otherwise, according to Brenda, I shouldn’t care, cause if I don’t get a mark, so what? And if Van O. refuses to correct my next test (that what she’ll do if we don’t have all our marks), so be it. And if that means I’m not going to 12th, who cares? I didn’t want to go to 12th anyway. But of course I do care – even if it’s only for morality’s sake -, and I should now eventually be able to get rid of this annoying feeling. Oh and by the way I want to get rid of those stupid doubts and the “ladies” driving me nuts, too, but I’m afraid that won’t be that easy.

Astri

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On My Future…

I feel sooo depressed… Now that I’m touring universities (went to the University of Utrecht today) and thinking about my future (ie. university, jobs, etc.), thoughts of what I REALLY think my future will be like keep spinning through my mind. Mum thinks I’m going to uni in September of 2005 (hate to say “next year”), do great there, move out on my own a short while later and care for myself perfectly, participate in all the extremely cool and advanced activities, get my BA with super grades ant then do a great research Master’s and then… She says I’m leaving for the States to get my Ph.D. then, but that’s my own idealistic dream and she probably realises that’s not going to happen. At least I’ll get a great job etc. etc. Some things are vague things, but some hold real expectations, or at least it’s coming across like that. For instance, Mum keeps worrying about having to travel to my university and then nagging about getting a room. She says she “just thinks that travelling will be difficult”, and doesn’t want to imply that she wants me to move out. Well, once I’ve moved out I’ll still need to travel at times (and walking is the most difficult type of travel for me) and I’ll also need to caare for myself and live in a dorm setting etc., won’t I? By the way, I don’t understand a thing about why she’s so worried about my travel skills while she seems to find my even worse daily living skills to be something I just acquire once I need to.

I know that parents like to be proud of their children at times. However, Mum’s future plans for me aren’t like that. Or she would be stupid as hell, not realising that if I go on like I do now I won’t achieve a thing she says I will. I think Mum ain’t stupid and she just thinks I’ll eventually get to achieve what she plans for me to achieve once I really, really need to. Well, I don’t think so. As I already have noticed during the whole issue with Mrs. Van O., I won’t get over my issues if I’ll otherwise get into trouble. Now by the way my Mum still wants to read the unit 7 (next unit) correction stuff to me. But yeah, I can’t go on not doing what I sould do due to weird issues and in the end getting (part of) the problem solved by my parents’ eventual willingness for some other years, can I?

I don’t imagine myself suddenly becoming a relatively normal student by 2005 (remember, I hate it, but that’s NEXT YEAR!). Maybe my parents and many other folks (in fact, I seem to be the only one who’s worried) think I’ll rub along there because they simply want me to be a normal kid except I don’t have sight (standard definition of blindness on E-mailing lists) or because, like most others, they just think an intelligent girl should be able to make it at uni.

As I’ve probably made clear already, I don’t think I’ll just make it once I’m forced to leave hs and got o a uni. I’m certain things like the Van O. issue will occur much more often, and that’s only for the academics that can become a problem due to non-academic reasons. Not even thinking of whether I’ll actually have the academic skills required, but that’s the thing I’m least worried about. But studying itself is so much more than academics. It’s quite interactive, and not really structured at all. And there’s so much more in studying than academics. Do I do well at highschool? Only looking at grades one’d say yes and academics are the only thing that will get me a diploma, but looking further few people think I’m doing really great. And on uni it’s indeed only academics (which as I said are much more difficult than in hs) that’ll make me earn my degrees, but the study involves much more and I don’t think folks at uni are as protective as they are at hs (read: I’m certain they’re not). Therefore, I believe I’ll only be a major in English for at last a month, if I even get to go to uni – cause it’s not just imaginary that I won’t even be able to take the initiative to apply for a study…

So, although my Mum imagines me getting my MA in 2009 and then leaving for the states or something to get my Ph.D. (Dad brought up that possibility once and of course it’s a fantastic dream), I’m almost certain that by 2006 I’ll be hanging round someplace, getting my income from SSI (which I’ll be on also if I do get to keep studying) and being like the stereotypic blind folks who are still overly dependent on others (read: worthless) as adults because either they had “over-protective” parents (if mine are over-protective I’m happy they don’t know)or are just lazy.

But yeah, many issues of mine with understanding situations and the “locked up inside/held back” issue etc. look quite similar to laziness. Maybe they are… And yeah, I have a negative attitude, but it’s just sooo depressing…

Astrid

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On Princess Juliana’s Death

Yesterday (Saturday) morning princess Juliana, queen Beatrix’s mother, died. She was 94-years-old and many people consider it to be in some ways good, cause she was severely demented. Juliana had already retired from queendom for six years when I was born, but from what I hear she was a very humane queen. Now I’ve never been really royalistic, but still. From what I hear on the news and what memories folks have she seemed to be a very “normal” queen, just like all the other Dutch folks. Only she was quite pacifistic, which wasn’t really good in the 1950s (Cold War), cause the government wasn’t either.

Juliana’ll be buried on March 30th in the New Church in Delft, where all royals are buried. Queen’s day and prince Friso’s marriage however can still go on, cause they’re after the period of familial mourning.

Dad immediately said: “So next Monday we’re going to have another minute of silence.” We had three minutes of silence for the Madrid terrorist attack victims, two for a teacher who was murdered on a school in The Hague and so forth and my Dad thinks we’re having way too many moments of silence due to disasters. He says that when he was in highschool, he’d experienced it once, and that was when Wilhelmina (Juliana’s mother, queen from 1898-1948) died. I to some extent agree with that, but yeah, when a folks were silent for a moment when Wilhelmina dieed in 1963, we should do so for Juliana’s death as well.

Astrid

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Updates on Rome

Yesterday Mr. De B. E-mailed me some info on Rome that he’d gotten from Mr. Nuesink (PE teacher and one of the arrangers for Rome). One paper was on the room arrangement. Wednesday March 31st we’re going to have a pre-arrangement. Hmmm, so I’m not gonna be free the first seven hours (which I actually would’ve been), but only the first five. Hehe no it doesn’t matter.

The other was the programme. Unfortunately, I can’t read the times, so am going to ask Sigrid of Mum to help me. Don’t know, maybe that’s a special format or something.

Today during classical culture our teacher, Mr. Blankenborg (or Bbg), talked to a group of us (only six had to come to class, including me) about the presentations we’re going to have in Rome. He talked about needing to show our peers round in the building we’re going to do our presentation on and about needing to know what the buidling looks like and looking at lots of pictures in order to have as clear an image of the building as possible, cause most times the building will look different from what we’d expected and we still have to know our way around in there. Oh well, I thought at first, I do it on Raphael’s grave which is simply a grave in the Pantheon and not a building, so that shouldn’t be too difficult. Then Bbg talked about the Pantheon, which wasn’t too difficult, but said that in each group there’d be someone to do a presentation on Raphael’s grave and that that can be pretty difficult cause you should know which stone to go to. Again he started nagginfn about needing to see pictures, lots of pictures, so that the one who does the presentation knows exactly where to go, cause we can’t wait half an hour tofind our way. OK, so he emphasised Raphael’s grave in discussing how difficult the presentation’d be? Sigh, that’d become difficult… Later, when everyone had left, Bbg asked about me in Rome and somehow we got to talk about the presentation. I said I did it on Raphael’s grave (which no intention of complaining or anything, just for his info). “Oh, so you do it on Raphael’s grave?” he said in a way as if doing the presentation on that would be even more difficult than I already thought. Anyway, I hope it’ll go well, of course.

On April 2nd, we have to hand in a paper on what facts we’re going to talk about in our presentation. We already had to write research questions, which I’ll try to answer. I mainly want to know what made Raphael so honorable that he got curied in the Pantheon. Unfortunately, I can find a whole bunch of info on Raphael, but very little on the grave, and one of my research questions is what are interesting hallmarks of the grave. Hope I can find some more on that, but according to Bbg it’s just a gravestone.

Astrid

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Eye Doc

Went to the eye doc. Of course, we had to wait for quite a while cause docs are always late. He looked at my eyes and tried to check my intraocular pressure. After some things he said everything looked normal or normal for someone with ROP (commented on something in my right eye not looking good but that was normal due to retinal detachment) and my intraocular pressure, as far as he could measure (had to feel it cause his normal way of measuring didn’t work) was normal. Dad asked about the cataract and the eye doc said it there was a lot of cataract, but that he wouldn’t operate it. The only reasont o perform a surgery would be if we thought I could get better sight, but we don’t think so. We left and I’m happy there’s nothing harmful with my eyes but I find it disappointing still not to know what I got the pain from and what to do about it. Hope it’ll disappear.

Astrid

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Doctor, V-Periods and Beautiful Weather

Went to the doctor this morning at 9:10 AM because of the eye problem. I described my symptoms and the doc looked in my eye, but he couldn’t see any outward problem. Therefore, he referred me to an eye doc. Mum asked if it could be high intraocular pressure and the doc said the eye doc had to check for such things. He btw also asked when I’d been to the ophtho for the last time. Mum and I thought 1995, but it appeared I’d had an eye exam in 1999 (talked about something with right eye retinal detachment). Oh yeah, that was because of me leaving the sped school. My Mum also asked for a note saying I had a reading disability (blindness is considered that), so that I might get the Daisy-player paid for by the insurance. We left and made an appt. with an eye doc for this afternoon at 4:20. That’s during my last class, but my Da’d going to pick me up then.

Oh, it’s beatuful weather. I’d actually planned to have a V-period this hour, but the cab had understood that it had to come at 11:40, while I meant 11:20, so it was “late” (well, it wasn’t the cab’s mistake, of course) so I was late for this class and decided I wouldn’t go there. I’ve been to two V-periods already, one of which I didn’t even get a stamp on my chart for. I’m going to Latin on Friday as well and also to classical culture, but I think I won’t get a stamp for that one, cause they’re being quite weird with their V-periods. Hehe, hear me blah about V-periods as if the only sense they make is because we get stamps for them and have to get six on our charts. (I didn’t count the mmultimeda centre ones in this, I’ve three of them already) Well, might go to a V-period tomorrow the sixth period or maybe the first or Friday the first or seventh period. I’m now probably going outside to celebrate the one day of spring we’ll get, cause tomorrow or Friday it’s going to get colder again.

Astrid

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Talked to Tutor Yesterday

Tuesday the first period is standard tutor period. Most students talk to their tutors then and so do I. At first, I mentioned the new grade (5.8) for German. I forgot the six for French. For today, I had to write down what I looked forward to and what I was worried for in Rome (we’ll go there April 24 – 30). I’d written that I liked the cultural experience and learning about the buildings etc. I was worried about the organisational stuff, cause it was quite complicated. For instance, I’d heard some things about info being brought round that I apparently didn’t get (but heard it from Sigrid, who’d heard it from Marten, her boyfriend, who’s in the 11th grade). Also, the whole thing with the annotated programme proposal had made me worried, cause I wasn’t prepared for it. Later I heard it was meant that I’d get to know of that thing much before, so th at it wouldn’t have been a surprise, cause I would need time to prepare for it.

Then we talked about socialising issues. This has been quite an issue for me for a long while and we’ve addressed it quite extensively over the last few months. I don’t know exactly how we got to talk about it; I’d written something about it in the thing on Rome but can’t remember h ow exactly it went. Anyways, I also had to write my SMART (thing on which you have to write your goals and how you’re going to reach them) about this topic. That way, we got to speak of situations that I had difficulty to behave the right way in. I said I sometimes didn’t know how to behave in a certain situation. Mr. De B. said it was the first time I’d really said that (I’d written it down before) and “congratulated” me. Hehe, LOL, grin! We talked about maybe talking to some classmates so that I could get to know something more about this. If this was a good idea? I said I’d think about it and write about it for next week (which’ll be Monday cause Mr. De B. will be absent on Tuesday). So I should do what I planned to on my SMART. Oh, and maybe we’re going to ask my teachers to fill out a social skills list about me. That’s a stupid list, but it might be good to determine what the teachers think of me in this area.

Astrid

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French Class and the Ladies’ Views

Yesterday I had French class. I arrived a little bit late because my computer didn’t work (my Dutch teacher had given me a floppy with sellotape on it, so I couldn’t get the floppy out of the floppydrive). I told Mrs. Van O. that I hadn’t done my work, but she was calling everyone to either show their work or confess they didn’t finish it. The latter one was the vast majority, who all needed to finish their work during this class or they wouldn’t get a mark. I said I still hadn’t corrected it and explained I’d asked my parents and siter (again) etc. At one point I got a little bit irritated (admittedly…) and asked if I shoud ask the person who accidentally drove by my house to correct it then. Mrs. Van O. seemed not to care – it was my responsibility and the work had to be corrected, no matter how I did so. How stupid! Why does she want to check on the work if she doesn’t care and it’s our responsibility??? She said she’d done her part of it and I should do mine. What part did she do, if I may wonder? She gave me some papers that can’t be scanned and when I told her she said that it was my responsibility and someone should read it to me. She asked when I was going to have it corrected then? I didn’t know. You know, I’ve done everything I could to get someone to help me with the stupid assignments! Anyway, I didn’t get my mark and I don’t really care. I really want to let down that stupid French2 (well, this was French1 but it’s one subject and I want to have French1 only, but I won’t get my parents’ permission.

The “ladies” were fighting again. Carol’s role is virtually over. Sigrid doesn’t think so – she still says I should complain about it etc. -, but I think it is. Jane’s haunting me terribly with all her arguments on Mrs. Van O. accommodating for me and I just being a lazy girl who’s stupid at French and should learn to appreciate Mrs. Van O.’s efforts to accommodate to me and not nag about her so-called “mistakes”. Brenda doesn’t care – if it’s my responsibility, for whom do I do this? Not for Mrs. Van O. cause she sucks anyway. Not for French cause that’s a stupid subject. Let alone for 12th cause I don’t want to go there anyway. Just for some stupid sense of Jane’s morality, which sucks and I shouldn’t care about. It’s all driving me nuts. Janés constantly telling me how egoistic and lazy I am and that she’s tried to teach me “compensatory skills” for a long while but I still am horrible at them. Carol finds that Jane ain’t right: of course we should appreciate people’s efforts to accommodate, but does that mean that we should be very appreciative of what Mrs. Van O. did and certainly not say a thing about her – as Jane views it – not accommodating? “Yeah,” Jane interrupts her argument. Ladies, please, I can clearly remember how you drove me nuts in 9th and I don’t want such battles inside my mind again…

Astrid

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Thoughts on the Madrid Terrorist Attacks

It’s Madrid, ETA, international terrorism and the elections in Spain what we hear on the news all the time. Because Aznar blamed the ETA (Basque seperation movement) for the train attacks of last Thursday, while there seems to be great evidence that it’s Alquaeda, Aznar’s probably lost the elections. Most Spaniards were totally against the war on Iraq, while Aznar was one of Bush’s greatest followers. The critics say the attacks reminded Spain of their opinion and Aznar’s, so that they voted for the social-democratic party rather than Aznar’s conservatives. I totally condemn the terrorist attacks, but am happy with the outcome of the elections, because I’m a socialist.

Would it be by accident that the attacks come exactly two and a half years after the 9/11 WTC and Pentagon attacks? We’re gonna hold three minutes of silence at 12:00 PM again. In Spain, they had a quarter of silence last Friday to remember the attacks.

Everyone’s debating now whehter the Netherlands are in danger of terrorist attacks. I don’t think there’s a great chance: we have neither skyscrapers nor big cities. However… We do have the international court of justice and other such organisations… But would that be a reason for terrorists to attack our country? If they would, they’d either attack Schiphol or Rotterdam’s haven.

Oh for clarity’s sake: I completely condemn the attacks – no matter its influence on elections or terrorist attacks in the Netherlands – and feel really sorry for all the victims and their relatives.

Astrid

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