I wanted to find Brave New World by Aldous Huxley in the library. The folks at the library for the blind only have it in recorded format, and I hate that with English literature – I tried with Ulysses. Dad said that I was actually asking Mum to go to the library with me to find the book and then scan it for me. I wish I had OpenBook or some other OCR programme that works with JAWS! Of course I did not want Mum to scan the book, but what other options did I have? For me, I’ve nagged quite a bit to the library for the blind folks. Of course, *now* I’m a bit late with the thing – it has to be finished by February 21 -, but I was not when I started trying to locate the book. Maybe there are 90+ other ways to locate a book besides nagging to the library for the blind folks, but I’m admittedly not that creative a problem-solver.
Mum got really angry, switching between what was the problem – the going to the library or the scanning – about every 30 seconds. She searched her bookshelves for English books, and most that she mentioned we aren’t allowed to read for our literature test. Mum screamed: “You know nothing about literature!” and went on to question why I actually wanted to study English while I hated reading. I don’t hate reading, I just don’t feel like doing any schoolwork whatsoever, and there are 90+ reasons to question my ability to study whatever besides my supposed likes or dislikes. There’s a huge difference between what I’m genuinely interested in – English, linguistics, literature, politics, philosophy, history – and what I’m currently busy with, which is more what is going on in my mind. I’m not “interested” in blindness, or giftedness in the way one can be interested in linguistics or history. I’m too busy with my own stuff to spend much time on my genuine interests, I know, but I cannot go to university to study me-ology. I don’t feel like going to university at all. It used to help to just work extra-hard on school stuff, but it doesn’t seem to anymore.
Mum went on to wonder when I was finally going to be mature and independent. She seems to think that all there is going on is a large amount of laziness. I feel like I did in late 1998 and early 1999, and also a bit throughout 1998: Mum who just wants to kick me to university (or normal school, at the time). But it was Mum making the applications at the time; now, it’s me. Part of me wants to apply to university, like Mum applied to my current high school in 1999. I held on, didn’t I? I’m a senior now. But what kind of senior in high school? There’s not the least bit of excitement about college in my mind right now, which there was in 1999 – at the time, Mum also only kicked me to normal school on insisting I do lots of advanced schoolwork, like with the enjoying literature now. There is much more to the university stuff than there used to be to the normal school stuff, at least in my view. Mum may’ve had the same worries, but I didn’t start to till the summer of 1999. Plus, at the time I had the illusion that I could get better at what I was bad at – behaviour stuff, mostly, at the time – just by reminding myself that I should. I don’t hold that belief now – I’ve had enough experience to know that a simple “this has to stop by [...]” won’t get me to gain independence in any way. I have to learn to, but telling me over and over again that I “wanted” to study English (I don’t want to at all right now!) and a “when are you going to get mature and independent?” won’t equip me with the skills I’ll need.
Eventually, I found Brave New World on the Internet. I’m going to tell my teacher on Monday. Now, I first have to read La Chute for French. But, fortunately, both books are quite interesting in their philosophical themes.
Astrid
