I write to you from Melbourne. City of opportunity and art. I am going to an open day in just over ten hours…
Shit shit shit. Why did I phrase it like that for myself? I should be in bed.
My mother is bothering me about everything again. I brought the laptop with me with the sole and specific intention of blogging; and here she is trying to make half inebriated conversation while I type. I only have it out here because it’s the warmest room and I didn’t want her to feel left out. If I go into another room it’s always ‘Are you going to be doing that all night?’ or ‘Fine, just leave me out here, shut yourself away, whatever.’ I have read entire books while she prattled on to herself in an exhausting circular monologue.
I was meant to be up an hour earlier. No-one woke me up because they know that the last three hours were all the sleep I got. I had one of the worst night’s sleep ever. It feels bad to dwell on this unpleasantness; kind of like the broken glass thing (as it has now become known) and even more so for my reaction. As I am astounded to find I haven’t referred to it yet (note to self: remember to include this on list of dislikes in CAPITALS) it might bear mentioning that might pet hate is SNORING. And my mother is a serial offender. This particular night; she snored, and snored, and snored, and snored, and snored, and snored, and snored, and snored, and snored, and snored, and snored, and I could never get sick of hitting ‘Paste’ to emphasise that fact. We were sharing the same double bed, and even though it was about freezing point out there, I was overheating like crazy. So literally every ten minutes for 5 hours I would be yanked out of my feverish nasty dream in which I was being chased; to the sound of snoring verging on asphyxiation; and be unable to get back to sleep – but upon miraculously managing to do so, would start the cycle again. So after 5 hours of this; with the open day drawing ever closer, and no hope in sight (believe me I tried everything!) I lay there on my back and began to weep.
Once I, and the source of my distress; were discovered the remaining three hours passed without event. It’s just a shame it had to come to that.
Of course we left late. Of course the day started without us. I am wearing my finest clothes, selected for the look and the warmth. And that extra three inches of height. The campus is huge; very white and blue. The lady at the desk gives us all the necessary pamphlets and directs us to the vocal teacher and director of my course. She is with other prospective students and so we wait. She sees them off with a warm handshake then welcomes us in. She has an unusual and almost inherently pretentious name. She’s pale and light blonde, well rounded and sort of soft at the edges; middle age suits her well. I tell her about my interest and slip in my singing teacher’s name. She gets down to business immediately; and in handwriting that would by and by become unintelligible she writes down the exhausting and thoroughly unachievable list of criteria on the back of my booklet. Although I am just barely able to follow what she tells me; it immediately occurs to me that I will never ever be able to get into that course. We came all this way, and weeks and weeks of my hopes for my future all tied to this course; I was so glad to have that to latch onto, a tangible string anchoring me to my dreams… cut lose in a second. We leave quickly after that; she never asks my name or shakes my hand to say goodbye. I contain the tears of realisation and melancholy as we turn the corner.
But indeed nothing cheers me up better than shopping; and being crushed against a horde of foreign bodies in a computer market was probably the best thing for it.
My mother and I come back to my grandmother’s to a kitchen full of over 6o doughnuts, and I have my first experience of cooking with my grandmother (almost forgot the ‘with’).
I tried not to think about the repercussions of the day, and attempted to catch up on some sleep on the way home.
Also on the topic of doughnuts (we had a whole bag taking up the last available space in the car, right behind my headrest, filling my hair with delicious doughnutty goodness); this is a shot I took of the service station we stopped at on the way back home.
When we got home, settled in and unpacked; I contemplated my pathetic existence in more detail, and found myself looking over the course guide that the unctuous speakers who came to my school gave me. I looked at my course options in a new although pessimistic way. University is not about realising your dreams. No amount of money or tutoring, is going to get me what I want. It is not about going out on a limb and chasing any rainbows. University is just another extension of your schooling. Just another link in the chain on the way to ‘real life’, that no-one admits is there. Just like kindergarten is preparation for primary school. Just like they told you that your final year primary school was all a preparation for high school. Just like high school is nothing but preparation for your final result. University does not entitle you to freedom and happiness. University is not preparation for your dreams.
I prefer to think of it now as the last link; the last narrowing of the subject selection within high school. Last year I had 6 subjects, this year I have 4, so what would I study if I only go 2? English and Drama.
A university course, as evidenced by my experience at the open day, is something that you have to spend your whole life devoted to getting into. Your interest has to be something that you are either superbly naturally gifted at, or that you have worked at every minute of the day. And there was never a surer thing than my language and acting skills.
I welcome this new course. This new avenue. Alive again are the feelings of life being a journey, which I at first shunned with incomprehension and annoyance, but now embrace with awareness and appreciation. Thank you for keeping on about that Idril. I’m sorry if I was an unreceptive subject; but I get it now. You have taught me more than you know; I learnt many a vicarious and difficult lesson about post-secondary life thanks to you. You have also officially had me bitten by the travel bug; and I have acknowledged to myself that my life would not be complete without visiting the UK. A student exchange program is the most hassle free cheap opportunity to travel the world that you will get; and I have promised myself, in light of my new course and choice of university, that I will study part of my course overseas.
...And as midnight rolled around again we see just how much change in 24 hours…
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