flighty white girl syndrome

I am not the next big thing. To preserve my psyche I turn to positive self-illusion and think otherwise, and it's popular psychology so don't you judge me you heathens, you do it too. I do not mean next big superstar, I mean next big women's activist; next big community organizer; next big group leader; next big volunteer. I am still trying to be the wunderkind I kinda sorta was predicted to be, at least by my family's standards, before I stopped at 5'6" (high school athlete, model) and stopped working so hard in school (Bs, Cs, went to a high school with higher standards and a sadistic Italian English teacher so no more easy As in the language arts). It's like I learned to read, started writing poetry, got into music and alternative media and comedy (and hockey - yes, I said it) and slid to a halt. I was way, way too fucking cool to be a hipster snob, but I never had a full-on 100% cliche to cling to. My art school friends are indeed in expensive art schools, texting me with stupid, overdramatic bullshit on a daily basis. I was supposed to be so artistically gifted - in some random artistic field - that I could get a scholarship to a privileged art school. My overachiever friends are in some of the most expensive and well-known universities on the east coast and in the midwest, save for any real Ivy Leaguers. The same teacher who refused to give me anything higher than a B (or below, thank God) told me to apply to Columbia's journalism school, of which I really had no chance of getting in unless my creative juices somehow turned sour and I became a fucking elitist snob but man I'd have a biting wit. I have been interested in film and directing since I was a kid. I'd taken my high school's film classes since 10th grade, taught by a director from Pittsburgh Filmmakers, and went through a free summer program also taught by two awesome PF women with a good friend of mine. I watched her go into her other, more practical field choice at Pitt, and I decided not to make a portfolio because - and this is as true as ever - I cannot handle the shitheads who go into film. Not all! Most. Plus, unfortunately, I need a partner to get ideas going. I could just never get anything going in my own head.

I never get anything going in my own head. When someone asks, "Any questions?", my mind goes blank, even though I want to raise my hand and ask something great. Of course, you know, who doesn't! Every day in high school - well, I could do philosophy. I could do politics. Well, I should do film. Or, I like journalism, I like reporting. I'm kinda funny, aren't I? Huh? Yeah, c'mon!

I have a pretentiousness that doesn't quite match my intellect. I have thought I was better than everyone around me probably since puberty, but this complex has disappeared since my emotionally, mentally, physically, academically, sexually and financially shitty first year of university, where I failed at everything but being a total fucking asshole. I still have it over my parents. My parents are homely Pittsburgh people. My dad's an asshole, but my mom is great. I had always figured - because I was told it for so long, or heard while I looked up at my grandparents and they marvelled over something about me - that I would go to college and get a great, great arty job, because the easiest thing to do for me was writing and talking about the technical side of movies through movies while people wanted to punch me in the fucking neck, presumably. (And I still use douchey words like 'presumably'.) I lost my ability to write in an exciting, humorous and 'different' way, a la Sarah Vowell (who I fuckin' love) or like, Lauren Weedman. I had applied to Boston College and was rejected. Although I am told from a friend in Boston that I would have killed myself there, I would have hated it, I just figured he was telling me that I was arty and liberal but I was still simple.

I am not going back on my social worker/activist aspirations, I've already discovered that being holier-than-thou is fucking PERFECT for my ass. No, no. I hate that shit. I do want to whip it out all the time, but that doesn't mean I should. I can't function day to day without thinking how someday I will be making real change. I know that I'm not one of the people who can talk about it and do something else because empowering people and advocating is the shit that draws me, and film and music and writing are relaxers - or second sources of income.

I don't know where this started out. Today I got a small assignment back with a kick-ass grade and aced a sociology test, but I know I'm just passing by. I want to excel and grow this giant fucking lame-ass brain and be the envy of all the critical thinkers in the land and get into Harvard, like my history teacher, who was this young guy who came from as unprivileged a background as I. And I'm sick to death of comparing my damn self to all those assholes cuz I know education's what you make it. My sense is kicking in, though, cuz that sick feeling is disappearing. And the audacity of me - I'm middle class and from white folks. I'm paying for my entire education with loans, even though my heart starts racing when I think about the $80,000 and up in debt I'll be to become a fucking BSW social worker and maybe teacher, which includes an education certificate (read: will never pay off, bitch), but I've had a bigass leg up from the beginning, and I got a stable family.

I got flighty white girl syndrome, and I miss Toronto. I had to get that shit off my chest about not living up to the expectations of anyone, but comparably - I have my shit together. Peace!