Tuesday 16 June 2009

Susie is watching and waiting

I don’t like the way things are at the moment. There’s a horrible uncertainty floating around about all sorts of things and I’m not very good at dealing with it.

These exams are more important than anything I’ve done before. They are what decides whether I get into the university I have my heart set on, or have the difficult decision of whether or not I’m willing to settle for my insurance choice. The next three years of my life are completely undecided and I have to keep stopping myself from planning them all out, because I know that will just make me even more devastated if my plans fall through.
Even in the short term - before all the test papers get sent off to stuffy examiners, and we sit around waiting for results day – the exams themselves are so uncertain. All of the papers I sit, I walk into thinking ‘this could go one of two ways: fine, or horrendously’ and I walk out not knowing much more. I don’t know if the revision I’ve done will be enough, I don’t know if I’ve even learnt it correctly, and all I can do is wait and see how the paper turns out.

Beyond all this crap that other people would call ‘exam stress’ are even more uncertainties that unsettle me even more. Things like whether or not friendships are going to stick. I was talking to someone the other day about needing to let go of old friendships, and look forward to new ones. I assured him that once he was surrounded by a new group of people who would mean just as much to him as his current friends do now; it would be all that much easier to be apart from those current friends. And suddenly all those friendships that I had built up to be strong and everlasting seemed a whole lot flimsier. As excited as I am about making new friends, and as sure as I am that once I have those new friends it will be infinitely easier to say goodbye to those I have now; I’m quite sure I don’t want to say goodbye to them.

On top of all this, are the stupid little uncertainties that when written down don’t seem like much, but having them all floating around my head is making me uneasy. I still don’t know how everyone is going to get to prom, nor do I have shoes, a bag, or a hair appointment. I don’t know how well any of my six holidays are going to work out. One isn’t organised yet; another we don’t know how we’re getting any food or whether we’re going to be able to tolerate each other for a whole week; I don’t know if I have enough money to afford any of them.

I think I’ve talked about this before. I do, I need consistency, I need certainty.

Susie is not getting a lot of that right now.

Monday 1 June 2009

Susie is 18, and not subtle about it.

I’ve been all over the shop today. Mood-swingamundo. Maybe I’m pregnant.

Susie is trying something a little bit new with today’s blog. A complete run-down of the day. It won’t stick, she promises.

11.15am – woke up fairly suddenly after a nightmare involving the Joker, craving some tuna mayonnaise. I was craving the tuna mayonnaise when I woke up, not the Joker in the dream.

11.16 – had a bath to fill the 39 minutes before the Gilmore Girls, also because I looked like some sort of greasemonster and there was a chance that Sam and I were going out for lunch, in public.

11.55 – watched Gilmore Girls and decided the tuna mayo craving was going to win over lunch with Sam. A gamble which paid off, because we never did go out for lunch and the tuna mayo was really good.

12.55 – started revision, but a little half-heartedly, in front of the tv.

13.55 – left the tv and started real revision in my bedroom.

13.56 – felt more frustrated with chemistry than I ever have in my life. As the last year has been passing by, I’ve known that I wasn’t learning as much as I needed to in chemistry. The unfortunate fact that one of my teachers was not only my form tutor and a lovely guy, but also an appalling teacher never did bode well. Today, one topic was just not clicking, and I couldn’t seem to find the notes to make it click; if I’m honest, that’s not the sort of thing that happens to me very often, I tend to get things at least in concept, and I didn’t like it.

14.15 – worked it out. Felt the unfamiliar feeling of success as a result of genuine hard work. I wonder if I’ll ever have a job that will actually encourage me to work really hard. Even this minor victory is making me think that it might actually be worth it.

15.30 – told myself I deserved a break from revision. Looked through my old computer for some music to listen to since I’ve lost my iPod and the laptop was downstairs with the cleaner, who I make it my business to avoid whenever she comes round. Found some classic tunes and was hit with various waves of nostalgia, quite nice really.

15.45 – found myself in tears. Every now and then I think about what’s going on at the moment, the idea of leaving school, leaving home, starting uni. I think I’ve come to terms with leaving school friends, because I’ve come to terms with leaving school and the two just come together. Today I thought about leaving Ally. For the past few years, I’ve seen him fairly consistently every week. How many times a week has varied certainly, but it’s been something that I’ve been able to rely on. But it hit me today that that’s all over; already. I knew we were going to have to leave, I knew we were only going to see each other in the holidays, I knew it was going to be hard to keep up the friendship we have. But I didn’t realise that it was all over already. We’ll barely see each other during exams, and then even less over the holidays, and after that we’re off. I thought about saying goodbye to him and I thought how much I’m going to miss him and yes, I cried. Pathetic? I think so.

17.30 – after a load more revision (although not as much as I had intended), decided I deserved to watch Friends.

21.00 – realised how happy I am to be leaving home. Somehow my family, my parents mainly, are capable of annoying me just by being. Everything they say to me seems to irritate me, everything they do. I’m just not sure I like them as people. I can’t decide whether that sounds typically teenagery, truly horrible or both.

22.00 – realised I hadn’t taken my iron tablet. Couldn’t find my iron tablets. Almost cried (again) I got that angry.

22.03 – found the iron tablets.

22.40 – So this is now. Mother has just walked into the room and decided to complain to me about her job. I think she knows that I don’t care, I think I know that I should, I certainly know that if I went into the reasons why I don’t care, I would seem like the nastiest daughter on the planet.

22.42 – Susie is going to bed.