30 August 2012:
Ten years on how and what would you remember me for?
Our lives in secondary school are ending. Whether we can't bear to leave or can't wait to leave, it's ending. The teachers that have taught us for the past four years, we'll leave them soon. The buildings that you look at for five days a week, you'll not see them in a long time.The friendships you made ... or broke; will you choose to keep them dear in your heart? Or will you choose to start afresh from whichever institution you head to in the future? Will you be someone who continues to meet up with secondary school friends, or slowly fade away using various excuses?
Four years. If you think of it, four years, it ain't short, it ain't long. If you ask me I think four years is just about enough. Your first year is getting to familiarise yourself with the school. Try and make new friends; it can be a fresh start for some who had bad primary school days.
Your second year is used to continue to learn while enjoying. You hopefully make even more friends, and of course by then you make your choice of subject combination. It is then that you leave your friends you have made to go to different classes. Your friendship, supposedly or not, is tested here.
You may be close to some during lower secondary. Both of you vow to keep in touch. "We'll meet up okay though in different classes!" Both of you agree on this. Then comes the third year.
This is where homework really gets a lot. Don't give me bullshit about having lots of homework during lower secondary. You have never experienced upper secondary homework-load before. With homework, there may come an inverse relation of existing friendships.
The 'we'll meet up' slowly becomes 'sorry, not today'. And that evolves yet again. Maybe last time it was very friendly and lively hellos that were exchanged. Slowly it becomes awkward waves. Should I wave or not, both of you think. Sometimes one party doesn't, the other does so too late, and you have the classic awkward delayed wave.
The fourth year: it's an irony because while homework, tests and other matters pile up the most, you would by right have the most fun and learn the most. Learn might not be referring to syllabus; you obviously should finish the O Level syllabus by then. Learn, as in, learn about people, about friends, about human relations.
Possibly about how you were, or are, an arsehole back then (or maybe till now). The things you did two years ago may suddenly become very lame. Risque humour that you avoided, instead becomes the main conversation starters.
Indeed much can change within four years. Which is why I said it's not long, either. I like to look back in history. Not dwell and feel guilty about past mistakes, but to observe what things were then.
How will people remember me? Maybe the first thing that comes to mind is 'short'. I can't stop people from thinking so; after all I guess height - extremely tall or extremely short - is considerably noticeable. But could there be more to height?
What about 'arrogant', 'bossy'? I have had people honestly reflecting their opinions of me in such. I will definitely be an unjust judge of myself, as it is all too common that we tend to judge ourselves less harshly. Hence I shall not comment on these, but perhaps it shall be true.
I don't know. I've made mistakes in the past four years. There must have been countless times, especially for severely imperfect people like me. I only remember two.
One would be misusing my new-found power as a councillor during lower secondary, against D. I was personally upset and angry at her behaviour, and unreasonably tried to book her. Although the offence I written down, strictly speaking, was valid, 憑良心講 I was not booking her for that.
D was really angry. She wanted to complain to Mr C and my senior (which happens to be the one I disliked most). Eventually I agreed to stop and the matter was laid to rest. If I don't remember wrongly I did not apologise. It was not that I purposely did not, but then it just didn't occur to me that I should.
Now D and I are in the same class. So that's four years in total with D, although of course I'm not close to her. Yet now we are on talking terms, and I think she has completely forgot this matter. Yet she did remark to me previously that she extremely disliked me during lower secondary.
Another would be my rant on Twitter over L. This happened last year, so I guess the impression I had is stronger. I don't know L personally, and I still don't now. Which shows how stupid I was about mocking and sort-of insulting him.
I remember waking up from a nap to a message confirming whether or not I typed something against L. I went to Facebook to check and I saw posts of people condemning me. I can't say anything against it; this is natural reaction upon seeing such things I guess.
This time I apologised. L did not reply or respond to my apology, and this has left me rather crestfallen. It's not that I demand he must accept it, but I feel that this is one 'puzzle' yet to be completed. However, I am contented with the state of affairs now.
L and I just live our lives as it has always been. We pass by each other on the corridor and don't wave. I don't know how he's thinking exactly but I hope that he has forgiven me. My stereotype of L also dropped after a while. I agree with his views sometimes.
We all made mistakes in the past four years. Sometimes they are severe and harrowing, but mostly they are minor ones that constitute our path of learning. We are all expected to be better men (and women) after four years of secondary learning, rightly expected to move on to tertiary education.
Would you remember me by my mistakes? I leave you with a song. It's not directly related with the theme of today's post, but it's a song that has memories. I don't know whether or not the one person I associate with this song can remember, or maybe not since he / she did not realise what this song meant to me then.