Friday, December 29, 2006

Stuff I wish I'd learned when I had the chance




I've been writing this detailed account of an incident which happened on the plane at the beginning of our trip, but when I write things in stages, they get way too long so the story is now approaching novel length. As a result, I'm moving on and going to spit something out in one blow and get a move on. That other story is like a clog in a fucking drain!

I been very ponderous in the last few weeks about the number of opportunities I've had to learn stuff which I didn't take advantage of. Is there any way they could make school such that kids would be more willing to take advantage of these opportunities? Or perhaps I was just born lazy.

I've always been interested in curious about things, so I struggle to understand why I was so lame in school and didn't learn certain things when I could have. It's so frustrating.

Just a week after I turn 29, I will be commencing a 5 week sewing course. I fear for the first class which will likely go over all the basics about machine operation and threading a bobbin. Shit I already know how to do! We covered all that in high school, but at the end of it, that was pretty much all I could do. Wind and thread the bobbin. Every time I tried to sew anything, it jammed down into the machine and I spent the remainder of the class digging it out with a sharp implement. Aside from the fact that the school sewing machines were probably lousy and their poor function did nothing to encourage my advancement in sewing, I know I went in with an attitude. I didn't need to know how to SEW. Who needs to know that? Ugh. I wonder how much better at it I could be today if I had paid attention. I somehow got through the class and made a tie dyed apron with the 90210 logo painted on the front. I wish I knew where that thing was! I started the class making a skirt, but all my fabric ended up chewed, so I had to make the default item with the school provided materials.

A purse I made with my limited sewing skills. I could be a more advanced sewer by now, had I paid attention!

The year after that, we were given the chance to learn photography. Shouldn't that have seemed a little cooler than sewing which is for homemakers and losers? No, still not interested. Admittedly, Mr C was one those teachers you simply couldn't learn from because 80% of class time was spent stirring him and asking him about his bung knee. He had been hit by a bus, so when he walked, the shin of one leg flew forward a few degrees past his knee. One day, he was fed up with the questions and said "Okay! You want to see it? If you don't want to see it, look away." He rolled up his trouser leg and showed us. It looked a little messed up, but not too bad. He then continually banged on it with his hand, "See...it's a good strong knee. See...OWWWWW!" He hit it too hard. God that was funny. Anyway, he was just one of those teachers that couldn't hold our attention because we all had an attitude about him. Good natured, but he certainly couldn't control us. All his useful information about aperture, ISO and lenses was wasted on me. I simply paid no attention unless he was over my shoulder making me do something. I know I could look up the meaning of aperture now, but for the purpose of illustrating my ignorance in this blog, I will do it afterwards (I promise.)

I remember he showed us some photos he had taken and one was a picture he had taken down at the beach. He had a TV with the insides ripped out of it placed on some rocks and his daughter was climbing through the TV. It was a black and white photo to which he had added his own colour with chinagraph pencils. It was a really cool picture, but I remember me, along with other kids scoffing at it like it was stupid. "Why would you take a TV to the beach?" and other such brain dead remarks. I've recently become more interested in photography, but I know nothing. I could have known something had I not been such a dick.

God, why are teenagers so fucking awful?


An attempt at artsy photography following advice from master photographer, Heather.

It wasn't until I was thinking about this that I realised what a disservice I had done to myself with my stupid attitude. I don't even think I was as bad as some, but I was still a teenager, so what hope did I have? Some hope, because not all kids pissed their time away like that either. Now, 11 years after finishing high school, do I realise the opportunities I gave up. I'm not saying any of those half year classes would have made proficient in anything, but I could have had a good step up into these things I now wish I could do, and further more, I may have started doing them seriously sooner. As I fumble with the settings on my digital camera, hoping I'm using the right one, I wish I had paid attention.

I wont even go into the Italian and French I ignored saying "When am I going to use that?" I wish I could have told my younger self that I was going to be in Italy in 2001 and 2006 and a French speaking country on my honeymoon. Oh, for shame!

Is there anything I can do to stop my kids from being so closed to new things and shake that shitty attitude? I really turns me off the whole idea of having kids. I hate teenagers! are my parents to blame? At the very least, I should understand them better when they show apathy, given my history and perhaps rely on there being hope for their 20s.

To see my feeble attempts at knitting and sewing today, click here.