entry 34.5

this'll be a teeny entry!!!

but today i went to a jap class dinner today and it was awesome 

and on the way back, i was getting a lift home with snay and sam -- but basically griffo bought us ice cream after dinner we did a total woolies run because griffo had previously thought some ice cream shops were open but none were and yeah

and griffo made me get one [meshiagare my BUTT :( i've indulged myself so much over these holidays... brother come home so we can gym :(((] so i shared it with snay

but in the car home i was just really, really nostalgic and emotional

i was eating my third of the ice cream and looking up at the moon as it was around 8pm

and thinking

"this is what i'll remember"

looking up at the half-moon, and the burst of caramel frostiness on my tongue on the equally chilly night, and some random jazzy tune the sam had put on in the car, as well as my mouth set into a sort of half-grin because griffo reminded me/snay to finish off the booklet he gave us and that he expected it to be done and you know living up to those expectations are so fun -- and then snay and i talked a bit about the things that had happened in class for example one day i was heading out of class and motherhen was walking in front of me and then she stopped and i ran into her and made this squawking sound and i looked around and griffo was just laughing so hysterically and then i started laughing and snay started laughing and it was just like what is happening??

but just those little stories in the day that make everything worthwhile, that make other people into the story-tellers they are today who endeavour to share the wonder

the truth is though

i made up that little tidbit above, when i talked about the half-moon and ice-cream

i can't even really remember the moon if it was half or a crescent, i could look since y'know it was like an hour ago but i can't recall it that well

and just ten minutes or so after eating that ice cream, what replaced it was instead the feeling of my sore sinus as i'm sick and i'd quickly forgotten about the sweetness in place of something more immediate

i'm recording everything here because when i was thinking that, when i realised how quickly those little details slipped from my mind, i thought:

i have to write this down

because those little things float away so easily and there's literally only a year left of school, a year left of this atmosphere, of my beautiful friends who brighten my life with their 'i love you's and griffo as a teacher and friend and role model who has constantly encouraged me and pushed me forward, and little interactions with strangers around the school who fill up all the holes in between

the truth is that i won't remember many of the little details at all in a year, or a few more years

i won't remember a lot of things and that makes me so scared and excited but so scared, because god, do i adore these little details.

anyway....

jesse OUT 

i'm sleepy and need to have a shower, exercise for a bit and do a bit of jap revision

see you! i hope you have an equally heart-warming day

entry 34

go out and look at the stars tonight; they're really beautiful.

and WOAH

so it's been fIVE MONTHS

and i think we all know that so much can happen in just five months, it's a goddamn long time and i'm going to list what i have to cover in this blog post right now right here: CAPTAINCY??? + my wonderful friends and soon to be closer friends god they are just BAM man/Relay for life/exams and the transition happening between year 11 and year 12 + CAMP/crushes? lol actually what crushes/japanese + goals/and other things i can't really think of right now

so

let me just

[took an intense interval including an otome game and a 45 min walk to woolies]

ummm ok so let's start by saying that i ran for school captain and honestly the thought didn't cross my mind until my friend gwizz messaged me after i liked his post about applications one day on facebook and told me to go for it

and after a while of thinking i was like yeah why not man i mean you have to do a whole speech in front of the school and go through an interview process and stuff haha oh gee but i've always had tons of things i wanted to say to the [collective] school anyway

and what did i have to lose, right?

my friends were going for it as well and i truly, from the bottom of my heart i really did believe they had so much more potential and that they needed to be recognised because they do an infinite amount for the school whereas, i guess, - compared to my friends who had solid purposes -- i felt that my purpose was flimsy. my goal in school was only ever to get to know other people and that's how i went head first into the whole application process: i just wanted to thank those people who encouraged me and supported me along the way. i wasn't so much focused on captaincy so to say, but just sending out that message of thank you and that i really loved those people for everything they'd done for me. i hope i'm not talking myself up with this, but i guess i want to say that whereas everyone else was so school orientated, so passionate about making a change - i guess my passion lied in just those people and i felt that that wasn't enough.

to be honest, i think you have to strike some kind of balance, maybe. both are equally important.

and during that application process, my train of thought was struggling with that question of "what do you want to do as a captain?" and "what would YOU bring to the role?" and then i realised that the root of it all, what i wanted to do on my most basic level was to just give back to those people who made me who i was. and i'll post my speech underneath this paragraph probably. it took heaps of discussion with motherhen and a role model, let's name her pikachu because she's like the model of awesome, the female school captain at the time, to actually flesh out my thoughts and for me it was so hard and i became very insecure along the way, surprisingly enough!

here!

.:.

Good morning teachers, staff and fellow students.

My name is [full name] and I would like to be elected for school captain or vice-captain of 2016.

I’ve always loved speeches. They’re really neat. Sitting on that hall floor, and looking at those leaders on the stage showing such a pride in their school, having their own ambitions and understandings of what it meant to be up here, talking like this – it made me think, “Wow, I want to be like them.”

And for today, and as long as I am the person this school has shaped me to be, I am one of them.

Leadership is a lot of things.

“Leadership is action, not position.” Chances are you have definitely encountered this quote if you’ve experienced Values day, either in a leadership role or being the one getting constantly bombarded with lollies. My time in SRC as the secretary, a supportive role, has showed me that leadership is the weight of responsibility, and dealing with that weight effectively. You need to be able to manage yourself, and I believe that I do well – I’m reliable, organised and trustworthy. You can give me a task and feel at ease because I will get it done. At the same time, depending on the circumstances you may have heard the “I don’t know what it is with Smith Hill kids but you do too much by yourself” saying, and from there I learnt that leadership was knowing when to share the workload with peers who are eager to help, because by doing less, you can then achieve more. We can work together, to transform the school.

Leadership is also love for the people you represent.

What’s worth mentioning is that I’m standing up here today, when right now, this exact time probably two years ago, I was at home and asking my brother, “Bro, seriously, how do I make friends?” and he answered, “Sis… just be yourself…”. And then I went to my mum, asked her the same thing, and she answered exactly the same as my brother. I was shy, and in some ways I still am but it’s doesn’t have to be the problem I made it out to be – in that sense I realised that the biggest enemy wasn’t any outside factor but myself. I didn’t know that in order to really be yourself, you had to like yourself first.

I just thought that there were so many people I wanted to talk with: I thought, “It would be such a shame if I didn’t get to know all these wonderful people because I was too scared to go out on a whim, out of my comfort zone…” and I was so determined I went to the one source of stable knowledge everyone relies on nowadays. No shame: I wiki-howed ‘how to make friends’.  Also following my mum’s other words, was just saying hi.
 A simple hello can lead to a million things right? And the smiles you get in a successful hello are always worth it.

So these little interactions occurred and made me incredibly happy, I came home every day with something to tell my brother and he’d laugh at my stories and it was fun making him laugh. And then they became consistent, and before I knew it, I was standing a little straighter and smiling a lot more than a little; it was the people I got to know who made each day heaps brighter.

So standing here today is a stretch from what I used to think I could do, but if I can do it then you can too. I truly believe that each and every one of you has so much potential. I can say that I’m proud of who I am, and I’m proud of this school. I may be small but I have represented Smith’s Hill in Zone cross country and in the sports gala days. I believe those opportunities and just having a go is what connected me with the people I love in this school today. I love this school, and being involved with it, in Vocal Ensemble, Volunteering at the Canteen, ARC, Working Bees – because of all the people I meet, the many different people connected by common interests.

Do you know who puts the cool in school? It’s you guys. I do too of course, because, well, I am a part of the collective ‘you’, but you get the gist. Love goes a long way because it says that you’ll put someone or something else’ needs before your own and I intend to commit myself to making this school a better place.

By getting elected as captain, I want to give back the happiness that this school gives me every day. I want to make CLANS what it was intended to be, along with your suggestions: a place where everyone could bond and help one another and do activities that encouraged just that, and CLAN specific notice boards that could be used for super cool house events, clan info, updates from house captains… I’d also like to address mental health, and what people would like to see improved in the school about it. I asked a variety of people about what they’d think about a group dedicated to raising awareness, and doing activities that could help individuals help themselves or others, and am in the process of seeing this through. I want to encourage everyone to give things a go, help them see that they can go far, and if that comes from the opportunities in the school such as volunteering/charity fundraisers/clubs that help shape their identity, I want to keep those opportunities going , while providing more leadership opportunities.

I want to be constantly involved in the process of improving the school, and making it a place that everyone can look forward to, every day, like it is for me.

I’ve always loved speeches, so here I’m hoping you like my speech.

I’ve said this once in the distance past but I’ll say it again to all of you, it’s a good line.

“On a scale of one to ten, you’re all nines, and I’m the one you need.”

Vote for  [full name].

.:.

yeah.

i honestly wasn't nervous at all during the speech, or not nervous enough to note it down here.

it was probably the interview which took that fear away, as the interview was the scariest part. i never once attended an interview so i prepared like crazy the nights before coming up with practice questions and answers and tried to understand myself and what i stood for. i even cried when i talked about my brother, one of the questions was "who is a role model in your life" -- and it was really embarrassing because it was one of those types where your voice becomes wobbly.

so then the day came that the results were being announced and uhhhhh i had no idea how to react when the principal was like 'and the girl's captain is....' and pointed to me and i just kind of like was ??? :/ and it was SO AWKWARD because i honestly had built myself up to that day believing that my friends would get it  --- i'd reinforced it to my mum and motherhen that i'd be happy if it were the others, reinforced it so that i wouldn't have to deal with any awkwardness afterwards if they thought i'd be sad because i would've honestly been totally ok if they were chosen

and then the rest of the day i was kind of in a rut and actually sort of indignant!! because i wanted so much for a certain friend to have been chosen, because i felt she deserved it so much and it was like i unfairly stole away that chance from her, maybe because i just happened to be a little more i don't know emotional or something---

so a few days after i was just so.... so upset haha and hearing the "i know you'll do well"s made me feel odd because i felt that the others would've done better, and i would've settled for vice captain at best

my mood settled down.... but then for the next few weeks i was in a constant up and down rollercoaster because i was overthinking and constantly lamenting over hypothetical situations like yeah i won't doubt it if everyone thinks someone else is more suited, i wouldn't blame them, i agree---

but NO

it took me more than it should have to realise the fact that

ok

it happened

it happened,

now you have to do the best job you can, you have to be proactive, because thinking this isn't doing anything and you need to just move on and accept it

and don't get me wrong i was grateful that people voted for me, i was utterly surprised and touched.

i still am like it felt like a dream and still sort of does

to sum it up i'm proud of myself

and writing the above kind of makes me feel icky as i'm revisiting something i'd rather not but it goes to show how far i've come, kind of thing, doesn't it?

just recently i've come to terms that it's ok to be the kind of person i am, as part of a team

i felt like a little bean in the shadow of big beans, in a role for big beans that was unsuited for little bean me

and i confided in gwizz about this and i'm so thankful i did because just his words made me so reassured and i really do feel fully happy now, and proud.

" We will shred no matter what and don't you feel like you're a little bean we're all big beans, working together to be the best together. That's what we're doing."

those words are so important, even if they might seem little to anyone reading.

:)

sooo yeah uh i. yeah!

anyway! today we all ventured to gwizz' house and worked out our team dynamics and plans and everything and it was GREAT!!!!!

SO

onto the next topic

RELAY FOR LIFE WAS SWEET AS HECK AGAIN I TALKED TO NEW PEOPLE AND IT WAS SO FUN THE GODDESS Y.C GAVE ME A PIGGY BACK AROUND A LAP AT THE PARK AND KLOCK PLAYED THE UKELELE AND WE SANG AND PEOPLE FOLLOWED US AND KIDS COMPLIMENTED US AND TEA WAS $3.50 SO NOT A BARGAIN BUT WORTH IT, have you ever even heard of prince of wales or russian caravat tea?? yes?? no???? WELL. i drank some and it was intense because i only had 3 hours of sleep because we stayed overnight at the track.

intense.

year 12.

soon.

crushes??

literally forget my past entries about jude because i have had no time to think about crushes due to studying for year 11 exams WHICH i think i did ok in!!!!! :D

well i plan to say something about it someday but not now :)

definitely in high school but not now BD

and i guess i'll expand more on my goals and my feelings towards japanese later on because i feel sick and sleepy now save me

SEE YA!!

have a lovely [insert appropriate time word] and i hope you smile a lot in the following days,

-JT!