Walk

14th

wake up early

I hear them digging in the backyard. They're going to build some other thing back there, and destroy some stuff to make space and improvements. They're improvements.

Today was Intro to Programming workshop. Teach high school kids the very beginnings of programming. The way I see this is, the main aim is to introduce the notion of programming, and to foster an appreciation for it. Learning actual syntax and programming tools comes second to that, so even though I was disappointed we didn't cover loops, I think it was still a success. Kids have so much hope. I still remember my maths teacher reading out the syllabus, and how one of the objectives was to foster an appreciation for the beauty of mathematics. I think I read somewhere that they were going to make maths compulsary in the HSC. Bad idea. I can accept English being there ... despite my personal dislike of it, I think it still benefits everyone who has to do it in the end. I think they should rework english though. They need short answer questions, it just makes so much more sense. You want students to answer the question? Give them a good question and a good medium to provide their answer, and you'll have more success. Essay questions aren't good questions because real essays take a lot of time, without time memorising is just the best option for a lot of people.

During lunch there was a phone call. I usually don't get phone calls, or use my phone at all - it's more like a portable computer. This phone call was to inform me that they actually did read my resume, and to schedule an interview. I never actually applied to anywhere after subway because my enthusiasm at the prospect of working vanished as quickly as it came. And since there was no reply for about a month, I assumed they had just discarded it, or thought it was really stupid, and that I'm really stupid, and I felt really stupid thinking about it. I don't know why, but I always assume the worst case scenario. It's one thing to prepare for the worst case scenario - that's not a bad thing. But I always leap to it as a conclusion, and believe it, and feel bad.
They asked if an interview on that day was fine, but no it wasn't because I was at uni. So tomorrow, then.

When I went back home, my mum told me to go to the backyard, wait, not through the house, you can't go that way, go through the side. So I went around the side of the house to the back. The deck/verandah/roof that used to be at the back is now gone. They disassembled it, and now there is just nothing there, instead. Now the back door is just like a door to nowhere. A door to a 2 metre drop. Doors look so out of place when there isn't any floor for them.

I go to nap until about 11. Then I remember I have an interview to plan and prepare for. I'm not really ready, but my friends give me some invaluable advice that I don't really think enough about. I decide, eventually, that it's time to sleep. I have to wake up pretty early.
Since the roof is gone, my window doesn't have anything above it, on the outside, anymore. There's light coming through the curtains. Did someone leave the light on again? I hate it when they do that, I can't sleep with it on. But they don't even realise it's a problem because I never bring it up. So I just get up and turn it off myself.
But it's not the light, the light is gone, everything outside the window is gone. When I look to my left as I type this in the present, it's strange to think that nothing is outside the window anymore. Outside the window is empty space, a drop to the ground.
It's the moon, it's the full moon, as round as a tummy and as bright as that light that I had to turn off every damn time. Except I can't turn off the moon, even if I wanted to.

I had trouble getting to sleep. I had a lot of trouble getting to sleep.

The fact that the roof is gone means another thing. It will be bright in my room after the sun has risen. Maybe not bright, but brighter. Not the darkness that I used to have. It means I will wake up earlier, naturally. So it also means I will be forced to sleep earlier, too.

I wake up to my alarm. When I got a smart phone, alarms became a lot easier. Now that I'm used to having easy to set alarms, I take it for granted. I take alarms in general for granted too, and in fact, I had a thought, "my list of things i take for granted looks just like the list of things i have".

I wasn't hungry. I wasn't really nervous, I just wasn't hungry. I'm usually not hungry, but not this not-hungry. Does that mean I'm subconsciously nervous?

I give up eating. 

The interview was pretty ... terrible. It's the worst I've ever done, and I hope it's the worst I will ever do. "Tell me about yourself". A simple, typical way to begin. I wasn't taken by surprise by this, I knew it was a possibility. You would think I would have thought of a pre-prepared answer, or pre-prepared plan to answer it. Nope. I'm taken off guard. Surprisingly, being off-guard didn't scare me, I didn't panic. But how I feel doesn't always correlate to how I act, in fact now that I think about it, a lot of the time it doesn't. I stutter and it's pretty obvious that I don't know exactly what to say, and that I am not confident at all. I was not confident, but I wasn't scared either.

I know this, but I also know that I must have looked like I was having a nervous breakdown or something like that. He tells me that I have to speak up - after all, you need customers to be able to hear what you are saying. Oh, sorry, I'm a bit nervous. That's a lie, I'm actually not. But everything I'm doing points to yes, I am nervous and this is the worst experience of my life. Maybe subconsciously nervous or something like that. Maybe the heat is getting to me, so I don't actually feel anything.

Okay, I need to speak up. I try this, and then forget about it like 2 seconds after I begin talking again. I didn't hear a single word you just said, he tells me. I find this a bit funny, on the inside, and apologise again.

I'm pretty sure I answered everything really poorly. At the end he asked me if I had any questions. Maybe I should have thought of some questions beforehand, because I didn't have any then. I managed to think of one question. Well... better than nothing, right?

I go back home and sleep. While going back home, and while trying to sleep, I half try to just forget about it, forget, and half think about the interview and what I could have done better. I know what questions I should have asked - what should I have done better, what was the right answer to that question about what I will actually be doing if I'm hired.

I wake up and get over my embarassment.

Wait, really?

Yeah, I do. It's strange to imagine that a negative experience might have a positive impact me, but apparently it happened. I must be growing up.


I think of myself and how I need to change and grow if I'm actually going to better myself for this world. I think of flaws.

I usually think about my flaws all the time, but only because I want to hate myself.

This time I thought of flaws because I wanted to actually do something about them.

I didn't even feel bad or ashamed.

what's happening to me?


The fall from the back door is now like 3-4 metres, because they dug another hole. Not really a hole. More like they just shaved a couple of metres from all of the land there, leaving a wide, perfectly flat, basin. The era of shovels has long passed.


I put down the events of the 14th and some of the 15th as dot points here, so I can expand upon it later.

"need to learn how to talk, again.", is one of the points.


They did something to the pipes while digging that hole-that's-not-really-a-normal-hole, and now our water/waste system is very limited, so we went to a family friend's house, which is just on the block next to ours, to shower.

One of my brother's friends is renting there, and my mother was talking to him. When I was done, I made out to go home, but when realised I had no keys I went back. But then my dad had the keys but he was showering so I had to sit down and listen to them talk about my brother and his future.

One of the things I realised while listening was that, it might be a good idea to look for a job related to computing, instead of something random like subway.

They also talked about life experience/experiences, which is what I guess you do when you are older or had a more interesting childhood than the ones we had.

My mum came here with pretty much nothing, she had a high level education - she may have been a teacher in china unless I remember wrong - in literature, but what use is that here? So she worked jobs that sucked. Someone suggested that she could do accounting. She thought it would be impossible, but was convinced eventually to go to tafe, and then she realised it was easy. She got a better job, with some company I don't remember but apparently they made military things. Eventually that company decided to move to Adelaide, but she couldn't go there. So she had to find another job.

Last day of work with this company on friday, weekend, start monday at a new company. The other workers said/implied how her new boss was not a good person, divorced, not white, etc, but for some reason her boss saw the good/potential in my mum and sponsored her to study at university. So she did that. So, my mum had a full time job during the day, and was studying a full-degree at night, and had kids to look after, too. It was something like - wake up and go to work, come back home, pick Daniel up from the after-school-care at 5, drop me off home, make sure something is there for dinner, go to uni, come back home, sleep.

This was all relevant to the conversation about my brother because my brother would want to tell her about his day or something like that, but every time she said "sorry I have to go, sorry I'm busy, can you just talk to me some other time?"
every time...

This was when we children were still young. As my brother grew older, he sometimes had disagreements and arguments with my mother, and even though now he appreciates her more, he still isn't very nice to her. Perhaps the neglected from two simultaneous full-time occupations may have had something to do with this ...

At the same time, my dad had lectures at night, I'm assuming that he was the one giving them, and he would come back home at 9.

And you wonder why I spend so much time on the computer, playing games.

My mum got that degree, and then went on to do a CPA (Certified Practising Accountants), while working full time as well, of course. As a child, I remember sometimes when she had stacks of books on her bed, like actual stacks, okay not actual stacks, but there were so many books and notes all over the place. She would be stressed about her upcoming exams or whatever, which is only natural.

After she finished that, she had time again. As much time as a full-time job would allow, which is still less than most mothers.

She did all of that for us, so we could have nice things, even though she lost us in the process. Isn't that funny? Isn't that ironic, isn't that strange

There are some sacrifices you make for others, which make them appreciative of you. And then there are sacrifices you make for others which are far greater, because it makes them unappreciative of you.


Presently, she often comes home after dinner. My family eats dinner late. Usually around 8. 

She works a couple or more hours overtime more often than not, without getting any extra pay for it. It sounds crazy, probably because it is. There are just things going on in the company, downsizing and merging, I think she said, things like that. When did this start ... I'm not really sure.





Louder. I need to speak louder. Louder, so people can hear me. When I am good enough at this, I need to speak clearer. More clear. Clearly, so people can understand what I am saying. Not an easy task, since I spend so much time talking quietly, well, actually, because I spend so much time not talking at all.

But that's a thing I need to do.

I need to talk more if I'm playing Avalon. I'm not good at that game, but that's fine if most people I play with aren't good at it either. Games are more fun when you aren't good at them. I've said it before, and it's true.

I used to take the game seriously, but that never worked because I'm not good at these games. I'm too easily read, and I can't deduce well enough.

So perhaps I won't take it seriously. I'll just speak loudly, whatever I feel like. If I'm generic good guy who has no role, I can say with such conviction that I'm the good guy, nah I'm just kidding I'm the bad guy. And then okay seriously, I'm actually just generic good guy, trust.

But still, I'm too easily read. I'm the bad guy now. I still don't take it seriously, but the change is obvious. I'm scared to say I'm the bad guy. I don't have the heart to say I'm the good guy. I will try anyway, but ... it's not the same.


Why is it different? I'm lying both times, anyway. Why can't I do it as well when I'm the bad guy?

It must be because I don't want to be evil. If I lie with a purpose, I can't do it. But if no one is hurt by my lies, because I actually don't know who anyone is, then it's harmless and I can. 

I'm too easily read, everything.



I wish I had more time, so I could work on Swan Song. Progress is satisfying. I'll be able to play this one day, and then I'll be proud and stop playing it. But it was always the journey, not the destination.

This post was different. I talked about my day, and events, things that happened. It was also a lot faster to write. I didn't come here to think then write, I came here just to write, I had done all the thinking and remembering beforehand.