I don’t talk at school. I don’t answer teacher’s questions, and I don’t talk to my classmates. I walk into class, take a seat, wait for the bell and leave. It’s like a daily thing.
I don’t wait around for any friends at break, I don’t join in group activities and I don’t “pair up” with anyone for exercises …I work on my own. In fact, I just don’t bother making friends. When school finishes, I catch the no. 15 bus home everyday to an empty house. Upon arrival, I change out of my school stuff and several hours until my parents get back from work. At six o’clock, when they both get back, I lock myself in my room and agree to only talk once we’ve sat down for dinner.
Tracing my teenage year’s back, I guess you could say it started when I moved schools at fourteen. Shit timing. Fourteen is such a tricky age to fit in. When you’re seven or eight everyone eventually slots into the year group no problem. But fitting in a fourteen? I loved my old school. I had friends. After school we hung about and discussed all the “important” issues of the day. Boys, films, plans for the weekend. It was great and I never imagined leaving. We had it all sussed out then. We would finish up our exams, go to different universities if we wanted, and met up every year in the town. Ha, unlikely story. When my older brother who was at collage was killed in a road collision, the family flipped 180 degrees and stayed that way. There was no way we were going to execute that plan. And that’s when it all changed.
So that’s how I am now, two years on. I could make friends at this new school if I wanted. If I wanted too, I could contribute to the class discussions and I could make an attempt to be part of the school community….but I don’t . I did summit a poem to the school magazine once, but it got rejected.
Don’t talk down to me.
Don’t be polite to me.
Don’t try and make me feel nice. Don’t relax.
I’ll cut the smile off your face.
You think I don’t know what’s going on.
You think I’m afraid to react.
The joke’s on you.
I’m biding my time, looking for the spot.
You think no one can reach you,
No one can have what you have.
I’ve been planning while you’re playing.
I’ve been saving while you’re spending.
The game is almost over so it’s time you acknowledge me.
Do you ever want to fall, not ever
Knowing who took you?
And now my situation is changing once more. I’m slowly but surely turning into a fool. All because of him, Justin Timberlake. The Untouchable of Untouchables. Whenever my time comes to be known at this school, he’s the one I’ll talk to first. Right now however, he probably doesn’t even know I’m in his year group.
Poem from Jenny Holzer's Inflammatory Essays, a peice of artwork that is currently up in the Tate modern art gallery in London
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