Mute Ears Deaf Speech

Mood: happy; tired
Currently: staring at homework
Listening to: hum of the laptop

It's pretty naive for me to say that I almost always think that people are happy all the time, up until the point they show me that face of anguish. Today in journalism, a girl who almost always got top marks on her math tests--I know that because she's in my class--and overall, based on her participation in class, she seemed like one of the really smart people. I found it hard to believe, hearing her confide in someone how she felt so dumb in journalism. Although I shouldn't eavesdrop when others are talking about such person feelings, or rather, I shouldn't at all, but I couldn't help but to want to listen. She was talking to a girl in our class who joined the Peer Counselors program, saying how she felt like she didn't belong in journalism because she was too dumb to be taking the class. Everyday, she would have fun, but also feel miserable, thinking, I don't belong in this class. Feeling conflicted, she asked if she should take journalism next year. She's a bit like me, we both get pretty bad grades on our articles and such, so she thought, "If I reapply next year, and I get cut, I'm going to spend the rest of the year feeling like a complete idiot. If I make it, I'm going to go through all this all over again. But if I quit, it's going to be just like swim. I joined this class because I'm interested in journalism, I like writing, but I don't want to take this class if I'm going to just keep thinking that I don't belong here. But I also don't want to quit and feel like some kind of loser who can't keep up with her passions." The peer counselor asked her questions calmly, and even though she was staring at the computer screen, she dedicated her full attention to the conflicted girl. She told her, "From my point of view, well, it's pretty biased since I hate journalism, but it's not like not taking journalism again next year will conflict with anything, even if you decide to pursue journalism as a career. I mean, being in this class for like, just one year is great and all, it gives you foresight and all, but it won't really drag you down if you don't join again, you know?" The girl sighed and said that she was going to think about it for a while longer. The peer counselor nodded and encouraged her to do so, then they briefly made arrangements to talk some other time around school. It was already snack when I decided to give up at my task at hand, feeling like find the right font, size, and color of the magazine titles were too much of a hassle for me today. When I was about to stand up, another girl approached the peer counselor and started to talk about, then said something about being stressed out about college. The peer counselor said, "This again? You're a junior, why are you thinking about this stuff so much?" Then the girl said, "But I should be! Last year, I didn't worry about college at all, but I should have." She went off into further details as I walked away. And a "you learn something new everyday" moment was that everyone has been through some rough times, no matter who they are or how they act at school or even just in front of you. Another one, a more specific one, is that peer counselors are admirable. People go up to them and talk to them about their feelings and their problems and you know, that's great. I think that's just really admirable.
And a rude awakening (ripped of Madison Finn, sorry) today was from what a friend told me. "People just don't seem to really care. Why is it that I listen to their problems, but they can't even listen to mine?" There really just are people who you can't confide to because they just don't listen, talking to them about your troubles is like a waste of breath, and although saying it all out gets it off your chest, your words feel like it sits on top of your heart, after mustering all that effort to say what you wanted to say, and that person asks, "what did you say?" Of course, I knew that there were people like that, but ignorantly thought that they were simply inconsiderate about how others feel. However, in reality, it's possible it's the other way around. Everyone is unfortunate, but some people are faced with worst problems than others. Perhaps we try to talk about our problems to those extremely troubled souls when they have enough to think about already. If that person's family has issues such as financial struggle and it's hard to guess what's going to become of them, I don't feel like that person will have the attention span big enough to listen to someone else complain about their bad grades. Well, it doesn't even have to be a big problem in that person's life, maybe even small conflicts distract their minds with such unsettled thoughts that they can't focus on what other people are saying. Maybe there really are people who couldn't care less about others' problems, but there's always a special case. But we can never assume we know people based on the person you see in front of. Sometimes we can't even assume we understand people even after hearing them.