Hey, peeps.
Ever since eighth grade, English was my thing. My talent. It's not my first language but learning it is highly valued here, much more than arts, for example (which is bad in itself). I'm very lucky to apparently pick up languages rather easily but it still wasn't child's play to get as good as I am now. And I liked to be rewarded for that, I enjoyed being the teacher's pet and not having to put in as much effort. Also, it's nice to have a reputation for being really good at something - the kind of reputation that has fellow students asking you for your help, and a sort of whisper among English teachers about that girl.
A friend of mine scored an A plus in her English final. I got an A.
And that's okay, for the most part. She deserves this grade, she's been deserving it for several years and our teacher somehow failed to acknowledge her abilities. I know that this English final wasn't my best performance, that I could have been better.
Not achieving the highest possible mark in this exam won't change the fact that English is practically second nature to me. It won't change how people think of me, for the most part. But now somebody else is obviously better at the thing I thought was my thing. And that stings, no matter how much that somebody deserves it.
See, in September, I'm going to go to university in England. Where speaking English fluently is like, normal. Results Day made me realise that my thing won't be a thing for very much longer. What, for years, was a big part of what people associated with me, what I used to set myself apart from others, what I thought of as special about me, will be nothing. Or at least, much less than it was.
I'll have to find something else, then. I'm the kind of person who needs to be able to remind themselves that there's some way that they're better than other people - "Her hair might be awesome but my freckles are cuter" "He's good at everything but I can read out Shakespeare without stuttering". And part of me keeps whispering, in the back of my head, what are you going to do now? What will you tell yourself, at one a.m., when all around you people are being awesome and you need something to pick you up?
For everyday life, my self-esteem is pretty high, I think. I'm relatively confident or at least good at pretending to be, and I'm starting to rise above society-induced body shame and expectations. But in the middle of the night? Entirely different.
I need something to hold onto. And I have no idea what that something is going to be for the next three years.
Love,
Jojo
