An Empty Slot

Back in my freshman year of high school, I remember the summer I was getting ready to go to school. I was anxiously awaiting my schedule, and the day it arrived, I remembered logging onto a popular media site to see who else had classes with me. While typing it out to post it, I noticed one very strange thing--in one of my elective's spots, there was a blank. I'm not even talking about a "TBA" or something, it was just blank.

I talked to my mom about it, and I was like "Um, mom--there's this spot with nothing in it."

Mom: "Well, that's weird. Maybe that's Art?"

Later, we would go to the school where the secretary would tell us she would talk with the counselor. The counselor would never get the memo, and on my first day on high school--when we got our official schedules--I was so excited to figure out what that class was. And again, there was an empty slot.

So, I went on through my day, meeting up with old classmates and being introduced to new ones. It was pretty simple, everything going smoothly. Until...

Okay, let's take a moment here while I tell you something: I hate Spanish. And before everyone pulls out their "racist" card, let's relax a moment. I'm half-Mexican, my dad coming from the "motherland" (as it's called by many Mexicans [including me]). So, generally, I understand Spanish. I can't speak it, but if you speak slow enough and give me a moment, I can get your drift and give you a semi-decent response (no, I will never type any Spanish, do not ask.). But, my problem is how the school I would be taking Spanish in taught it--it wasn't even close to being realistic. My brother had taken it, my friends had taken it, and even though I couldn't speak it, it really did sound wrong. I would rather learn from my father how to speak Spanish, and he's a horrible teacher. I just have a problem with learning something that sounds so horribly wrong--I'd rather be submerged in the culture and forced to learn with nothing to go off of than an iffy English-Spanish translator.

...I got to that class period with no where to go. Because of my ways--those ways being that I am a terribly good student *wink wink*--I realized that I had a moral obligation to go to the counselor and seek guidance on how to right this. This would be the first time I would go to the counselor's office, and would certainly not be the last. But this time would be the strangest, for sure.

Basically, we discussed where I could go. We would discuss for a couple of moments the very few ways we could fill that 85 minute hole in my schedule. When it came down to it, nothing could. Nothing...

BUT SPANISH.

And so, I argued. I begged. I pleaded--how could this be happening? Why me? Why Spanish? There couldn't be a reason. None. But there was nowhere else for me--that was what would put me in Spanish. And so, against every fiber of my being, I was put into Spanish.

And so, one year of suffering would begin. One year of suffering, and my freshman year without art.

That was the first year of my bad schedules.

Cheers!
Jenn