hi buddies!
It's 11.40 pm now so I guess I'll do this zippy quick. Urgh it's sunday night and I have homework to do, and I finish school pretty early, so I have to finish the work that's due tuesday tomorrow (way to go captain obvious) and keep a study date with friend and post the book that I was supposed to post a month ago.
Clearly I am needing time management skillz.

Proof that, at 16, I am not becoming more mature/ intelligent/ adult-like:

FRIEND: *is studying*
ME: Oooh I like your graphic calculator! *snatches*

=5-minute interval in which I spend pressing random buttons=

ME: How do I turn it on?
FRIEND: ...

What, can't someone like the feel and sound of clicky buttons? And the colour and the shape of different buttons...
Clearly, I am destined to be in preschool.

By the way, that happened a few months ago, when everyone in my year was supposed to by a graphic calculator, but I put off buying it because there was this thing about seniors/ school leavers selling their second-hand graphic calculators at half-price, and it wasn't confirmed yet, and I'd rather spend less money. Eventually, I ended up buying a new graphic calculator, because the second hand ones were being sold on a first-come-first-served basis, and I had signed up too late. (a silver edition costs $185= $123.30 USD and looks like this. ) Now we're supposed to be proficient at using them, since we've been using them for the last three topics, and, mercifully, I have found the "on" button. I can use it to solve math problems and... play games, but not much else.

This made me think about one's maturity and self-perception. Because in my head, I still think that I am a child. ("No surprises there when you behave like one," my conscience says.) That because of my inability to pay bills, drive, or manage a bank account, I am absolved of adult responsibilities, and I am therefore technically a child. And I still have this feeling that adults will always be watching out for me and making sure that I'm doing the right thing, so I let my guard down and stop making the effort to become more independent.

My classmate, who recently moved to a boarding school, was afraid that he couldn't get up in the morning on his own, because his mum always woke him up. Being able to wake up in the morning and get to class on time may seem like a small thing, but it's significant of a bigger worry that there is no one to tell you to fulfil your responsibilities, and so you might neglect them. But he realised that when he lived away from his parents, waking up wasn't a problem at all. So I think maturity and adult-ness doesn't come with age, but it is a product of necessity and adaptation to adult life. That you have to work at it, and knowing how to manage your money doesn't just come like that, and it is a skill that you learn on the job.

Therefore, the feeling of not bothering to become more adult might just stem from the fact that you know there are people there who are going to clean up after you when you mess up. Like the time when I went on my first overseas school trip, and my parents were so worried that THEY CAME ALONG. They wore worried that I might hurt myself, get sick, or run out of money. The irony is that I came home without a scratch, and with 200 of the 300 pounds they gave me. (the money was only for meals for two days and other misc shopping things, and my friends were cheap.)

But I keep thinking that every year I lose being stupidly dependent, it will be more difficult for me to adapt once I move out and everything. Perhaps this is my mother's evil ploy. She hasn't moved out of her parent's house her whole life.