Pearltruths

(Alter ego now is thinking, if my parents were around or paying attention, they could’ve decided to hire a tutor for class.  Alternatively, it would’ve been nice if they had my class switched or had a discussion with the principal of the school for options as assessments and diagnosing me on the spectrum).  At my high school, when the teacher assigned homework to the class.  Pre-Algebra was tough for me. For other subjects, I didn’t know what to write, how to answer the questions, write an essay or take quizzes, tests, or whatever. I thought life was all bad.  One time, one of my brothers, I’ll call him Jose. He did my math homework, and all the numbers didn’t make sense to me. Yea, I’m bad, as that was not conducive for me. But I couldn’t understand pre-algebra.  The numbers were crazy and my brother did my homework for me. Jose said, “You have to learn this stuff.”   How will you do it later when you really need it?” Darn, I should’ve listened. Smh (Shaking my head) now.  He was right and I didn’t know what to say or how to respond.  Jose was a wiz and reached as far as calculus.  Huh??  Who the hell needs calculus? What was calculus? (Today, I’m thinking, testing for math for example would be a huge help, otherwise hire a tutor)?  Pre-algebra was a foreign subject for me, but my strong point and strength was in writing. (By this time, I believed I was on the Spectrum, as explained in my earlier blog). (Looking back now, I would fit the personality type). Anyways, English was a subject I did like.  I wouldn’t say that I love it, but I definitely liked it, writing letters, and thank you notes.  Those are the things I do take an interest in.   Another challenge was History. It was difficult for me to learn since my memory has been shocked.  So, one other time, at the beginning of class, our history teacher assigned us to do an essay. Instead of reading the passage of my history book I was too lazy, but mainly I felt I knew nothing and I had someone else write it for me. The next day all the students turned in their papers, and my teacher came across mine.  Humiliated me and said, “you did not write this paper.”   I just stared at her in disbelief. (My gosh she knew)? (How did she know)?  It was horrible and I said nothing.  I don’t know what happened after that.  As you can see, I was severely traumatized and I can’t blame the teacher for that. By this time in high school, I just became a quiet teenager.  Probably feeling insecure, angry, and resentful.  I didn’t really socialize much anymore and learned later on…. little aspects of myself. I still didn’t know who I was at 18-19 years old.  Do we really know who we are at that age? C’mon. Most of us do not. Although, some of us do. High school was the toughest back in the day. Today, I have confidence knowing I turned out ok. We all learn the hard way, as long as we don’t repeat the same mistakes.

Us siblings were getting older and ready to leave the nest, or at least my brothers were.  My oldest brother Perlito moved out and got a job at Big 5 Sporting Goods as an Assistant Manager. Jose went on with his girlfriend and had their first baby.  I think of him as my twin brother because we were born on the exact same date, but different years. We kind of are, but also not.  I am calling him my twin brother Jeff 😂.   Straight out of high school, we were roommates for a while. After I lost my job, we went our separate ways and then he met his then girlfriend, Trudy.  They’re married now. I stayed with my dad for a while. We all pretty much went our separate ways for now. Stand by.