Madeleine returns

Dear readers (I've always wanted to say that),
I have finally returned from that place called I've-been-really-busy-with-school-and-yes-I-know-the-blog-needs-to-be-updated! I hope you're glad to see me.

I'll tell you about art class first since it's been happening the longest. Back when the school year started, I got signed up to take an art class at the public high school because it is supposed to have a really good art program. The art class that I wanted to take (Drawing 1) is a first period class, so I take the bus or carpool there and my mom or dad picks me up at the end of the class period. Actually, I've only ridden the bus once since another seminary kid goes to Parkway and his dad or mom drives us both there. Art class is very enjoyable and mostly relaxing. For art, I get up three days a week at 6:45, which is nearly torture for a homeschooler who is used to getting up whenever she pleases! then I stagger around getting dressed and brushing my teeth. Every morning, Elise moans and groans; usually she's only half awake and seems to have forgotten what I'm doing and where I'm going. "...uhuhh..Madeleine, why are you getting up?..[deep sigh]...why do you do this every day?....[cough]....where are you going?...huuhhhumm..ahhr.." She thinks she has it tough... By the time I leave my room to eat breakfast, I am relatively alive and able to speak in full sentences. I eat until 7:30 when Frank and his mom or dad leave for school[side note: Frank is very interesting in the mornings]. Once we arrive at the school, I journey the long hallways to the classroom; I always feel kind of bare walking through the school hallways since I don't have an enormous, sagging backpack like everyone else. During class, I like to watch people and listen to them talk. Sometimes the girls at my table talk to me a little. They're not unfriendly, and they always talk to me if I talk to them. I don't talk a lot-- I hope that doesn't make me look stuck-up. Usually, I'm sleepy. And when you are sleepy, it's easier to just watch people and listen to them than to actually talk to them. I talk a little more now than I did before. One nice girl asked me if I found it difficult to be around people since I was homeschooled. I said, “Do you think I act like I do??” in a slightly nervous, questioning tone of voice and she laughed and said no. At the end of class I sit by the school entrance and wait for my mom or dad to pick me up in our new blue van (the cockroach/coffeebean Previa died last month). It's almost the end of the semester and this is a one semester class. I want to take Advanced Drawing next semester, but it's a second period class and it wouldn't work out with my Thursday classes. So...I'd better enjoy it while it lasts.

My mom was going to the grocery store last week and I thought I'd escape the apartmental claustrophobia by doing schoolwork in the car while she shopped. Actually, I ended up exploring the dashboard area of our new van-- it was just way more interesting than logic or biology. I noticed that the steering wheel didn't have a button to press for the horn like our old car did, so I thought I would kind of gently press all around the center of the wheel to see if I could find it. I found the horn. It was a short honk, but embarrassing nonetheless. But worse was yet to come. The honk cured my interest in the dashboard for a while, but I got bored again and wanted to open the car door and get some fresh air (I was in a very safe, suburban grocery store parking lot). I thought I could just flip the lock on my door to open it, but I was wrong. The car must have had a built in security system because even though the lock was flipped, the door wouldn't open. Also, the car alarm went off. If you have never been inside a car whose alarm is going off, I can tell you that you haven't missed much. It is truly startling when it first goes off, but you gradually get used to the way the horn is fraying your nerve ends and battering your eardrums. But that's not all you suffer. At first, you wonder what the wealthy suburbanites in those shiny SUV s are thinking-- “Will they think I broke into the car? Will they call 911? Or will they scorn me as a stupid kid who's never been in a car with an alarm system?” Then you realize that everyone who passes by looks at you and grins a little because car alarms go off all the time and no one pays any attention. Anyway, if a person had really broken into a car and set off the alarm, they wouldn't be sitting stiffly in the passenger seat and avoiding eye contact. Well, eventually the alarm stopped. Then my mom came back and I had to tell her what I'd done. It was truly and experience. And I guess I taught those suburbanites that not everyone has been privileged enough to grow up with alarm systems on their minivans.