Oh, surely today is a good day. Bit windy, bit it's unfair to judge the day on weather alone. Today, as you may have guessed by the title or have just known, was the day of my last leaving cert exam. As it turned out, it was economics, y'kno.
Two weeks of unmissable, insurmountable, un-get-out-of-able exams, or summer tests as one optimistic student called them, dominated the lives of sixth year students all over this fair isle (and that weird other country that does a form of the Leaving). In sooth, I pity the poor sods that aren't finished yet. For example, the music heads, but it's their own fault for being music heads, nobody forced them to be. But seriously folks, two years doing senior cycle for two weeks of show off knowledge time is all it boils down to. I know that's not aparticularly revolutionary notion, but, eh, the fact o' de matter is dat dere over now, well, for me anyway!
English I, English II, Maths I, Gaeilge I, Gaeilge II, Maths II, French, History, Chemistry and Economics. Seven subjects, ten papers. That's what's expected of us, young ones and young fellas. It's strange to think, most people older than us, present Leavin' students, have sat the same exams. Parents, teachers, shopkeepers, Jacko park warden (well?). But nobody seems to have any good advice on how to keep sane or not to drive yourself loopy. "You'll do fine" doesn't help. There's dozens of those silly little phrases that don't actually mean anything. Clarke's words of wisedom were ok. Now, I don't know the exact words used. But they came to the conclusion that the leaving isn't as big as it's made out to be. And, now that I can take a objective look at it, I'd agree. But, by far the best advice I was even given in the face of exams came from a Swords woman presently living in the state of Italy. Before sitting the Junior Cert she told me to just go in there and puke all over dem bleedin' exam papers!
I tried to stay clear of the media during the whole thing. Of course, with the 'lection and all the hype about the Greens and the crap proformance of the PDs, I couldn't really. Newspapers were ok because you can choose not to read an article. But a mistake I made was listening to Gerry Ryan, for about three minutes on the morning of the fifth. This young one called up and was saying that she was gonna study all day and get up at half six the following morning to look at final things for English. Bitch. What made it worse, was that Gerry, owner of the Ryan-Line, was like, "oh yeah, well that's about right, yeah".....slurp...shite. So, officially that day, I ruled out 2fm for morning radio (apart from the odd Colm&JimJim). Anyway, Ray Darcy is much better. There's no coin flippin' to be done between Ray, the cool former The Den presenter, slick, but small, deadly Darcy and Gerry, with the puke invoking voice, old-timer, low ratings, shite loving, (apparently) Ryan. Sorry Gerry.
I think this will be my concluding paragraph, not that I'm bothered with concluding paragraphs or have ever been bothered with them. The day that began on June sixth has ran its course and the sun has set over the horizon of Exam Centre 3981.
Wednesday, June 20, 2007
Saturday, June 02, 2007
End of School...
At this stage it's 2nd June. Fuck. That is, the second day of the sixth month of the year. We usually call it June. "Y'kno Juno, you shudda been called Juno!" Thanks to Ms. Hartnet for that one. The school year was neatly tied up there during the week, later for some than others, y'kno how it is. Graduation was on the 21st of May, of a Thursday it was. Very terribly emotional as you can only imagine. The yearbook was ready. (I had my doubts.) It turned out very nice altogether.
One interesting part of the evening was just as people began to leave and we were having a signing session. The buzz about was cool. I hadn't a breeze what to write for individuals, so I wrote "Fair play to you," or "Nice one," on most of them, and my name. I thought it appropriate, that's what I've been saying these part 2 years. I could hardly write, "fuck da'," that'd just be rude. Although that didn't stop Jamie, say no more.
Unfortunately, all the signing (including our beloved cleaner from Mullingar, Co. Westmeath) held us up at the school. Poor Lorna and Grace were stranded, well stuck, outside my house for half an hour. God love them, hearts of gold and the patience of saints they have. But after a quick change out of that bloody uniform, we were ready for out. By "we" I mean meself and the Graham man. The four of us were heading down to Eddie's for a malt or something along those lines. So a malt was had by all (except Graham, you see, he's weird) and it was especially enjoyed by Ms. Kelly. She wouldn't give any to Graham, fair play to her. She had a wonderfully serene look on her face as she slowly consumed Eddie's speciality.
After the auld Eddie's experience, we went down to the place where everyone else was livin' it up. That was deadly actually. It was interesting to see everyone in a different light. We were finished school, no uniforms, (and in little more than a tea towel in some cases, say nothing) in our own time, and mostly with a drink in hand.
I've been in that place for five years, and I'm glad to be moving on, no doubt. But I'm sorry that I didn't make more lasting friendships, if you know what I mean. The lads are sound (Adam, Rob, Steven etc.) yeah, and the girlies are good craic (Lee-Anne, Erica again etc.) and all, but, it's quite unlikely that I'll ever see them much again. I think I've seen the lads down in HMV once, but apart from that, I don't see these people anywhere else apart from that school place. Leaving the exams aside, losing touch is inevitable. They're good craic that's the only thing.
This last term, I've had a good couple laughs, and I think that I've talked to more of the people a bit more and had a laugh in class. Funny how it goes. At Ciarán's party, in his house, (whenever that was) meself and Finn talked about something like that. Just saying something funny if you can in school, come out of your shell if you will. I suppose I did that a bit.
So, my secondary schooling is over at last. It's been a long time coming, but I got there. ("Little Help From My Friends" plays in the background) I'm not going to get sentimental or anything don't worry. But, let's just say goodnight. Sin thart anois, slán libh.
One interesting part of the evening was just as people began to leave and we were having a signing session. The buzz about was cool. I hadn't a breeze what to write for individuals, so I wrote "Fair play to you," or "Nice one," on most of them, and my name. I thought it appropriate, that's what I've been saying these part 2 years. I could hardly write, "fuck da'," that'd just be rude. Although that didn't stop Jamie, say no more.
Unfortunately, all the signing (including our beloved cleaner from Mullingar, Co. Westmeath) held us up at the school. Poor Lorna and Grace were stranded, well stuck, outside my house for half an hour. God love them, hearts of gold and the patience of saints they have. But after a quick change out of that bloody uniform, we were ready for out. By "we" I mean meself and the Graham man. The four of us were heading down to Eddie's for a malt or something along those lines. So a malt was had by all (except Graham, you see, he's weird) and it was especially enjoyed by Ms. Kelly. She wouldn't give any to Graham, fair play to her. She had a wonderfully serene look on her face as she slowly consumed Eddie's speciality.
After the auld Eddie's experience, we went down to the place where everyone else was livin' it up. That was deadly actually. It was interesting to see everyone in a different light. We were finished school, no uniforms, (and in little more than a tea towel in some cases, say nothing) in our own time, and mostly with a drink in hand.
I've been in that place for five years, and I'm glad to be moving on, no doubt. But I'm sorry that I didn't make more lasting friendships, if you know what I mean. The lads are sound (Adam, Rob, Steven etc.) yeah, and the girlies are good craic (Lee-Anne, Erica again etc.) and all, but, it's quite unlikely that I'll ever see them much again. I think I've seen the lads down in HMV once, but apart from that, I don't see these people anywhere else apart from that school place. Leaving the exams aside, losing touch is inevitable. They're good craic that's the only thing.
This last term, I've had a good couple laughs, and I think that I've talked to more of the people a bit more and had a laugh in class. Funny how it goes. At Ciarán's party, in his house, (whenever that was) meself and Finn talked about something like that. Just saying something funny if you can in school, come out of your shell if you will. I suppose I did that a bit.
So, my secondary schooling is over at last. It's been a long time coming, but I got there. ("Little Help From My Friends" plays in the background) I'm not going to get sentimental or anything don't worry. But, let's just say goodnight. Sin thart anois, slán libh.
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