EPTnow you might be asking why i named this 10 years. well, i've been in high school for 4 years and college for....6. now before you start making assumptions about me, listen to my story
my parents came to america from another country in the early 90s, just so they could give me more opportunities. when i got here i didn't know a word of english. my dad was always a star student, he got the best grades and was always interested in math and physics. he got scholarships in his country. he was studying for a master's in math when his dad died, and my dad had to support his whole family, his mom and his two younger sisters. he got a computer science job and came here through a company job. my mom was never a good student, she spent most of her time with music and art. her parents were overprotective, they didn't let her go anywhere except school or college and her relatives's houses. as a result she had no friends and was afraid of the bigger world
somehow my mom and dad found each other. when i was 3 years old, my dad left for america, and my mom and i came to america 2 years after my dad. we lived in apartments in new york city (queens and flushing) and the 1st floor of an old house in brooklyn (another family lived on the 2nd floor)
for a couple of years we were illegal. we didn't have a car. my dad was paranoid of the police who he thought would deport him. after the house in brooklyn burned down, we had to go to new jersey, and we got an apartment in edison. i was to live there from 1st to 7th grade (we spent a year in south carolina because my dad got a job there, that was 6th grade). we drove from from new jersey to south carolina at least 5 times, and it sucked because not only did it take about 13 hours but the tv was in south carolina and the computer was in new jersey
in 8th grade we moved to south brunswick in new jersey, and i had to leave my friend (who i had known since 2nd grade) behind. i went to his house whenever i could in the summers
being 1st generation, my parents knew nothing about the american education system. i always knew i was a smart kid, but i could never show it in school. i always felt like i was smarter than everyone around me. but things never connected for me. in 7th grade i took algebra 1 but i got a c+, and my parents didn't seem too upset about it. in 8th grade they bumped me back down to 8th grade math, so i had to take algebra 1 again in 9th grade. i'm pretty sure when i registered for 8th grade they mistakenly thought i was going to 7th grade, because everyone in my class was a 7th grader and i was the only 8th grader. even in middle school i got straight b's and barely any a's and my parents never made a big deal out of it
in 9th grade i felt like i was behind all the smart kids. i was in algebra 1, spanish 1, normal english, normal social studies, and 9th grade science (not physics 1 because to take physics you had to be in geometry). high school was a scary place. because i didn't have many clothes, people would pick on me. i would eat lunch by myself in the cafeteria
at the end of 9th grade, i got all b's, an a (algebra), and a c+ (english). i was devastated. the thought of getting a c didn't really dawn on me until later. i thought i was not one of those kids who could get c's
10th grade i took honors biology, honors us history, and honors english. though i did ok in the other classes, i failed honors english and i had to go to summer school. i was depressed the rest of high school. but i was still a smart kid, i almost got a 2000 on the sat even though i didn't take any honors or ap classes junior or senior year
i was accepted to rutgers in 2006 against all odds. but i couldn't do well in college either. i still had no friends, i couldn't talk to prefessors due to social anxiety, was always self-conscious and paranoid, and spent all my time not studying but on youtube or 4chan, or playing chess online in the computer labs. i just couldn't find myself. i didn't even know who i was. after failing expository writing in my freshman year, i failed us history the next semester. and before i knew it, failing had become an addiction, i had to fail more classes to get the same high. i had to take a break in the fall 2008 semester because of my poor gpa, and when i went back in spring 2009 i almost failed all my classes. my parents were really depressed, and i hadn't even declared my major yet. my dad stepped in and made me major in economics, which i didn't really want to do but i was wasting my life and his money and he had to do something to stop me from committing suicide
the only science classes i took in high school were biology, chemistry, and physics, and in college, biology and astronomy. i stopped math after taking calculus 1, 2, multivariable calculus and linear algebra (i was going to take differential equations but my dad thought i would fail that too). but, even after 6 years as an undergrad in college, i finally did graduate in 2012, with a 2.7 gpa
i tried looking for jobs, but having such bad grades, being pretty antisocial, and not being able to present myself to other people didn't really help my case. now i'm going to some college no one ever heard of and doing a master's in accounting (my dad wants me to take the cpa exam in 2 years)
but, i realize i could have been so much more. now i'm just going to be an accountant and spend the next 40 years working a dead end job and then retire and die. life has never been fun for me, i don't even know what fun is. but what i realized is that i really do love studying, despite my grades. i love knowing about the world, i love the routine of studying everyday like in high school and college. i realized i'm fascinated by science, biology, neuroscience, chemistry, physics, astronomy, engineering. i realized i love math and logic and computer science, english, history, sociology, anthropology, psychology, philosophy, geography, geology. i realize i could have been something great, like a scientist or someone who could change the world, but i let the emotions get to me, i let everything other than the studying get to me. i was immature, and thought i was better than everyone else, but that attitude is only going to kill you in the long run
and now my brother is 14 and he's about to start 10th grade, and my parents are upset about him getting b's in some classes and not getting to take ap classes next year (even though he got 2 a's this year and is taking honors classes next year). sometimes it does really take mistakes to get other people, and yourself, to see what's really wrong. meanwhile, my cousin is at yale and doing a phd in biochemical engineering. whenever he comes to our house i want to talk to him, but i feel like he knows everything about me and would never take me seriously. i feel like i really did waste my life, the last 10 years of it anyway, and i will have to pay for my mistakes
so i just wanna say, to any kids out there in high school or starting high school, or even if you're in college, study hard, because sometimes you really don't get a second chance
also work for your social anxiety do a martial art it really help
