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Welcome To Our Blog

I realise that you’re never supposed to start off with an apology but this is a necessary evil, I reckon. If anything goes awry with the set up and structure of this blog, don’t be surprised. I will have fouled something up. I’ve never attempted such a task before and, to be entirely honest, I have no idea what I’m doing. In fact, I don’t understand most of the technical terms used and, as a Kiwi bloke, I admit to an innate aversion to reading instuctions of any sort. Without the help of my daughter Alex, who set the technological process in motion, this project would not have proceeded beyond the theoretical. Thanks, dear.

Anyway, during the recent Christmas holidays, I had an idea. Having taught at Feilding High School for something over four decades I’ve had the privilege of coming across a large number of smart people, many of whom are using their writing to make successful careers. One thing we all need to succeed, whether we’re teenagers or not, is confidence and it occurred to me that if I could assemble a collection of pieces of writing created by our past students, just maybe this would boost the confidence of our current cohorts and inspire them to improve their writing so that their employment opportunities and choice of leisure activities are greatly widened.

So that’s the dream. Over the next few days I’ll be introducing some established writers and a few who are yet to be “discovered”. You’ll be reading columns, essays, poems, editorials, sports news, satire…..just about everything.

Philip Jeffreys

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For I Now Know

Kathleen van Rooyen  teaches English at FAHS .  She studied a Bachelor of Arts at Victoria University of Wellington double majoring in English Literature and Political Science and double minoring in Theatre and International Relations. She is passionate about NZ politics and enjoys using literature as a medium to encourage political conversation among young people. But first and foremost, she is kiwi. Her mother’s family arrived in New Zealand during the 1860s from Germany and her family history has been recorded in a book, passed down from generation to generation. This poem was first coined while she was studying but she has been changing it over the years. This is her final version. She will let it speak for itself.

Yesteryear I seized

Your tongue, your land, your seas

A cost you bore and still you pay

To submit to my superior ways
A tongue impounded where one was learned
For I now know, by force it was earned
My kin arrived in droves
Traded blankets and muskets for homes

And tore apart our Mother in rows

Proud hills violated

As fickle pockets dilated

Short-sighted were we from the pain

The scars visible today in the remains

 

At Waitangi together we signed

An accord that favoured only one side

A peaceful protest was your reply

Such savagery one can never condone

A fault that was mine, never your own

Women and children fled to their deaths

Better that than face the white man’s breath

Once nourishing waters ceaseless in red rage

 

And as the pages of history fill

Our tale is at a stop

Rights and Privileges unjustly withheld

Are tragically overdue

Reverse racism makes headlines

“Scholarships here and there, but what about me?”

Would you rather Chinese or te reo?

Grotesque question

Your warriors: “aggressors, oppressors”

Us and them

And them and us

 

If sorrow is a qualifier

Let mine unify

For I now comprehend

That I believed a lie

No amount of money will ever amend.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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Justice?

The following article was written by Michelle Duff and appeared on www.stuff.co.nz on 17 March 2018.

 

A senior civil servant who was once strangled unconscious by an ex-partner says the justice system allowed her to be re-victimised by her cashed-up assailant.

Olivia — whose real name cannot be used for legal reasons — says she was traumatised by a Family Court process which cost her $150,000 and enabled her ex-partner to continue his control over her through psychological and financial abuse.

Her story comes as Justice Minister Andrew Little announces a review into the Family Court — the third attempt to fix the troubled system in under a decade.

Little said cases like Olivia’s were motivation to make change. “I’m sufficiently concerned about what I’m hearing, which is why we will be initiating a review of the Family Court. We have a major concern about access to justice generally, and the time taken to get things sorted out is just way too long.”

Currently, a backlog means even relatively simple cases are not heard for months. In Wellington, lawyers are warning clients not to expect a hearing until December. “These are families in highly stressful situations, who are being caught up in a bureaucratic system,” family lawyer Liz Lewes said.
Olivia, who has since died of cancer, spent the last 14 years of her life in hiding from a man the Family Court deemed no threat. She had no online presence, her address is not publicly available, and her family were worried about her safety in speaking with Stuff.

But as the cancer stole over her body, she met with Little and Ministry of Justice officials to argue for the rights of domestic violence survivors and a simpler system.

“As soon as I found out about the cancer, I decided I wanted to do this,” she told Stuff. “I mean what’s he going to do, kill me?

Olivia was in an physically and psychologically abusive relationship with Paul (not his real name) for eight years. It began with Paul backhanding Olivia across the face, and escalated to punching and strangulation. Olivia tried to leave, but felt trapped and afraid.

After an incident where Paul bit Olivia on the arm until she bled, she filed for a ‘without notice’ protection order.These are granted under the Domestic Violence Act 1995, if the court is satisfied the applicant has been subject to domestic violence and needs to be protected.

The interim, three-month order was granted. But Olivia says Paul used vexatious litigation to fight the final protection order, and she was dragged back to court for the next 2 ½ years without a hearing date in sight.
She says judges did not take her case seriously, with one telling her she was “over-emotional”. She felt punished for not leaving her alleged abuser.

“I couldn’t believe it,” she says. “I’m an average, law-abiding citizen. I thought the police and the courts were there to protect me, to protect women. Now I know they’re not.

“The worst time of my life was when I was with my abuser, because he could have killed me. But the court process was a close second.”

Olivia eventually secured a final protection order in late 2006, after her ex-partner agreed to it through lawyers when Olivia signed an unrelated property deal. “I didn’t care about the property. I just wanted to be safe,” she says.
But four years later, Paul applied to discharge the final protection order. Olivia had no money or energy left to fight”I couldn’t do it anymore. I felt horribly judged, I didn’t feel listened to, and the process made me feel isolated and trapped.” Instead, she went into hiding.

When asked to comment, Paul maintained the abuse allegations were “not true or proven.” He said the protection order was baseless, and he had applied to discharge the final order as he believed it could be seen to reflect on his character and prevent him from travelling and owning property.
“Just because she wanted it does not make it right — so of course I defended myself.”

Nationwide, around 650 applications are made for protection orders each month. Lewes said if a defendant opposed the order, a victim could expect to spend upwards of $5000 to get to a final hearing. In other cases, like Olivia’s, the time and cost was crippling. “I think it puts some people off making these applications and securing protection — it just adds to their re-victimisation.”
Domestic violence campaigners say victims should not have to pay to keep themselves safe, and that Olivia’s case highlights the ability of white-collar perpetrators to game the system

“I have known of women in this situation who have been actively suicidal, because it’s just so desperate,” said Shine client services manager Jill Proudfoot. “It is abuse through the legal processes.”

The Family Court has faced claims of long-standing problems, exacerbated by reforms in 2014.

Little said his ministerial review would combine external review and public consultation.

It would address challenges currently facing the court, including long delays of up to a year for hearing dates and a backlog of urgent applications. A separate review of legal aid was also planned.
 

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Faith

When I was a little girl, I was scared to sleep because I thought that someone would come in and hurt me. I refused to sleep until I was absolutely sure that there were angels watching over me.

Then, I grew up and realised that Christianity wasn’t a faith that I could hold onto. I missed that though. I missed praying, and believing in heaven, and having angels watch over me while I slept.

I especially missed it when I was 14 or 15 years old. This was a really significant phase of my life, and probably the darkest. I was at a really low point that I just couldn’t escape from. One night I wasn’t able to sleep, and I got increasingly terrified about the type of thoughts I had throughout that day. I decided that I couldn’t feel like this anymore. Don’t ask me why, but I decided to get my phone and write a letter to myself. Through it, I found something to hold onto. Faith. Not in the form of angels or religion. But something that I could hold onto for a long time.

“Find something to have faith in. That doesn’t necessarily mean that you have to have faith in a religion. Everything happens for a reason and everything in life is either a blessing or a lesson and the only way you can see the blessing is by finding the lesson or by learning the lesson. Decide to put what you have of yourself into holding onto the faith, that even though you can’t see it, there is a blessing. It’s kind of like driving down a dark road and your headlights are only letting you see so far ahead. ‘This sucks right now. The way I feel sucks right now’ but maybe I am only seeing this far ahead and if I give up now I won’t know what’s further down the road because I quit and dropped off the road too soon. So, I decided to have faith that I can’t see the bigger picture and that something else has a bigger picture in store for me.

Every single day that is really good, or the days in my future that have yet to come, the day I get married, get my degree, have my own house, hold my child for the first time. Just the days I feel grateful for life. Those days are the days I decided to believe in. Even when I couldn’t see them yet, even when I didn’t know that they would exist yet. Even in days as simple as today. That is what I decided to have faith in.

Find your faith. Find what you decide to believe in. That will pull you through those dark times.

Trust me.

You can’t give up.

Even though your foresight is only so far ahead, and you might not be able to see yourself feeling any better in a few days, or weeks, or years, or whenever, but there is a time when you are going to feel better.

You need to hold onto that and make that happen because it is so worth it.
I have faith in that.”

Those words mean so much to me because I know that they will always be a beacon for me whenever I find myself lost in the dark. It seems like I was so young when I wrote this, but those words will remain with me forever.

Anonymous

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Sometimes Success Is Just Surviving

The following piece was written by Sasha Beattie, who attended FAHS from 2008-2012.
Sasha is the current News Editor for Salient, the Victoria University of Wellington Student magazine. She is concurrently completing her final semester of a Bachelor of Arts, majoring in Political Science, International Relations, and Religious Studies.
This article was written for Sasha’s fortnightly column in Salient, the irreverently titled ‘Shit Chat’.

It’s really easy for me to slip into a cycle of flippancy when it comes to talking about mental health; it’s really easy for me to deflect talking about the hard stuff with humour. There’s nothing wrong with that, I don’t think. There is value in escapism.  I do think, however, that it’s important not to get stuck in that cycle indefinitely.
This week I’m going to attempt to cut the shit and speak sincerely. Apologies for any inconvenience caused.
In 2014, my first year, a friend of mine was co-editing Salient. He wrote an editorial for the mental health issue. It was, after a long time of feeling very isolated, the reason I finally went and got diagnosed.
The editorial spoke candidly about struggling, and about being kind to yourself. It was a relief to see someone say it out loud. Seeing someone who I admired so much admit he was struggling made it seem like it was OK, actually, that I was struggling too.
I don’t remember that time in a whole lot of detail. I do remember sitting in the overbridge at uni, reading the editorial, and crying. Then walking myself to student health.
Talking candidly about mental health is hard, but as Cam and Duncan said in that issue, we need to talk about it. We need to say it out loud.
I was diagnosed with anxiety and depression in October 2014. The diagnosis was a while in the making. In the years since, I’ve been to doctors and counsellors, I’ve come on and off meds. I’m still figuring it out.
Right now, I’m doing OK. I’m pretty stressed, I’m worried about my friends, but I’m doing OK.
There’s a part of me that’s worried this OK-ness that I’ve been feeling for the past couple of months has an expiry date. There’s a part of me that’s worried I’m going to get overwhelmed again, that I’m going to sink back into the intensely dark place I was in this time last year.
University is really tough for me. I expect a lot from myself. I often won’t attempt something if I don’t think I’ll excel in it; I’d rather not do something at all than deliver in mediocrity. I have an all-or-nothing mindset that results in periods of chronic stagnation with intermittent bursts of panic-induced activity.
Human interaction is really tough for me. I tend to give a lot of myself to others. I feel incredible pressure to be “on” when I’m around people; I read into silences as some deficiency in my character. I haven’t quite figured out yet how to comfortably exist without the approval of others.
It’s often easier to pretend I don’t care than to admit that actually, I care a lot, and that I won’t always be in control or live up to the high standards I set for myself.
Cam and Duncan openly talking about their struggles was powerful, and I am forever grateful for the impact that their candour had, and continues to have, on my life. Struggling is OK; normal; valid. Let’s talk about our mental health, if only to find comfort in the fact that we aren’t alone.
Success doesn’t always look like thriving; sometimes success is just surviving. I think it’s important to be reminded that the ostensibly simple act of surviving is admirable in and of itself.
Love you, xoxo
If you want to read Cam and Duncan’s editorial from 2014, you can find it here: https://issuu.com/salientmagazine/docs/mental_health_issuu

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Taking Care Of Our Youth

The following piece was written by Dr Katrina McChesney. As Katrina Haigh she attended FAHS from 1996 to 2000. (Coincidentally she was in the same Year 10 class as award-winning columnist Michelle Duff).

The original article appeared on www.nzareblog.wordpress.com.

Katrina returned to Feilding High to teach Mathematics from 2006 to 2009. She recently completed her Ph.D which focussed on teachers’ experience of professional development.

This article was co-authored with Associate Professor Jill Aldridge of Curtin University, Western Australia and appeared in the blog of the New Zealand Association for Research in Education.

Editor’s Note: I have left the setting-out of this piece unedited as its current format reflects the way it was set out in the original publication.

 

March 10, 2018

The mental health and wellbeing of NZ’s young people are in crisis. The latest iteration of the Youth 2000 national survey of NZ secondary school students found that 16% of female students and 9% of male students reported clinically significant symptoms of depression, while in the previous 12 months:
38% of female and 23% of male students reported feeling down or depressed most of the day for at least two weeks in a row;
29% of female students and 18% of male students had deliberately harmed themselves;
21% of female students and 10% of male students had seriously thought about suicide; and
6% of female students and 2% of male students had made a suicide attempt.
NZ has the highest teen suicide rate and the second-highest youth bullying rate in the developed world, with our rates for both these issues being more than double the OECD averages. Concerningly, all these trends have been relatively stable over the last decade or so – things are not (yet) getting better for our youth. In addition to these national statistics, we must also acknowledge the heightened challenges faced by youth in Canterbury following the 2010-2011 earthquakes.

So, what can we do? Lots of policy-level ideas have been floated, including more social workers and educational psychologists in schools, increased national attention to wellbeing outcomes, cross-sector approaches to improving youth mental health, and learning from past intervention efforts to inform productive ways forward.
Policy-level efforts are important, but so are school-level ideas. How can schools make a difference to student mental health and wellbeing – and what is realistic now, in the context of existing staffing, funding, policies and requirements?
School climate: One way schools can contribute
Our research centres on measuring socio-emotional school and classroom climates, and investigating how these climates affect students’ experiences and outcomes. As part of this work, we recently published a systematic literature review in which we examined over 550 past studies and synthesised the 48 studies that directly linked school climate with students’ mental health and wellbeing.
96% of the studies we examined found evidence of associations between the school climate and students’ mental health and wellbeing. In most cases, the research designs mean that we can’t be sure that it was the school climate that directly caused the student outcomes – but the consistent pattern of associations found in almost all of the studies nonetheless indicates that there are important links between the school climate and students’ mental health and wellbeing. Since school climate is “malleable” and can be deliberately modified, it may be a useful lever for promoting positive mental health and wellbeing among students.
Our analysis identified four key aspects of the school climate that are associated with students’ mental health and wellbeing. We suggest that by considering these four aspects, schools can take manageable steps to promote an environment that supports student mental health and wellbeing.
Social connectedness / relationships: When students had positive relationships with both their peers and their teachers, they reported better psychosocial wellbeing, more positive / pro-social behaviours, fewer mental health issues, and fewer delinquent or risk behaviours. Aspects contributing to this sense of social connectedness included: positive peer relationships, peer support, an absence of bullying, teacher support, positive relationships with teachers, teachers’ regard for students’ perspectives, a democratic school environment in which students are given autonomy and voice, and respect and trust between all members of the school community.
School safety: When students felt that their school was a safe environment, they reported better psychosocial wellbeing, more positive / pro-social behaviours, fewer mental health issues, and fewer delinquent or risk behaviours. Aspects contributing to students’ sense of school safety included: school safety policies, rule clarity, rule enforcement, mechanisms for reporting and seeking help, and typical behaviour patterns at the school. It is important to note that teachers, parents and students all tend to have different views about how safe a school is, meaning that we should be cautious in making assumptions about how our students might feel about the school.
School connectedness: When students felt a sense of connection to their school, they reported better psychosocial wellbeing, more positive / pro-social behaviours, fewer mental health issues, and fewer delinquent or risk behaviours. Aspects contributing to students’ sense of school connectedness included their feelings of belonging at school, their loyalty or attachment to the school, a positive school community, and positive attitudes and practices to affirm diversity.
Academic environment: When students experienced an academic environment that was characterised by high demands and pressure, they reported increased mental health issues and delinquent or risk behaviours. Aspects contributing to high-pressure academic environments included perceived academic demands at the school, a competitive school or classroom culture, an imbalance between academic efforts (what is required of students to meet expectations) and rewards (the outcomes students experience such as good grades, praise, and opportunities), and a focus on academic outcomes without attention to social, emotional, and motivational influences.
Ways to make a change
The New Zealand Curriculum offers schools the opportunity to define their own cultures and values, in consultation with their communities, and to craft curricula that reflect these values. ERO have highlighted five principles that are important for schools’ promotion of and response to student wellbeing. These principles illustrate how wellbeing can be integrated at all levels, from strategic planning and vision to on-the-ground systems and practices:
A culture of wellbeing: Agreed values and vision should underpin the actions in the school to promote students’ wellbeing.
Wellbeing in the curriculum: The school’s curriculum should be designed and monitored around valued goals including student wellbeing.
Student leadership, agency and voice: Students should be recognised and utilised as a powerful force in wellbeing and other decisions.
Systems, people and initiatives: All students’ wellbeing should be actively monitored.
Responding to specific wellbeing needs and concerns: Systems should be in place (and followed!) to respond to wellbeing issues.
Although wellbeing is explicitly incorporated in the health and physical education learning area of the NZ Curriculum, we believe attention to students’ mental health and social, emotional and spiritual wellbeing should be much broader than this. The models and concepts that underpin the health and PE curriculum, however, remain excellent springboards for whole-school practice: the whare tapa whā model of wellbeing / hauora; a health promotion stance; a socio-ecological perspective; and attention to students’ attitudes and values (and not only their behaviours).
New Zealand schools also have free access to NZCER’s excellent Wellbeing@School programme which includes tools, resources and support around examining the current school climate and planning and implementing improvements (see also this overview of related work Jill and her team do in Australia). As a starting point, these school and classroom level checklists are good prompts for reviewing current practice against what we know works in NZ contexts.
Overall, our recent literature review contributes to the growing body of evidence showing that what schools do every day matters for student mental health and wellbeing. Our school climates are not neutral – they have important links to our students’ experiences and so it is important for teachers, school leaders, school trustees and policy makers to consider the nature of our current climates and how these can be improved over time. This is one way that we can take better and better care of our youth.

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This Too Shall Pass

 

Some things in life are hard. Your exams, assignments, exercise, people. But dealing with grief and loss? That’s the hardest thing of all.

You cannot explain something so raw and real. One day your life is carrying along as usual and the next it is completely shattered. It makes you question your purpose, how do you go on? You just do. The world will always keep spinning and everyone’s life will keep moving. I’ve experienced the pain of loss, of death to your once tight-knit family, and the emotional trauma that is grief. Losing my grandfather, my godfather and uncle, even my childhood dog and cat. It is immeasurable. You feel as if you have lost a part of your soul that you can never get back- how many tears can you cry, when does your body stop feeling numb, when does the shock of pain pass? When the funeral is over, when the flowers have died, when everyone has carried on with their lives, you suddenly realise that this is your life now. Nothing will ever be the same again.

I was visiting a family friend the other day who had just lost her husband, my boss that gave me my first paying job. As I was listening to her speak of his final days and the visible pain of losing her husband, a father, and a grandfather I noticed how frustrated she was at recent mourners that have come and gone and how in social situations, you avoid talking directly about the loss and overcompensating with words that don’t really help mend that pain. “I’m so sorry for your loss” – are you? Then would you mind please bringing them back now. “Yes my husband went through the exact same thing” – yes but he is still alive. “I had some casserole left over so I thought I would bring it to you” – gee thanks.

In this moment I looked down into my cup of tea and thought about how grief is like a cup of tea. It takes so many formations, colours, and textures. You never know how or when it will rear its ugly head and take control over you. Sometimes you cry unfathomably and other days you feel guilty because you haven’t cried. In some moments you are so angry or filled with this anxiety not knowing what to do.

“Death comes to all, but great achievements raise a monument which shall endure until the sun grows old.”

I see grief as an emotion that has a life of its own. It carries every feeling within it and sometimes there is just no way to discern it or control it. You cannot measure it or even begin to understand it in its entirety. That is what grief is at its core. No matter how many books you read or how much advice you get or how many times you go over it in your head, you cannot define grief. There is no right or wrong way in dealing with it. You take every day as it comes and appreciate the memories you did have- no one can take that away from you.

The shock of loss to our bodies- emotional, mental, physical, and spiritual is incredible. For those of us who have experienced grief you wake up in the morning and for a split second everything is okay in the world. And then you remember, the storm clouds gather and the overriding question lingers: what is the point in getting out of bed? It questions the very nature of who we are.

So here are my thoughts and tips if you want to call them that. Grief cannot be solved, taught or justified. Grieving is a process and a journey you have to go on by yourself.

Self-care: During this time our bodies need to be fed in order to handle the multiple phases of grief and trauma. Although this may seem small and insignificant you must remember that you are still with the living and to live you must eat, drink and carry on because your body won’t stop to allow you to just crawl into a ball and ignore all signs that tell you you are still alive.
Accepting what we cannot control: A time will come when you need to accept you have no control over what happens to you. You need to realise that what you once knew, you no longer can know. If you look at this from a sort of spiritual perspective (regardless if you are or not) you have the power to realise all that we are not and less about what we are or what we think we know. There is great freedom that comes with this because it gives you the courage to meet life’s adversities head-on.

Accept the bad days: As myself and my family have learned over these years, grief pressures you to seek within yourself. Sometimes you have bad days- that is fact and others will understand that. It may be as simple as a text: “Bad day, can’t talk”. The simplicity of that text shows that you can’t force grief to be something different. Don’t suppress it but don’t force it to be something it really isn’t.

Embrace the hard times: When the pain of loss happens, it is like a lightning bolt. I use this comparison for two reasons. Grief is like a lightning bolt because you are aware there is lightening around you, you can hear it and sometimes you can see it but you never think that it can strike you. And when it does it comes and shakes the foundation of your grounding. You question everything- what you’re doing, what’s more important, who you truly are. But there comes great power in surrendering to the unknown.

The days and the weeks that follow on from a death in the family will seem like they bleed together like the diary of your life disintegrating in front of your very eyes, but there are days in between that where you experience joy and laughter. Don’t feel guilty about that because one of the feelings you can experience from grief is joy. Joy for the memories you shared, joy for the time you had, and joy for the life you have lived with them. Outside of that context, a weekend away with your friends, a lunch out with your family or simply days where the sun was shining and you felt no reason but to be happy. Embrace these days for what they are and don’t feel guilty. Life is there to be lived because one day the harsh reality of it is that we will die as well.

And like everything else, your suffering will go, until one day it comes back again. Their favourite song on the radio, the car they used to drive or their mail that arrives in the letterbox.

But for me, the greatest thing about death is that it helps us grow. It matures us, brings us lessons of holding on so tightly and letting go and gracing us with the wisdom we need to move forward with everyone else. With time, the sun will shine again. Embrace this new chapter in your life by going for a walk, taking your shoes off and feeling the sand beneath your toes, looking up at the trees and breathing in the air. The happiness we once had never really went away, one day you will find that it still exists inside us, we are just remembering it anew. It engages us again and revives us.

“This too shall pass”

That is the very nature of grief because it has its own rhythm. It is both in the present and in the past and will always appear to stay that way no matter how much time has passed.

Learn to live on, accept the hand you are dealt, and never forget what is important in life.

(By Danielle Balmer)

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Being A Woman In Your Twenties

 

Today is International Women’s Day. A day where we celebrate the social, economic, cultural and political achievements of women. Did you know that? Nah me either. I think it’s because I’m living beyond my means. These days a third of us young professionals are. And I salute us… the lost generation.

It’s a Tuesday morning in the office and I’m sitting with my mouth open on its hinges still trying to recover from the weekend. I don’t seem to bounce back like I used to because back in my day… wait who am I kidding I’m 22. I look around at my fellow employees and can’t help but ignore the sour taste of envy in my mouth. With their children, their fiancés, building their new homes, complaining about the tenants they have in their rental properties. Basking in the glory of success. I sink slowly into my chair.

I’m having a millennial breakdown. We’ve little hope of a high paid job, saddled with debt, will probably never own a home, we can’t get a boyfriend because they are all on Tinder… I’ve even worked out which one of my girlfriends I’m getting hitched to and adopting two children with. She seems like she would do a great job at being my life partner based on my previous track record.

This is the life for us born shy of 1980: a hopeless offering of limp employment, academic debt, sex so casual that choosing partners is as easy as swiping right with your index finger, and, of course, little hope of ever having a “place of one’s own”.

Let me throw some numbers at you to prove that I’m not being a Drama Queen. The gender pay gap in New Zealand for women is 11.8% based on median hour earnings. I guess I can counter-argue this. I would be mega rich by now if I had no social life, if the word ‘takeaway’ wasn’t in my vocabulary, if I thought the bus was my only convenient form of transport, if I didn’t care what clothes I wore, how I looked when I woke up in the morning or the quality of my cellphone to take the right selfie. The brands, oh the brands! I do care because it’s really hard not to.

It’s no wonder then that at least some of this generation see things a little bleakly. I’ve got Lena Dunham to cry with me and capture the sad-eyed, antsy demographic through her character in Girls. Girls, if you haven’t seen it is our generation’s version of Sex and the City, just with bad footwear. It is infused with a language to a world of dead-end sex, dead-end jobs and expensively educated kids working day shifts at their local cafe. Dunham has created quite a name for herself as the town crier for a frightened generation. For the young men and women who believe their feelings are only valid unless posted on social media, struggle to make sense of a world that doesn’t really have any room for them.

And I know what you’re all thinking: “Please! This generation will never know the threat of military service. These young women will never know what it feels like to be confined to the four walls of their kitchen as the legal ‘subject’ of their husband or denied free access to contraception. What real punishment meant for them in schools. For them, a university education is a given, not a privilege. They can travel! Delay motherhood! Build a social network empire through the voodoo magic of their phones!”

And without a doubt this age group enjoys the spoils of modern life that their parents and grandparents could only ever dream of: free entertainment in their back pockets; air travel that costs less than a meal out; and cheaper food which means we will never know the taste of the mystery casserole in a can.

These are the things our predecessors worked hard for. Paying for movies and music, shopping in charity shops, and riding the waves of the devastating effects of a recession: houses lost and savings obliterated. What a depressed bunch we are.

But doesn’t every generation think they have it worse than before? The classic first world problems and all that! My father would probably agree. But then if his mother was alive she would shake her head and explain that neither of us would ever know how it feels to have lost loved ones to the war, or know with certainty that your life would never stray beyond the perimeters of motherhood and the small patch of a home town.

So I did some digging into the gossip mag archives to find the headlines that made the decades:

1960: “When a Working Girl sees a Psychiatrist”

1970: “What’s New and True about Woman Doctors”

1980: “25 Ways to Ignite a Love Affair”

1990: “How to Look like a Fashion Model” with a close second being “Does he bore you? How to stay interested”

2000: “You! You! You! Secret Ways to stop stressing about Hideous Days”

2016: “New Year New Booty”

So in short, we have all had it hard. Even though I’m biased I still can’t help but think us poor, rictus-grin selfie of a generation still have it worse. We’ve been duped the most out of all of our counterparts. Nothing stings worse than the feeling of being over-promised so much yet realising you’ve become an adult overnight. Our self-esteem was bolstered: being told in school that we could do or be anything if we put our minds to it. A university education was the way to go next and a guarantee of well-paid employment. Grandparents cannot fathom how their adult grandchildren still don’t have a home, husband or any assets that signify “welcome to adult life this way please”.

So what have we done? We’ve hustled and created “personal brands”. Our YouTube channels, our blogs, our social media hierarchies. Some of us have found the job the husband and the baby growing inside of them. I wonder how many ‘likes’ they’ll get on Facebook?! It is a little bit of a disguise, I’ll give us that. We’ve mastered the art of distraction by waving a cheery scarf, or a well filtered Instagram photo from where you’d rather be while stuffing our frightened senses into our pockets.

So forgive us when you hear us talking about our followers or our Snapchat filters. Purchasing the right shade of Mac lipstick or taking 1000 selfies to capture the most ‘natural-not-looking-at-the-camera’ shot. Don’t judge us for our relentless self-promotion or our Saturday nights on the town. We do it because we have to. We get tough and we get pushy in the most discrete way possible and we do whatever it takes to get noticed in the 21st century.

(By Danielle Balmer)

Posted on

Judging The Book

 

I once knew this guy who made a lot of money. He saw the world as a series of values and propositions. Everything from what home to buy, who to deal with who, to why certain people liked him or not.

If someone was rude to him it was because they were jealous or felt threatened by his power or success. If someone was kind to him it was because they admired his power and success, and in some cases, may be trying to manipulate him to get more access to it.

He measured himself through his financial success. And naturally he measured the world and the people around him through financial success.

I once knew this woman who was beautiful. She saw the world in terms of attraction and attention. Everything from the clothes she wore on a lazy day, to getting discounts, to dealing with the naggers.

If someone was rude to her it was because they were intimidated by her beauty or their own lack of beauty. If someone was kind to her it was because they admired her beauty and wanted access to it.

She measured herself through her beauty and attractiveness. And naturally she measured the world and people in it by their beauty and attractiveness.

I once knew this guy who was an introvert. He was socially awkward and nobody liked him that much. He saw the world as a popularity contest, a contest that he was perpetually losing. Everything from how much beer he could drink alone, to the invisibility cloak he wore out, to the girls who just didn’t get him.

If someone was rude to him it was because they realized how much cooler they were than him. If someone was kind to him it was because they saw how much of a loser he was and took pity on him. Or perhaps they were just bigger losers than he was.

He measured himself through his social status. And naturally he measured the world and the people in it through social status.

The way in which we judge others is a reflection on the ways that we choose to measure the value in our own lives. Some of us measure our life through money and accolades. Others measure it through beauty and popularity. Others measure it through family and relationships. Others measure it through service and good deeds.

Chances are you measure it through some combination of all of these things, but one in particular matters most to you. One stands out and determines your happiness more than others.

I’ve showered you with my opinions on here for quite some time now. But if there is one thing you can take away for later, it’s that it is always important to measure ourselves by our own internal metrics as much as possible. The more external we make our metrics for our own value and self-worth, the more we screw everything up for ourselves and for others.

If you measure your life by your family relationships, then you will measure others by the same standard – how close their family is to them. If they’re distant from their family or don’t call home enough, you’ll judge them as deadbeats, ungrateful or irresponsible, regardless of their lives or their history.

If you measure your life by how much fun and partying you can have, then you will measure others by the same standard – how much fun and partying they have. If they prefer to stay home and watch reruns of the soap opera we all love to hate every weekend, you’ll judge them as inhibited, scared of the world, lame and soulless, regardless of their personality or needs.

If you measure your life by how much you’ve travelled and experienced, then you will measure other people by the same standard – how worldly they’ve become. If they prefer to stay home and enjoy the comforts of routine, then you will judge them as incurious, ignorant, unambitious, regardless of what their aspirations really are.

The tape measure we use for ourselves is the tape measure we use for the world.

If we believe that we’re hard workers and we earned everything we have, then we will believe that everyone else earned what they have. And if they have nothing, it’s because they earned nothing. And if they haven’t worked hard but still manage to get what they want for nothing, we will judge, my god will we judge.

Speaking of God, this is why people who are born-again Christians tend to believe that everyone should find salvation through Jesus Christ. This is why hardcore atheists try to logically argue about something that has nothing to do with logic. It’s why racists often claim that everyone else is racist too. They just don’t know it. It’s why sexist men justify their sexism by saying women are worse and sexist women justify their sexism by saying men are worse.

This isn’t to say that judging is wrong. There are plenty of values worth judgment. I judge people who are violent and malicious. But that is a reflection of who I am. I judge violence and malice within myself. Those are traits that I will not tolerate within myself, therefore I do not tolerate them in others. But that is a choice I am making. That is a choice we are all making, whether we realise it or not. And we should make those choices consciously and not on auto-pilot.

It’s why people who think they’re ugly look for all of the ways people around them are ugly and why people who are lazy and slack off look for all of the ways others cut corners and slack off as well. It’s why corrupt officials choose to be corrupt: because they assume everyone else is as corrupt as they are. It’s why cheaters choose to cheat: because they assume everybody else is going to cheat if given the chance too.

It’s why those who can’t trust are the ones who can’t be trusted.
It’s why this world we live in has a gross aftertaste of selfishness and milk 10 days old.

Many of us adopt our own internal tape measures not through conscious choice but through the shaming we’re subjected to. But another big part of development is to recognise that everyone has their own metric. And that metric is likely not going to be the same as ours. And that’s fine. Most metrics people choose are fine. Even if they’re not the same metrics you would choose for yourself.

You may view the world through family values, but most people do not. You may view the world through the metric of attractiveness, but most people do not. You may view the world through the metric of freedom and worldliness, but most people do not. You may view the world through the positivity and friendliness, but most people do not.

And that’s simply part of being human. Accepting that others measure themselves and the world differently than you do is one of the most important steps to consciously choosing the right relationships for yourself. You may not accept a person’s ideas or behaviors- but don’t be bashful because of it.

It’s inevitable- it’s in our nature to have a lack of contentment, a streak of jealousy, and a thirst for the spotlight. It’s not the healthy way to live our lives. At times I make myself ill on the inside just thinking about how I judge, who I’m judging and why I’m doing it. We are the parasites that thrive off the negative Nancy comments and the nasty words.

Don’t give these thoughts or the judgemental thoughts of others the time of day. If the spotlight isn’t on them, they’ll fade because nobody will listen.

Stick to your own path, it’s the one only you know and the one nobody else does. That’s how it should be, it’s how it can be and it starts with me. Right now.

(By Danielle Balmer)

Posted on

Dear Hypothetical Man

Danielle Balmer attended FAHS from 2007 to 2011. She has a degree in communications and is currently a Communications Officer for the Manawatu District Council. She also writes a blog -www.daniellebalmer.org.nz

The following pieces first appeared on that blog. I have fallen in love with Dear Hypothetical Man. Here it is:

 

Dear Hypothetical Man,

We’ve often wondered what you’d be like. We even thought we’d met you before. A couple of times, in fact.

Other times, we’ve questioned whether marriage is ever a possibility for us at all.

We are not sure whether you exist. If you do, that’s lovely. But if you don’t, that’s fine too. Of course, it does make this letter existentially problematic – I mean, who are we even writing to? – but we’re totally fine either way.

We don’t do perfect. We do real. Let authenticity, conversation and hunger for each other be the manifesto for a marriage.

In the interests of full disclosure, please know that we aren’t porcelain dolls, we have insecurities- a kaleidoscope of flaws, as we hope you have too. We may get anxious, and bite our nails. All too often. And at times, get lost in our own heads.

But please don’t ever mistake our desire for independence or intermittent silence as indifference.

We want you to know that we’re not trophies or a symbol of your perceived success. Apparently it’s a compliment- just ask Kanye West. We were not raised to sit and look pretty on anyone’s shelf. We want to have intellectual conversations. We want to help you chase your dreams. We want to be your partner and not your prize.

Sometimes we’re boisterous and giggly. Confident. We were complete before we met you, as I hope you were too. So don’t get out the glue- that’s way too much pressure for anyone to bear.

Despite grocery shopping and doing laundry, our home will not be one of small talk and monotony. We are the authors of our suburban sonnet, after all.

We want you to know that we are feminists, and we want you to be one too (yes we said it). That doesn’t mean we are anti-men, and it doesn’t mean that we think of ourselves as superior to you. It merely means that as women, we believe we should have the power and the choice to define what it means to be female. Maybe it is defined through continuing to work a full time job throughout the duration of our marriage. Maybe one day it’ll mean deciding to take on the onerous yet rewarding task of being a stay-at-home mum. Either way it’ll be “working” and the best social situation that we can come up with will be free from societal expectations.

We want you to know that while your opinions will be valuable, we will try our hardest not to exchange our personal identity for your stamp of approval.

And what do we think you’re like? Well. The weight of expectation is a heavy one, so let’s avoid preconceptions. If we said yes, then, well, know that you’re perfect to us. Character is far more important.

I read somewhere once that you need to fall in love six times before you get married. Honestly, we are not sure what the ‘magic’ number is. We’ve fallen in love before, more than once. And fallen out of it again. We’ve met some very special people out of the 7 billion wandering the globe. Yet, despite time and life and multiple broken hearts, some inexplicable nonsensical pull could bring US together.

Too many people stay together because of expectation. Or exhaustion. Or fear of upsetting the status quo. But we, perhaps because of the divorce skeletons rattling through our heads, have always vowed we would never settle for second best.

And we won’t. You will be family. Bound not by DNA, but rather the family we choose.

And every day, we will choose you, again. And again.

It’ll be worth the wait.

With love,
Your Princess. (Ugh. I’m joking! Don’t you dare.)
Us

 

 

Posted on

Sailing

(This poem has taken close to half a century to write. Yes, it is about a relationship. No, the promise of the concluding stanza was not realised)

I’m deep-keeled,
Stable in strong winds
But slow to come about
In lighter airs.

You are narrower,
Crafted for speed,
Responsive to every
Wind shift.

I try to keep pace
Using every strategy to
Maximise boat speed.

But it’s no use.

You edge away
Until
You
Are
Just
A
Speck

On my horizon.

But
Sudden
A black cloud bank rolls in
A gale screams from the south
You come about
No choice but to run
Everything lashed down
Tight.

I manoeuvre to windward
And you’re safe.

Now we surf the waves
Home
Together.

 

Philip Jeffreys