How Low Can You Go?

Depends on your perspective.

In terms of pickleball (Opera spellcheck doesn't even think it's a word. Then again, "spellcheck" isn't a word either), you can rally the ball regardless of the distance the ball is above the ground, with respect to your skill. I personally can't do that, but it's possible. Evidence decrees it.

In terms of sample size (for stat), below 30 is generally bad, unless it's known ahead of time that the population is normal. Which you can never know, really, because that's just life, so we assume. Some ignorance is always better than complete ignorance.

In terms of my concentration, low is 1:55 in the afternoon, when it's so, so close to the last bell, and yet it's still so, so far away. I just want to fall asleep in those last 20 minutes.

No matter that I go to bed relatively early (10:30). I can never fall asleep anyway until well past eleven. Whoever said that the average time it takes to fall asleep is 15 minutes is so obviously misguided. (I could also say that I'm an extreme case of an outlier, but that doesn't sound as appeasing.)

Last period is always a nightmare for me. I feel sorry for my U.S. history, stat, physics, gym, and English teachers. Having me in a daze for half the class must be immensely fun. I wouldn't know. I'm too unfocused to take note.

Of course, having Mogley say, "I slept at five in the morning and I don't feel tired," is not very good consolation.

Really.

I slept at five in the morning once, and the next day I felt ready to crash to the floor. Actually, that's how I felt today as well, but that's a minor technicality.

The only time today that I felt extremely passionate about something was during lunch, when Reese brought up that Argon should be in the Challenge.

"But I am in the challenge," Argon said, thinking about the challenge our school is hosting.

"No," Reese said. He stretched out his voice in an attempt to emphasize his words. "The Challenge. The TV one."

He was talking about a game-show like competition held amongst several local high schools, including ours.

"Oh. That. Maybe. But I think I'm going to wait until I'm older, and I know more."

"Or," I said. "You could join now and defy the stereotype of upperclassmen dominating the team. Actually, the whole gender thing is also unbalanced. There's four guys on the team, and only one girl."

"Well," Joss said. "It's open to everyone, right? So it's not an issue of discrimination."

"I know, but still. It's like my calc class. Only one in three people are girls."

"And math team," Argon said. "Wasn't last time's A team all guys?"

"True. Although I did beat Dino, which was my goal, so I'm happy with that. Besides, I wouldn't have wanted an 18 (the perfect score) anyway. I wouldn't want to be stuck with a cafeteria poster."

Which was what Argon had received yesterday, in celebration of his perfection. A poster that said, "Eat, Learn, Live," and happened to be "on the ground." What fun. But I digress.

Later on, I told Mrs. MacDonald, my stat teacher, that I was interested in another math event.

"Great," she said. "We need more girls on the team. I was so mad last year because the team was all guys."

Is it just me, or does this seem like a recurring issue?

The issue of the disproportion of girls vs guys in higher-level math and science classes have obviously been brought up many, many times. (And it's unfortunately rather true. Take my AP chem class, for example. Twelve people. Four girls.) But it was counter-defended by the argument that more girls take higher-level English and social studies classes.

But the Challenge isn't about just math and science. The clip aired during communication time today showed the team being asked a geography question. That's social studies, right? And I've seen questions before that tested poetry, which is obviously English.

So with a higher proportion of girls taking AP English and AP World History, why are guys the majority on the Challenge team?

I think there's a serious discrepancy here.

But what can I do? I'm just another sleep-deprived girl, struggling to stay awake during gym as our teacher postpone our supposed pickleball tournament yet again.

Sometimes it's frustrating to think about how powerless I am to change society. (Which also brings up the topic we were discussing in U.S.--what if the change I perceive as necessary contradicts someone else's beliefs? What if they're adamant about not having change?)

Then again, I do happen to both fit into and go against a lot of conventions. I fit perfectly into the "school-->college-->job-->retirement" mold. I--sadly, I would say--fit almost perfectly into the Asian-American stereotype (Asian-Canadian for me, but it's not that different. Half of my Asian-Canadian friends are taking the SATs this year, so they can get into an American college.) with the exception that I can't play an instrument without killing someone on the inside. But I'm a girl in a mathy and science-y world, so I defy some stereotypes. I like shiny things and cold oatmeal with hot chocolate and I'm supremely disorganized, even though none of my teachers realize.

(There seems to be some direct relationship between organization and relatively good grades in the minds of most people that I am somehow missing out on. Or it's as my fourth-grade teacher used to say, "Disorganization is a trait of genius." I think I like the latter way better.)

So let me rephrase that. I'm only a sleep-deprived, math-geeky, easily-distracted, internally-disheveled, music-playing-abhorring girl.

Seriously. What can I do?