Ugh... it's just been a crappy week.

I've been at work, it hasn't been wonderful. It hasn't been awful either, I've just been a bit dogged by other things, like MH's revelation that she thinks exactly the same things about me as I think about myself- namely, that I'm a coward, and not half as clever as I think I am.

I don't know what I want, but I know that I want people to say I could be... I don't know. I want MH to like me, despite my flaws, but I don't know if she can. I want people I like to like me even though I'm not brilliant. I like people that are better than me in lots of ways; it's therefore fairly easy for me to like bright people who put forth their views, who are kind and straightforward and honest.

I am not all of these; arguably, I am bright but simultaneously so dim and altogether too proud for my own good. Imprinting my views onto others, I'm terrible at, and being kind... I wonder if I'm like GF, pretending to be kind but not actually being particularly kind. Straightforward and honest... again, I try, but I am so unsure that what I think is the right way to progress that I'm always second-guessing... would MC, SC, NG or AG find this annoying? How would they do it? These processes inevitably fail, because I'm not either of them.

GF, then, has to break it to me in the kindest terms that I'm excellent at what I do except for one little thing... and I know that people don't think this, because MH has told me straight (as she always would) what she thinks of me, and it's so much coarser when she's kind and straight about it.

Ugh. It makes me not want to do anything, which is ridiculous. I need to be less prone to things like this.

What a lovely thing to say...

M McD. I know she isn't the sort of person that I should like, but she is all the same. She's pedantic and has a touch of the stage brat about her at times, but I do like her. She's fun, and she's bouncy, she makes us tea and she pretends to be part of my gangsta cru- anyone that does these things cannot be awful. She will sing with us and she'll run lines that aren't her own for the greater good without pointing out that this is what she's doing. If she thinks anything, she will tell you truly, and I like this about her. I think that she is straight with people and unafraid to say what she thinks, which can only be good things.

She's got a very prim, dolly sort of face. It's pretty, almost, but quirked. She should be in a Tim Burton film or something- it's almost plastic shiny, and she's a little bit chubby, and she has smooth hair cut into a little girl's bob with a fringe that she clips off her face and a squeaky voice- or a voice that squeaks sometimes, it's usually calmish. The whole effect is of an overgrown child. I find it easiest to imagine her in one of those flouncy sunday silk dresses with lace gloves so popular in the fifties for classy families.

She said today that I was talented and energetic and that I worked hard, and it was lovely to hear someone say it, and asked me to audition for her next play. I couldn't believe it. Two asks for me to audition, and yes, it is an amateur place but I like being creme de la month. Mois. I thought she'd be a pain. I suppose it's difficult to dislike someone who's so definite about admiring you, simply because she believes I am talented... argh, ego's involved. But I do like her. According to her, I am not only talented but have raw energy and... ah. I am glad.

How Odd...

That I always adore people less like myself... or not me at all. I like MH, who is kind without being overt about it, who is sensible and simple, and direct. Who is beautiful in what she does. Who is clever, but maybe she doesn't think so- "I couldn't do the gifted"... but you have a knack with simplicity. I cannot distill; you're clarity personified. Whose saddest times were shared, willingly, with a lot of children in a bright sunlit room, and me. I don't know what she thinks of me. I'm hoping it's not hatred, or worse (because she does not hate), irritation. But MH, who is laid back and fair, and who cares, who gets the job done, who responds to things other people don't and ignores the dross... she's brilliant.

And DB, another one, brilliant at everything she does- and they both make me laugh, but I don't know if I can make them do the same. I take any excuse to speak to her... I can't not. I wish I was more like her, or more like both of them. I saw her driving her car in today, and I was in the way (a perpetual feeling with me) and just stood there, staring... comme une vache...she laughed, and I sidestepped away. I'm always floored. I just want to shout, "I'M NOT ALWAYS SHIT, IT'S JUST YOU FLOOR ME!"

I am worried that someone else will come and take my place, as bright young thing. Because I haven't got much, at my job, but I have got my brain... and though I'm not always cleverest, I can get things. What if the new person is like me but better? I hate not being the best me I am.

Things I know about myself.

1. I lie about big things, and they become bigger.
2. I would rather risk, and spend my days in panic and fright I'm not doing it right- and chance, and try and learn- than stifle myself at an office desk job. I do not regret what I am doing at all.
3. I am ambitious.
4. I need to abolish the thought of others onstage. And be more forceful directorially.

A terror...

A highlighted blonde terrorizing the hallways and corridors
Calls her superiors bald
(because they are)
And sneers when told
She can't
Because she's trapped herself
She's too proud to ask for help
So shuns it; bold
it seems
Is the order of the day.

Sick with something...

And I don't know what that is.

I ate 1500 today, and that's a generous estimate, and walked 4.4 miles in about an hour and a quarter. I think that'll be about 350 calories gone.

I'm fed up about SW and her stupid Religious Education standoff. Your subject doesn't matter! They get told about it in History and English and all manner of other subjects. She assumes that I'm skiving. I hate that class; I can think of far more useful things to do, and besides, I am not much use in a behaviour function anyway, but I go. I am conscientious about my work, whatever other deficits I might have- I would not shirk, and I am irritated that she assumes this about me. I'd just rather be in French laughing with CW, who is all kinds of brilliant, and helping people get real qualifications. I feel like screaming, "THERE IS SOMETHING USEFUL I COULD BE DOING NOW YOU KNOW."

I'm excited about the play, and nervous that I won't do myself justice, and worried about what my work people will think of it, and whether or not they'll hate me after, or think I'm stuck up, or something. Or just that I'm shit at something I get overly excited about. That would be worst. It's started to creep in, the thought that someone else (Judi Dench, Fiona Shaw, contemporaries at University) would do it better... which I detest. Despite all this, excitement is still the overriding emotion.

Instead, I will just enjoy the words, and feel what it feels like to be Brigit. This is a better way of doing it. Because screw them all, I'm in it and I'm doing it and it's fun. Have fun. I like it and I've got ideas and... I can. Hold it myself. The audience isn't holding me. Do it as if you're just alone in your room.

I'm excited that the poem went down so well with my recalcitrant ones, and that I had such a wonderful time with the girl I found difficult at first. I am excited to be getting better at what I do. I like it, and I didn't think I would this year, but I am glad I've taken the challenging ones because it's more exciting for me. I knew I could do the others, now I am surer. I worry less about others thinking that I am rubbish at what I do. I think that DB probably still does. I wish that she could see me being good at something; I wished she'd drop in on me doing the poem today, but she didn't, or see me talking French, or anything that would make her smile at me more, or stop looking at me as if I'm dim, or shallow. I can't stand that she might think these untrue things; or worse, that she might think awful true things- that I'm an awful narcissist and terribly vain and arrogant at times, and that I know nothing about children and I'm too posh to relate to people, how could I possibly... the list goes on. All of the disdains I heap upon myself in her name. I judge myself harshest by those I'm in awe of. I can't fathom whether or not MH likes me either; I think she does, more than she did anyway, but she's lovely to everyone, and I can't work out whether it's me or not... she likes me more now I've made fun of myself a bit. I wonder if people assume I don't? I know exactly how ridiculous I am, ludicrous most of the time...

I'm worried about my course, that work paid for. I want it to be perfect; I want to get as good as I can in it, and I'm worried I won't and it'll be a waste of their money and people will be disappointed.

Here is what I think...

Nightwalking through the crowds after a football match.

Is your face there, DB? Is the car you drive? I can't see through the hordes, but I run because I feel like doing so. I feel safe, running against the crowd (some of them laugh). I wonder if you do this, or if this is not your particular brand of ridiculous. I contemplate the likelihood of me accompanying la petite Francaise into your lessons in the future. Though she'll know more English then, of course... but I thought that if you saw me speaking French, you might just believe that I wasn't as useless as you think I am when I skitter uncontrollably or twitch at the back.

I could explain your favourite phrase. "Une doughnut. C'est un petite gateau- tu as le vu? Avec un trou dans le centre. Comme la femme la bas- il n'ya pas rien dans le centre, pas de cerveau ou personalite. C'est un bon mot, n'est ce pas?"

This is why I am a shit person. I am speaking french, not for edifying purposes... so that she will like me. I like speaking French, and I do it when she is not there (of course), when there is noone to impress. But even so, I dislike that I have planned to impress someone. I am strange and seedy and bizarre in general. I crave her approval; I do not crave the approval of everyone, but from her, yes. From those I like. And I have not won it, nor done anything particular to further my cause, not that I could, being who I am. I might be the only person that likes people different to myself. People who are kind and decent and respected and good, and funny and clever. I can be those, but not like the others are.

Ooooh... I could be angry.

Yet, there are good things about today.

Someone told me that 'you've got the feeling of that woman from Sense and Sensibility'. I would love to know if it's Elinor or Marianne. I'd like it to be Marianne. I've got a sinking feeling that it's Elinor. Though Elinor isn't awful. The feeling, not the look... she was specific about that, and I liked it.

Good things have happened this week, but they're overshadowed by present storms.

C is playing up; being a brat, and yes, he is depressed, he is sad, he is upset... but M and D treat him as if he's this vulnerable little thing, as if he doesn't hit out. We must be careful round him. We must treat him gently, even if he is throwing it all in our face. We must lie down and surrender.

I am heartily sick of being told to surrender. Particularly via email, a pre-emptive surrender from D, who is away most of the time and so gets C's skewed version of things, which is given the same credulity as E's and mine despite his aversion to the truth.

I do not despise C. I even like him (sometimes) and undoubtedly love him, but I cannot stand this particular approach to him; that he is 'really going through it'. They were never as supportive of me. Buck up, is the main message. We can't solve your problems. Work harder, do better, be more tolerant but for god's sake, it's your problem. They only want to know because it's too late.

And then I read this through and think, god, I am bitter. It's not about other things; I don't care if he gets more money than we do, or even if M and D consider me more spiteful than he is. I don't care. I care about the unfair treatment. I care that they don't send little round robin emails to everyone telling them to treat me gently. I know that they do not do this. I hate that we must handle C with care, when he is anything but to us and expects beautiful behaviour from the family in return. I detest the popular misconception that C 'has a good heart' and that I am 'cold hearted' or 'intolerant' or even, on one occasion, 'a spiteful bitch'. And thus responsible. I cannot stand the way that I am a parent, a culpable entity when M and D desire it of me, capable of making him happy or weaning him off nefarious drugs or able to give sisterly advice (under their orders, of course) but I am not to be considered if I say anything that contrasts with their opinion. I can be a mole, find out what's in his heart and pour it out to them, but if I find it unpalatable their ears are closed. I despise myself, that living at home has made me into this teenage angst spewer that has no real problems. That it brings back all of the necessary bile.

The upshot is:

I am angry because C is allowed to be an arse and is treated sensitively when I feel that he needs a kick. D should stop putting pressure on him to excel at school, and make him be less of an utter cock the rest of the time.

It makes me question myself, because I am constantly told that I am intolerant. Doing the work that I do has showed me that I am far too tolerant. I will tolerate... but on different scales, for different things.

I realised today that I am busy seeking approval. I got a present from a pupil. A 'good' pupil, and somehow it was worth less than winning over a bad one was. And this made me think about C- are his opinions worth more because he throws his baby out of the cot more? Why should challenging kids be valued more? I was not one, and now I feel... not undervalued, they value me the same, but they care less about what I feel.

It made me feel awful, and I am glad that the pupil gave me the gift. Everyone else is good with the naughty kids; everyone that I admire says, "ah, I get on well with so and so, though others have said"... And I want to be one of those, one of those respected by nature... rather than one who is not, who is picked and chosen.

Then it made me think, why am I so very reliant on other people's opinions of the children that are 'fun' or 'good at heart'? Why can't I decide for myself? I am only pushing other's views onto myself, and running a popularity contest that I'm destined to fail at. Because MC and AG don't go into every lesson determined to like bastards. They go in to see what they see and to stamp it down, and everyone disagrees and has their own. Why must I conform to who other people think are good?

I have decided that to be a good person, you should conform to what your own idea of good is. I know lots of good people, who I think pick out good people. Some of them pick me. Some, like DB, think I am ridiculous, and not in the way that she is; just ridiculous, pitiful. It makes me wonder whether C and D are right. Every time I'm queried, my entire character analysis falls flat on its face. What kind of person am I? Am I malicious and vindictive and grudge bearing and clever and, god, sympathetic, and kind at times? Because all of these things have been said.

Am I angry because noone has noticed fundamental problems that I have got, larger than C's, equally as self inflicted (though I contain mine, as opposed to unleashing pestilence)- that I starved and people worried but didn't act, didn't send little messages, didn't. That I am upset but it's all about discussion to prove that I am wrong to be upset, I am not allowed to be upset or angry, because that is C's domain. He is allowed to have feelings that are not incorrect. That every time I was worked too hard it was my own fault, for not trying harder, because I always could, of course it was my fault, and just try a bit more and can't you put more effort in and oh, you're a model child so we don't have to think about you. Worry, they said, but think...

I am angry because I keel over and fade into the background as soon as anyone wants me to.