feelings....

So, here we are, and I have a pretty good opinion formed about Holden Caulfield, and what type of a person he is. If I had to pick between the words sympathy, empathy, and judgment, I'd have to be somewhere in between the words sympathy and empathy.

I don't particularly like the term sympathy, because I always connect that with feeling sorry for a person...and I really don't feel sorry for Holden at all. I do have an emotional response towards him, and that's where empathy comes in.

The feelings that Holden has expressed about some of the teachers and students being 'phony' greatly connects, in my opinion, to my experience at Peet Junior High, which was a living hell. Apologies, but it was.

It reminds me of a certain time when I was a young 7th grader and in the position of not having time for my cello lesson because of my teacher's schedule, and because of my swim team workouts. So, my mom and I decided that it should be fine to skip Key Comp. (where you learned how to type) once a week and go to a cello lesson with a college professor. the teacher claimed that it was fine...but the Principle pitched a fit.

He claimed that I was missing valuable one-on-one instruction for learning how to type, and that it was unacceptable to skip class once a week to go to a petty cello lesson, even though he and the orchestra teacher already took all the credit away from me for all of my orchestral accomplishments while at that school...

It was horrible. I hated it. I didn't have any real friends. It was wrong in general. This is how I feel connected with Holden Caulfield. The same thought processes that he has would go through my mind daily, and I would hate every second of it...except, I didn't use the word 'phony'....I was too consumed by hate to truly analyze the situation... but now, I see that everything about that school was just, in itself, perversely wrong and dignity robbing.

I'm glad that I attend NU.