by BELLA WESTAWAY
Dear Mum,
Last year was the best year of my life.
As you know, it was the year I turned eighteen. The year I fell in love. The year I rebelled.
The year I smoked a cigarette and went to a nightclub and slept on the beach (well, umm, you know about that now…).
And, of course, I did the HSC.
For heaps of my friends, the HSC came at a really disastrous time in life. It was a year of hell.
But mine was awesome, and I owe it to you.
Thank you Mum, for supporting me through my HSC.
Thank you for encouraging me in my studies.
Thanks for helping me with my chores, for giving me a night off the dishes before my maths exam (okay, before ALL my exams).
Thanks for providing me with a quiet, peaceful study space free from TV blare and brothers.
Thanks for driving me to my exams, and shouting coffee.
But most of all, thanks for letting me do the HSC. Myself.
Remember all those stories we heard about, where the HSC was chaos? About the kids who didn’t sleep for months and mothers who stopped exercising, socializing or working for the year to, umm, help their kids study?
Mum, thanks for understanding that it was my HSC, not yours.
Yeah you read through some of my creative stories, and brainstormed with me about my major work.
But you didn’t put your whole life on hold for my final year of school.
You didn’t hover, like a helicopter, putting on the pressure. Encouraging (ahem, distracting) me with cookies and tea, the syllabus outcomes and assessment dates in hand.
You didn’t indulge my tantrums, tears and tiredness.