Is there something that you like a lot?

“You can’t even think in one thing.”

“Yes, I can. Yes, I can”

“Well, do it, then.”

Before I started my blog post I thought in which topic I should focus. Should I start discussing how Holden is a boy who suffered from the peter pan syndrome? or should I put emphasis in his panic attacks, depression and how a hell of a tennager he was? After think of it for a while, I decided that it would be neither of them, but don’t worry,  I am sure that my classmates would have a good opinion and debate in these matters. 

When I read The Catcher in the Rye these aspects mentioned above were not the ones that called my attention. I could notice that Holden was more than that. Despite the fact that he hates almost everything that surround him, most of the time he finds beauty in every little moment that he is living. He enjoyed seeing people being passionate about something. If you were a phony person, but you were dancing and you were good a it, it did not matter. If you were a phony pianist, that could play the piano terrific,  he would acknowledge you, and even if you just had some time to speak with him and hear him, you were a worthy person in that instant.

When Phoebe ask him if there was something that he like a lot, Holden could not think in something apart from that moment. So why couldn't he notice that one of the things that he really likes is when he can have a good conversation with someone, or when he read a good book, or when he go and watch a good play? Here is when I started to realize that Holden’s hate to society was justified. The only things that were worth to like, were the ones socially worthy, such as schools, fraternities and careers. And that idea was so rooted into his mind that he could not even notice the others things in life that he enjoyed.  

English for example, Holden was a good speaker and even though he had a very specific taste for books, he still would read something that was recommended to him by someone else. The only subject that he passed in school was English, and Oral expression, which he failed because he did not agree with how the class was made. Despite this, he was seen as a person who did not care, who did not put effort in what he did,  when in fact he cared about different things. This can be see when Stradlater ask him to write a descriptive composition of a room for English, and he write a descriptive piece about a baseball mitt who had more meaning to him. The Composition was strictly correct, but it was not what the teacher had asked for, so in the end it was worthless.

Is not our current society the same? Nowadays kids are taught that they need to do well on school, after this, they need to go to a good university, and even after this they need to find a good job with a nice salary. There is not another path. Furthermore, schools kill the right to think different on kids. Creativeness will be only allow if it fits with the ideals of a teacher.

At this moment I remembered a TED Talk that we listened in our English class called Do Schools Kill Creativity? by Sir Ken Robinson. which explain that “Many creative, brilliant, talented people think they’re not, because everything they were good at at school wasn’t valued, or was stigmatized.” 

Going back to Holden, he had an awesome creativity even if he used it the majority of the time to come up with lies. If this creativeness would have been potentiated and more important, noticed by one of the teacher, maybe the story should have been different.  

Beyond this I can also relate this TED talk with Holden not wanting to grow up ““Kids aren’t afraid to make mistakes. If they don’t know, they’ll take a chance. But by the time they become adults most kids have lost that capacity. They have become frightened of being wrong. We run our companies this way. And we’re now running national education systems where mistakes are the worst thing you can make.” When you became an adult, you don’t have the right to make mistakes and this can be very frightening and hard to accept. 

It was important for me to touch this, since we will be future teachers, and I can see myself someday having a student like Holden. I would also like to be one of those teacher in which he look for support when there was no one else for him.  

To conclude, I believe that It doesn’t matter what society says, you should be able to choose your own path in life. One that makes you happy. So what would you do if in the future you find a student like Holden? Would you encourage him to follow his dreams or would you try to change their mind?