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kuangningOne of the things you don't know about me has been a bone of contention between me and my parents for ten years.
I was really quite bright as a child. Really bright. Kids in Trinidad start school early, and we outright compete from the very start for good class rankings. Except for one single term where I was third in my class, I was first, every school, every term, through all the years we were there. At age nine, I was the top student in my division of the country, St George East. I think I was second overall. At age ten, I became the first student in the history of the division to pass the Common Entrance exam for St Joseph's Convent. I think there've been two other girls to follow my lead since then.
And then when I was twelve we emigrated. And things changed. I felt that the successes I had, and there were some, weren't fairly earned, in some ways. I had a different background, had started earlier, it wasn't that I was any smarter than the older kids, I'd just seen the material before. So any good grades I got didn't really count.
Then, my sophomore year, the year after Kelly, I don't remember much of at all. I remember crying a lot, but no tests, no papers, no classwork -- I went through school on autopilot for a year, and my GPA slipped badly. I never quite made it up; I graduated with honours, but wasn't valedictorian or even close, and I was okay with that because it proved that I really had been right all along. I wasn't really any smarter once I was on more equal footing. I received the Presidential Award for Academic Fitness my senior year and shrugged it off; I got it despite my slightly-low GPA, and again it didn't count. Besides, everybody knows lots of kids who start out brilliant burn out along the way. I went on to college, and into the prerequisite courses for the Nursing Program. Indian River Community College has one of the best RN programs in the country, and the exam is stiff. Many, many people take three tries to get in, and many more never make it at all. I'm good at standardized tests, but I worried. I took the test, and my parents informed me that I'd passed. Then there was a bit of a battle; I was sixteen, and the Board didn't want to accept me because of my age. Still, my mother wanted me in badly, and she's nothing if not determined. Nursing was her dream, I wanted to be a veterinarian and wasn't sure I had any aptitude for nursing at all. I went along because once she'd blocked my own dream, I might as well go along with her and make one of us happy. But I felt like a fraud.
That was confirmed the first day of the program, when my teacher pulled me aside to say that she didn't think I belonged there, that I was taking up a space someone else should have had. It didn't get any better from there. Ms Spooner made it her business to make me miserable. For the first time in my life, I hated school. Worse, she was my mentor as well as my teacher. I would have had to explain to her why I wanted out of her classes and have gotten her permission to switch teachers. Going above her head never occurred to me at all. I was only in the program on sufferance, and what would they think of me if I made trouble? Every other classroom, I'd been in my own territory, on solid ground. I'd gotten bad teachers fired before, but that was on the strength of the fact that I was a good student. Her classroom was hostile territory, and I was a failure. Worse, I was a waste of a valuable slot. I got in on the strength of threats and my mother's determination.
And then this morning, my father and I rehashed the old, old argument. Why did you quit? You could have been great! And when I protested, he told me something nobody told me before.
That hard exam, with the material I hadn't seen before the prerequisite programs? The one so many people fail? I had the top score in the state of Florida. I scored fifth in the country.
If you can't understand why I'm crying my eyes out right now, try to imagine having someone tell you you didn't deserve something, try to imagine letting yourself be pushed out -- because I did -- and then finding out you probably had a better right to it than anyone else who shared it with you. That you earned it, and more than earned it, fairly. That you let someone who disliked you shape a very significant part of your life. I don't have a degree. I don't have a career, I have a job, and there have been so many damned unpleasant things in my life I could have avoided had I finished that program, I can't begin to reckon them up. It's not even her fault. It's my own for not being stronger, for not believing in myself. My children would be so much better off today had I finished that program, it's almost too much to wrap my mind around. It's my fault. But I still hope she gets to go through at least half of what I have. She was both mentor and teacher, and she, if no-one else, would have had to know my scores were good. Better than just good. Two days ago, I hated no-one. Right now, I can't see an end to hating her.
I was really quite bright as a child. Really bright. Kids in Trinidad start school early, and we outright compete from the very start for good class rankings. Except for one single term where I was third in my class, I was first, every school, every term, through all the years we were there. At age nine, I was the top student in my division of the country, St George East. I think I was second overall. At age ten, I became the first student in the history of the division to pass the Common Entrance exam for St Joseph's Convent. I think there've been two other girls to follow my lead since then.
And then when I was twelve we emigrated. And things changed. I felt that the successes I had, and there were some, weren't fairly earned, in some ways. I had a different background, had started earlier, it wasn't that I was any smarter than the older kids, I'd just seen the material before. So any good grades I got didn't really count.
Then, my sophomore year, the year after Kelly, I don't remember much of at all. I remember crying a lot, but no tests, no papers, no classwork -- I went through school on autopilot for a year, and my GPA slipped badly. I never quite made it up; I graduated with honours, but wasn't valedictorian or even close, and I was okay with that because it proved that I really had been right all along. I wasn't really any smarter once I was on more equal footing. I received the Presidential Award for Academic Fitness my senior year and shrugged it off; I got it despite my slightly-low GPA, and again it didn't count. Besides, everybody knows lots of kids who start out brilliant burn out along the way. I went on to college, and into the prerequisite courses for the Nursing Program. Indian River Community College has one of the best RN programs in the country, and the exam is stiff. Many, many people take three tries to get in, and many more never make it at all. I'm good at standardized tests, but I worried. I took the test, and my parents informed me that I'd passed. Then there was a bit of a battle; I was sixteen, and the Board didn't want to accept me because of my age. Still, my mother wanted me in badly, and she's nothing if not determined. Nursing was her dream, I wanted to be a veterinarian and wasn't sure I had any aptitude for nursing at all. I went along because once she'd blocked my own dream, I might as well go along with her and make one of us happy. But I felt like a fraud.
That was confirmed the first day of the program, when my teacher pulled me aside to say that she didn't think I belonged there, that I was taking up a space someone else should have had. It didn't get any better from there. Ms Spooner made it her business to make me miserable. For the first time in my life, I hated school. Worse, she was my mentor as well as my teacher. I would have had to explain to her why I wanted out of her classes and have gotten her permission to switch teachers. Going above her head never occurred to me at all. I was only in the program on sufferance, and what would they think of me if I made trouble? Every other classroom, I'd been in my own territory, on solid ground. I'd gotten bad teachers fired before, but that was on the strength of the fact that I was a good student. Her classroom was hostile territory, and I was a failure. Worse, I was a waste of a valuable slot. I got in on the strength of threats and my mother's determination.
And then this morning, my father and I rehashed the old, old argument. Why did you quit? You could have been great! And when I protested, he told me something nobody told me before.
That hard exam, with the material I hadn't seen before the prerequisite programs? The one so many people fail? I had the top score in the state of Florida. I scored fifth in the country.
If you can't understand why I'm crying my eyes out right now, try to imagine having someone tell you you didn't deserve something, try to imagine letting yourself be pushed out -- because I did -- and then finding out you probably had a better right to it than anyone else who shared it with you. That you earned it, and more than earned it, fairly. That you let someone who disliked you shape a very significant part of your life. I don't have a degree. I don't have a career, I have a job, and there have been so many damned unpleasant things in my life I could have avoided had I finished that program, I can't begin to reckon them up. It's not even her fault. It's my own for not being stronger, for not believing in myself. My children would be so much better off today had I finished that program, it's almost too much to wrap my mind around. It's my fault. But I still hope she gets to go through at least half of what I have. She was both mentor and teacher, and she, if no-one else, would have had to know my scores were good. Better than just good. Two days ago, I hated no-one. Right now, I can't see an end to hating her.
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no subject
Date: 2003-01-01 05:34 pm (UTC)just for the record, and not wishing to make you feel you _ought_ to,
and fully acknowledging that it would undoubtedly be terribly inconvenient at this point in your life,
it _is_ possible to go back to college and finish what you started.
no subject
Date: 2003-01-01 05:44 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2003-01-01 05:46 pm (UTC)Think, though. You allowed her to talk you out of it partially because you didn't WANT to be a nurse anyway. It wasn't your dream. Was it so wrong not to achieve it then?
I mean, I can't tell you...but maybe you did the right thing, influence or no.
no subject
Date: 2003-01-01 06:06 pm (UTC)I can't figure out how/why no one ever informed you how well you did on that crucial exam. First I can't understand why your so-called mentor (she doesn't deserve that title) didn't. Why was she so set on making it so difficult for you - to prove her unfounded belief that you were taking up space there? When did your father know your test results and why didn't he ever tell you before?
*sigh* It all must hurt like hell. ((((Cairsten)))))
no subject
Date: 2003-01-01 06:46 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2003-01-01 06:48 pm (UTC)I'm a smart girl, and I have also known exactly what I wanted to be when I grew up. I did well in High School, and had very high SAT scores, so I was able to get into a number of good colleges. It came time to pick my school, and, instead of picking a college that was known for it's academics, I chose East Carolina University because my best friend got a teaching fellows scholarship to there, and I wanted to be near her. In retrospect, I wish that I would have gone to Carolina or NC State.
At ECU, I realized that suddenly, I had to learn how to study. In grade school, I never had to study... ever. I had no idea how to study and it's NOT easy to learn how to do it. I was very quickly discouraged from my classes, and, to make a long story short, I ended up convincing myself that I wasn't as smart as I thought I was, and maybe college just wasn't for me. So here I am today, a 22 year old with a decent brain that is wasting in this shit town.
Not a day goes by that I don't think about the mistakes that I made to bring me to where I am today. I am extremely angry at myself for my choices, and I spent the better part of a day last june bawling my eyes out because that was the day that I would have graduated university. But I had a talk with my mommy about this the other day, and her spin on it was this:
Between the time that I gave up and now, I have learned enough life lessons to make up for the lost college time. Call it the school of life if you wish. Because I know the things about the way the world works, about myself and about the past, I can now go back to school and do better than I probably would have done the first time around, had I stuck to it. Because I know what I did wrong, I can NOT make the mistakes that so many others make in college.
It's never too late to go back, Cairsten.
no subject
Date: 2003-01-01 07:30 pm (UTC)Wish I didn't.
no subject
Date: 2003-01-01 08:03 pm (UTC)But I'm thinking now of how strong you've become, of all the wonderful things you've done and what you're capable of,
and it makes me smile to think of what your children will accomplish one day.
I really am sorry you had to endure this heartbreak..
no subject
Date: 2003-01-01 10:42 pm (UTC)Remember even that woman, prejudiced as she was, may have thought she was doing the right thing...even though she was wrong, from her perspective she was right. She's human too.
...forgiveness was never made for the person you forgive. Most of the time it doesn't do them a mite of good. But it does you a lot of good to forgive, because when it comes down to it, the forgiveness heals you.
no subject
Date: 2003-01-01 11:21 pm (UTC)My high school geography teacher (who graduated high school with my folks) said that about me at their class reunion.
Some teachers are scared of brilliance. It shows up in the way they teach. And some take on the challenge, and it shows up in how they teach too.
I've got scars of being the bright one meself, so I comisserate. :P
*hug*
-kat
no subject
Date: 2003-01-02 12:51 am (UTC)You're better than her. You're better than that.
And you will find your own greatness. I know that you will.
And when you do, buy her mortgage from the bank, and foreclose on her. Who says revenge isn't fun?
no subject
Date: 2003-01-02 01:25 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2003-01-02 09:49 pm (UTC)