It wasn’t officially called the stupid table, but that is what all the teachers called it when they thought we weren’t listening.
Myself, a few other boys and one girl.
Off to the side of the room where we were left for most of the day.
Later in school once we started switching classes and had dedicated subjects it become more nuanced.
Subjects like mathematics and English grammar were hard, while others such as life science and drama were no problem, even easy.
Academically I was all over the place.
The friction that this created growing up stuck with me for a long time.
My father the academic thought I was lazy, and my mother the teacher thought the answer was more school.
Both meant well and did the best they could with something that was outside of their framework.
Senior year of high school brought its own challenges as everybody went to college.
That was the dominant life scrip: go to college and get out with a degree which will land you a high paying job, and if you don’t go to college you will wind up homeless on the street.
The trades weren’t even a subject.
I remember meeting with my guidance counselor, explaining to me and my parents that it was going to be a 50/50 shot.
My grades were all over the place, and I had no sports activities to counter that. But I had the drama club and some decent teacher recommendations, so most likely it would come down to an interview for the colleges I applied to.
If I could ace the SAT’s.
My parents said I wasn’t studying enough, yet that is all I did.
Books.
Courses.
Practice tests.
Talking to other who had taken the test.
It was the first time in my life that I can honestly say I put everything I had into it.
The day of the test my best friend Chrissy was sitting next to me and he looked like his usual I don’t give a shit about anything mode as the test began.
I worked those questions filling in the ovals on the test sheet precisely so there would be no errors, and when I looked over to see what section Chrissy was working on, he was apparently done.
On the test sheet he had filled in all the ovals to make the bat man symbol and was now spending his time drawing superheroes in the test book.
He didn’t care as he was going to art school.
When the results came back to say things were perhaps taken out of proportion would be mild.
A family meeting in the kitchen how nobody else in the family could know my results, especially not my aunt in Virginia and that side of the family.
I had scored the in the lowest percentile in the nation.
Chrissy had scored higher submitting the bat symbol.
I knew my father had given up on me when he suggested I speak to Mr. Richards at church who was a Marine.
A month later I was sitting at a table being interviewed by an admissions officer for my first choice University.
Just like my guidance counselor predicted, it was going to come down to an interview.
As we talked about my studies and school activities I could see the interviewer trying to resolve what he was seeing on paper compared to what was before him.
My parents had to re-read my acceptance letter twice.
College was very much a repeat of high school.
Certain classes required little effort, while other required early morning tutoring and help at the learning center.
College should have been building my confidence, instead it was destroying it.
The only advice my father could offer was maybe if I spent less time fucking around with martial arts and more time studying my grades wouldn’t be shit.
My transcript was going to be a disaster and how was I going to get into graduate school. My father only had one way, his way.
Undergrad, graduate school, PhD.
Academics.
Tenure for life.
My cousins in Virginia were on this track.
Did I want to be like my other cousins in Florida?
Stop being lazy.
It was during my senior year that I first realized things weren’t adding up.
A lifetime of being told I was lazy, stupid, and not being focused.
This is the first time I dared to ask myself if that was even true.
I got into a good University, was on track to graduate with a degree in Computer Science, and while my grades were not spectacular, I was holding my own.
I had built a good network of professors over the past three years and had started a pop-up valet parking company booking things online with a friend in the CS program that was already turning a profit.
Just how exactly was I stupid and lazy?
What really bothered my at family events and reunions was that my family only saw academic success and pre-approved paths.
Pick one: lawyer, doctor, architect, or accountant if you were male.
Pick one: marry rich if you were female.
Richie our gay cousin was on his own as nobody in the family had a path for him.
Nobody saw my success in the martial arts as it had now way to track to visible social success.
Paying money to a place that beats you up a few times a week didn’t make sense.
I was told I would outgrow it.
But something was working itself over inside me.
In martial arts, at the dojo, things came easy.
Unlike my academic experiences if I was shown something once, I could repeat it. The movement wasn’t easy, but it came naturally, and I steadily rose through the ranks.
Responsibilities and opportunities in the dojo were extended to me and I never doubted myself or my place.
Two opposite worlds I walked every day.
Graduate school was where I finally realized what was wrong, or rather what had been overlooked in me for all those years.
Again, on the academic side I was average at best, and had to struggle for that, but when it came to leading a project, or getting up to speak or defend something in class there was a natural cadence to it.
I had unlocked the model.
The model regarding how I *learn*.
I learned and connected things physically, not through books or lectures.
Show me.
Interact with me.
My mind understood a physical connection.
It was the first time I allowed myself the small grace that my family, friends, and academic advisors were wrong.
I wasn’t wired for the academic model.
I was wired for the apprenticeship model.
I did best when I wasn’t thinking and just moving.
No comments:
Post a Comment