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dead in his hands
Nov. 5th, 2010 07:10 pmDay 03 → Something for which you need to forgive yourself.
I am in the process of forgiving myself for my childhood. I was a brat, plain and simple, and it is only now that I can look back and realize why I acted that way.
When I was younger, I was very energetic but didn't have a lot of social skills beyond the rough-and-tumble 'use your fists to settle your problems' approach I learned from my siblings and my male friends. I practically flunked elementary school and got in arguments with my teachers. A kid like me, today, would probably be diagnosed with oppositional-defiance and dosed to the gills just so their caregivers could deal with them.
But I realize now that my real issue was that I was pretty smart for my age and I had no one who really got that. I didn't learn how to read until I was almost six; not because I was dumb, but because the reading material they gave me was so mind-numbingly boring, I didn't want anything to do with it. I called out my kindergarten teacher, in the middle of class, because she was teaching us that a bat was a bird, which I knew was wrong. I even went to the school library to find a book that would prove it. Yeah, you can bet that I was the class favorite after that little episode.
When I was ten, I shocked my parents and teachers alike when I told them that I wanted to enter the Gifted program in school. One teacher informed me that if I wasn't in the program already, it was because I didn't belong in it. But I insisted, and the school humored me and had me tested. My mother told me, later, that the man administering the test was amazed that I hadn't been tested before, because I was clearly qualified.
So I was placed in gifted classes and met my peer group for the very first time and made my first real friends. And then, somewhere in there, I actually managed to grow into a reasonable human being.
I know now that I was yet another child left behind, but its hard to look my old acquaintances and teachers in the eye, knowing that they had to deal with my bitch-ass. But I also know that, in a lot of ways, my behavior stemmed from frustration and resentment of the 'talking down' attitude of the people around me. So I'm transitioning from the horrified, "Why did I do that?!" to, "You know, that could have been avoided if someone paid attention."
And then there's just the fact that kids are a pain in the ass and the people who have to deal with them deserve sainthood.
I am in the process of forgiving myself for my childhood. I was a brat, plain and simple, and it is only now that I can look back and realize why I acted that way.
When I was younger, I was very energetic but didn't have a lot of social skills beyond the rough-and-tumble 'use your fists to settle your problems' approach I learned from my siblings and my male friends. I practically flunked elementary school and got in arguments with my teachers. A kid like me, today, would probably be diagnosed with oppositional-defiance and dosed to the gills just so their caregivers could deal with them.
But I realize now that my real issue was that I was pretty smart for my age and I had no one who really got that. I didn't learn how to read until I was almost six; not because I was dumb, but because the reading material they gave me was so mind-numbingly boring, I didn't want anything to do with it. I called out my kindergarten teacher, in the middle of class, because she was teaching us that a bat was a bird, which I knew was wrong. I even went to the school library to find a book that would prove it. Yeah, you can bet that I was the class favorite after that little episode.
When I was ten, I shocked my parents and teachers alike when I told them that I wanted to enter the Gifted program in school. One teacher informed me that if I wasn't in the program already, it was because I didn't belong in it. But I insisted, and the school humored me and had me tested. My mother told me, later, that the man administering the test was amazed that I hadn't been tested before, because I was clearly qualified.
So I was placed in gifted classes and met my peer group for the very first time and made my first real friends. And then, somewhere in there, I actually managed to grow into a reasonable human being.
I know now that I was yet another child left behind, but its hard to look my old acquaintances and teachers in the eye, knowing that they had to deal with my bitch-ass. But I also know that, in a lot of ways, my behavior stemmed from frustration and resentment of the 'talking down' attitude of the people around me. So I'm transitioning from the horrified, "Why did I do that?!" to, "You know, that could have been avoided if someone paid attention."
And then there's just the fact that kids are a pain in the ass and the people who have to deal with them deserve sainthood.
