Clearing Out the Ghosts
"Behold, this dreamer cometh." Genesis 37:19
I'm not back...at least I don't think I'm back. I just need to talk to someone and this is where I talk. I just spent an hour writing and crying out my history with education. I’ll save you all from that lj cut here and truncate. For future reference to anyone else out there: I’m going back to school is all….that kinda terrifies me.
Don't ever let me watch a math movie
In Kindergarten I could multiply and divide without any one teaching me how and I had an 11th grade reading level.
I began doing algebra by myself somewhere around seven and was placed in a private school in early high school classes.
I had no friends; I didn’t even understand how to make friends. Cigarettes became my friends. Later drugs became my friends.
I was placed back into public school and given a grade level by my age. I went from a junior in high school to a fourth grader over the summer.
I was tested by my school, John Hopkins, and the SAT all before I was in ninth grade. The outcome being I’m in the 99th percentile, I was a “who’s who among American children,” and 1530. I was pronounced genius and then tried to kill myself.
I don't want to be eccentric. I don't want to be like my brother. I went to CalTech. I saw all the others. They can’t function. They aren’t normal. They don’t stop and smell flowers; they see Fibonacci. They can’t by gas; they calculate miles per hour, gallons per mile, rates of consumption multiplied by prices per unit. They wear only blue because it soothes their brains. They have names for their genius. They talk to themselves like someone else is there because they need someone else to bounce their ideas off of (this is seriously normal there).
I terrified to become one of them. I can become that odd. It doesn’t even take work. I just let go and it happens. I can stay up for days doing math and not even realize that I haven’t eaten. I refuse to be that kind of freak.
I'm not a genius. I don't want to be a genius. I just remember shit. I don't know why. I just get math. The numbers come out of me from my head and somehow I can put them together. I can't do math without that happening. It will wake me up at night. It will cause me so much stress. I will fixate. I can look at a pool table and just see it. I don’t even know how I know; I just do. It isn’t that I’m the luckiest pool player alive, my head just somehow knows what to do. It has to happen for other people. Doesn’t that happen for other people! It makes me feel crazy so I shut it off.
I have a cat. I read books from the library. I garden and to yard work. I work out at the gym five times a week. I do laundry and cook and grocery shop. I take care of my son. I don’t even have a bachelor’s degree. How normal is that!?!
I was supposed to be great. I’m just a 24 year old single mom.
My son began bargaining with numbers before he was a year and a half old. He would negotiate for more pushes on the swing. He adds up the road signs on the way to Gramie and Grampie's house (there are 47) and he isn't even three. He has been able to replicate and continue complex patterns for months. I don't want my child to feel crazy the way I do.
I want to walk the world. I want to look up and appreciate that I am seeing what has been above others for thousands of years. I want to have a remedial job that doesn't require me to think. I want to practice subsistence living; raise an confident, happy child; and die in complete obscurity.
I want to stop feeling crazy.
"And you shall know the Truth, and the Truth shall set you free." John 8:32
I'm not back...at least I don't think I'm back. I just need to talk to someone and this is where I talk. I just spent an hour writing and crying out my history with education. I’ll save you all from that lj cut here and truncate. For future reference to anyone else out there: I’m going back to school is all….that kinda terrifies me.
Don't ever let me watch a math movie
In Kindergarten I could multiply and divide without any one teaching me how and I had an 11th grade reading level.
I began doing algebra by myself somewhere around seven and was placed in a private school in early high school classes.
I had no friends; I didn’t even understand how to make friends. Cigarettes became my friends. Later drugs became my friends.
I was placed back into public school and given a grade level by my age. I went from a junior in high school to a fourth grader over the summer.
I was tested by my school, John Hopkins, and the SAT all before I was in ninth grade. The outcome being I’m in the 99th percentile, I was a “who’s who among American children,” and 1530. I was pronounced genius and then tried to kill myself.
I don't want to be eccentric. I don't want to be like my brother. I went to CalTech. I saw all the others. They can’t function. They aren’t normal. They don’t stop and smell flowers; they see Fibonacci. They can’t by gas; they calculate miles per hour, gallons per mile, rates of consumption multiplied by prices per unit. They wear only blue because it soothes their brains. They have names for their genius. They talk to themselves like someone else is there because they need someone else to bounce their ideas off of (this is seriously normal there).
I terrified to become one of them. I can become that odd. It doesn’t even take work. I just let go and it happens. I can stay up for days doing math and not even realize that I haven’t eaten. I refuse to be that kind of freak.
I'm not a genius. I don't want to be a genius. I just remember shit. I don't know why. I just get math. The numbers come out of me from my head and somehow I can put them together. I can't do math without that happening. It will wake me up at night. It will cause me so much stress. I will fixate. I can look at a pool table and just see it. I don’t even know how I know; I just do. It isn’t that I’m the luckiest pool player alive, my head just somehow knows what to do. It has to happen for other people. Doesn’t that happen for other people! It makes me feel crazy so I shut it off.
I have a cat. I read books from the library. I garden and to yard work. I work out at the gym five times a week. I do laundry and cook and grocery shop. I take care of my son. I don’t even have a bachelor’s degree. How normal is that!?!
I was supposed to be great. I’m just a 24 year old single mom.
My son began bargaining with numbers before he was a year and a half old. He would negotiate for more pushes on the swing. He adds up the road signs on the way to Gramie and Grampie's house (there are 47) and he isn't even three. He has been able to replicate and continue complex patterns for months. I don't want my child to feel crazy the way I do.
I want to walk the world. I want to look up and appreciate that I am seeing what has been above others for thousands of years. I want to have a remedial job that doesn't require me to think. I want to practice subsistence living; raise an confident, happy child; and die in complete obscurity.
I want to stop feeling crazy.
"And you shall know the Truth, and the Truth shall set you free." John 8:32