Mrs. M

Grade 2, Mrs. M is my teacher and I unequivocally hate this monkey-faced woman. She hovers; relentlessly reminding me that I am going to fail. “You’re going to fail, D”! Over and over again, ad nauseam.
I’m guessing it was grade 2 when my foster parents and biological father were informed that “she will never grasp the simplest concepts” and “she should be groomed for domestic service”. My bio Dad would tell you that I was backwards!
I was watching “Inside the Actors Studio” the other day; the guest was Jim Carrey and he talked about how we all start off with some intrinsic lie about ourselves upon which we build our personality. This was (maybe still is) mine.
I was 32 years old (1988) when I was asked to submit to the very same, or maybe similar, testing my son was undergoing as a result of my decision to have him assessed independent of the school system. We’ll get to that part of the story a little later on.
When I arrived for the appointment to review the assessments, I was told that I scored above the 90th percentile, if I remember the phrasing correctly. It was then explained to me that I am brighter than (the average bear) over 90% of the population. I asked the person to check the file to ensure she had the correct one explaining that my full name was D_________ G_________ A_________. She smiled and told me she had the right file.
I remember calling my friend, Linda, relaying this news and her response which further astonished me before breaking out in uproarious laughter was, “well, if you’re weren’t really smart we wouldn’t be friends.” Well, bully for us!
It took me quite awhile to process this information. I had been taken out of school when I was 15, flunked out of university in 1984 and by 1986 had given up on pursuing university studies. I was too “stupid” to manage academia.