Tuesday, January 11, 2005

The Failure? Failure! Rant

When I was in sixth grade, I took a very difficult math test and got a 68. On the way home, my mother asked me how I had done on the test. "Not very good," I told her. "I got an 83."

Now, here's the thing. I have no idea where I got that specific number from. 83 is the year I was born. My locker was 283. 83 is a grade that isn't that great but isn't a trainwreck either. It's not good enough to get any praise, so I would minimize the guilt I'd feel for my lie, and it isn't bad enough that I would be in trouble with my folks. Looking back, the choice of 83 was pretty good.

Except for one catch. I had forgotten - or maybe I had just put it out of my head - that it was parent's night at my school. Whoops.

When my mom came back from parent's night, she came into the family room to see me. She didn't say anything about the math test, so I dared to think that I was in the clear. I mean, knowng my mother, if I had messed up this badly, she would definitely have given it to me already. So I was beginning to breathe again, giving myself this sense of security in my undiscovered lie. My mother continued to talk about the night, saying which teachers she liked and all. She talked about my English teacher, who was a pretty big weirdo. She would be talking in a normal volume, and then she would start to get VERY LOUD ALL OF A SUDDEN AND THEN JUST AS QUICKLY she would get really reeeeeally quiet for emphasis. Weirdest talker I have ever met. But anyhow, back to the math test.

So my mom talks about how she went into the math class, and Miss Elliott told the parents about our math test. "She said that nobody had done well at all, and not to worry, that this didn't indicate failure or anything," my mother told me. I remember being really relieved, like, maybe I wasn't a mathematical moron after all. And then it came: "So as I was walking out of the class, I went over to her and said, 'Yeah, now Elana's 83 looks pretty good to me, and she's not even that great in math!' And Miss Elliott looked at me like I was crazy and said, 'Hmm, I don't remember Elana getting an 83.' "

Fuck. Fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck.

There are several things in that exchange that make me cringe. First, my mother has always been the type of parent who will talk to teachers. Some parents, they go to this open house, sit through the little presentation, and move on to the refreshments. Not my parents. They would ALWAYS talk to the teachers about their kids and find out if we were doing our work. God I hated that. So that was the first thing that got me going that night. My mother, always having to talk to the teachers. Jesus. But before I could get too angry at my mom, I had to think about my teacher. What the hell, Miss Elliott?

It turned out that my mother and Miss Elliott had gone to see the gradebook and there it was - my 68. My mom was pretty ticked, but she didn't get as mad as I thought she would be, probably because she knew the real humiliation was coming: Miss Elliott wanted to see me the next day during recess. Wow, this was just getting better!

So the next day, you would think that Miss Elliott would have been able to keep it quiet and just subtly wait for me after the bell had rung and everyone left. But no. Like ten minutes before the class ended, she goes, "Oh, Elana, remember, you're seeing me after class is over and during your recess because you failed the math test and told your mom a fake grade and most humiliating for you, I found this all out because your mother stayed behind to talk to me specifically about you during parent's night." Ok, or she goes, "Elana, you're staying during recess," which was basically the same thing, because nobody could figure out what I had done and why I was staying, so I had to kind of shrug and explain that I was a moron in math. Anyway, I don't really feel like going into details about that meeting, except to say that I spent most of it squirming uncomfortably while she lectured me on trust and honesty and I concentrated on the hot pink lipstick stain on her teeth and wondered why she had named her daughter Mariah, if it was a tribute to Carey.

I don't really miss Miss Elliott.

I once wrote about my AP French teacher, who drove me insane, and whom I'm sure I drove insane in return. I was pretty bad to her, but recently I thought about another teacher I had my senior year. Mr. West was a new teacher to Glastonbury, and he was a pretty nice guy. He looked like a giant - I mean the guy had to duck whenever he entered a doorway - but he had a fiancee and he didn't seem to want to intimidate anyone or give anyone a hard time. The only thing was, for some reason, nobody really liked him.

I can't explain why. Maybe it was because he had this doofish quality to him. I don't know. I mean, he definitely had the doofish quality, but I don't know if that's why people had issues with him. But my friend and I never really gave him a hard time, and so I think he kind of liked us. He thought up some pretty good projects, too. It was a statisics class, and he had us make paper airplanes - whichever design we could come up with - and then fly them and chart the statistics for their flights. That was a pretty fun assignment, only my "friend" who was my partner was a jerk and made my job picking up the airplane and bringing it back to him and recording the data while he designed, made, and flew the plane. Thanks, pal.

His best idea was making this Family Feud game for Christmas. It had nothing to do with statistics, and we just played it the day before vacation. I still think that was the best game ever played in a high school. I give him a lot of credit for that game. For the rest of the year, he was okay with me.

The class, however, was a mess. First of all, we had this girl in the class who was - how should I put this delicately? - just not someone whose underwear you'd want to see hanging out. Luckily, we never saw it. Instead, we saw her butt. I mean, it was awful. It was just awful. Even thinking about it now - grosssssss - and I try not to actually THINK about it, but just think about it to write about it, and the whole thing is actually a pretty big failure. Just like her ass, really.

Anyhow. So there was this other girl in the class, Katie. I had never been in a class with Katie, but she seemed nice enough. Only she really had it in for Mr. West. Whenever he would give any tests back or any assignments she didn't like, she'd really give it to him. Once, when he was explaining a concept, she couldn't understand it. Other kids in the class were even trying to explain it to her, but she just wasn't getting it - or willing to. Mr. West was being really patient with her, but she just kept giving him such an attitude. She actually said to him, "Listen, I don't get it. Forget it. Just forget it. Just stop. Forget it. Just forget it." It was a mess. Mr. West's face was like, "What the fuck am I supposed to do now?"

That face was second only to the face had made the day he asked Katie to stop eating her Fritos. Let me just set it up by saying that our class was at 8:20 AM, so how anybody could eat Fritos at 8 AM is beyond me. Also, I hate Fritos, so the entire incident just made me kinda grossed out. Oh, and, Katie smacked her food, so that when she ate anything, the entire class heard every bite. So Mr. West said to her, "Hey, Katie, no eating in class."

"Yeah," she said to him, like she'd say to any of us. She kept eating the Fritos though.

"Umm, Katie? You gotta put those chips away."

"Yeah." Crunch crunch crunch.

"So, today, we're going to be starting regress-" CRUNCH CRUNCH - "regression equations and" - COUGH CRUNCH CRINKLE OF PACKAGE - "Katie, seriously, put the chips away. No eating."

"Right." Goes on crunching. The girl was a legend, I tell you.

Mr. West kept on talking, every few minutes stopping to ask Katie to stop eating. The whole class just kept looking from Katie to Mr. West, wondering which one was going to crack first.

Mr. West kept his patience, but I bet he really wanted to turn around, hurl the chalk at her fat face, and just yell, "JESUS CHRIST YOU STUPID BITCH STOP EATING THE FREAKIN FRITOS ALREADY!" and just punch her. If I were Mr. West, I would have wanted to go right up to her desk, take the bag out of her hand, and the chip out of her other hand - already on its way to her mouth - and just ate the rest myself, even though I absolutely hate Fritos, just to make my point. But clearly, Mr. West was a mature man.

"Katie," he finally said, "would you puhhhhhleeeeassse stop eating those chips?"

"Sure," she said. She flattened out the now-empty package and put it back into her bag, laughing the entire time.

Mr. West's face was ridiculous. He looked defeated, dumbfounded, doofish. Looking back, though, I can't tell if behind his look he was really thinking, "Man, I want to kill her," or something twisted - but understandable, no? - like that. That's the thing about Mr. West. You just never knew what he was really thinking, because he was so busy being nice and staying calm. Maybe what made me like him so much was that I just thought that no matter how doofish he seemed, he would never, ever have done what Miss Elliott had six years earlier. He would have just smiled and nodded at my mom, and then the next day been like, "83?" and that would have been that. The guy was remarkable, really.

Something completely unrelated to math, but related to failure, is that I have always wanted to have my own cooking show, or craft show. Oprah had this show recently where she asked celebrities what their wildest dreams are. Teri Hatcher gave the most annoying answer, saying that her wildest dream was to become involved in some humanitarian effort. Maybe I'm just a horrible, horrible person, but I think, "Come on, is that REALLY your wildest dream?" I hate when people pull crap like that. For me, my wildest dream is hosting a cooking show. I don't even think the crafts make it there. I realize that this being my wildest dream - not, say, skydiving off Mount Everest (can you even do that?) - makes me a freak, but whatever. That's it. It might help to say that I don't really know if I can cook, having had limited - albeit successful - experience cooking. The truth is, I love the Food Network. I don't know that I love food as much as the Food Network, but I really just like the idea of cooking. When I was a kid, I would pretend to be having a cooking show while I made peanut butter and jelly sandwiches. I know, I know, ridiculous. Also, sadly, true.

The other failure which I wanted to mention is Annie Camden. Has anybody watched 7th Heaven? Talk about a screwed up show. And at the head of it all is the mom of the show, Annie. This woman is a complete freak. She should sue the writers of the show for making her seem like a complete crackpot. One episode, when her dad dies, she recognizes the value of life and becomes ridiculously happy. Her big bang-up scene? Dancing around the kitchen table with her four year old twins, singing some nursery rhyme. And when I say dancing, it's more like hopskipdying. Here's a real gem from Annie: "You want a piece of me? I brought seven kids into this world, I can take one out." I've never seen this actress - Catherine Hicks - in anything else, and my guess is because everyone in casting probably thinks that they're hiring a loose canon nutcase, and who can really blame them, when every day she's on TV having some breakdown crying or happily dancing around her kitchen table, possibly in the same manic episode? So Annie Camden - and I'm sorry, but Catherine Hicks by extension - is a failure. Her husband on the show, Eric, is also a failure because whenever he says ANYTHING, his eyes tear up and his voice gets shaky. These people are ridiculous.

Also, Arissa on Real World-Road Rules Battle of the Sexes II is a failure. The girl has failed at every mission, she cries like a baby and singlehandedly lost thousands of dollars for her team. So last night, it was time for her to stand up and accept that she no longer deserved to be contending for the end cash prize. Only Arissa didn't do that and instead, Ruthie went home. This just didn't sit right with me. Completely unfair. She was a moron. She is a moron. She has this moronic face too, that just kills me every time she talks. And you know what is really great? She KNOWS she sucks, and she knows that she's being sent home next. Why not save everyone the week? Nah. Stick around.

What a loser.

What also got me last night was that the guys' team, which had previously acted with some sort of idea of friendship and fairness, really pulled a bad one last night. Eric had more DQs (disqualifications) than the other four on the team, but he and his BFFAEAE, Mark, got together and made a swift move to keep Eric there. I could go into more details and analyze the wrongdoing, but that would really jeopardize my status in all this as the evaluator of failure and instead just paste a big loser sign on me, so forget it. (Incidentally, my brother just entered this category by running downstairs - almost skipping in delight - and telling me of this grand scheme he thought of for strategy for next week's episode, based on a thirty-second preview clip. When I told him that the idea was a good one, he literally pumped his fists and said "Yessssss!" and went in for a high five. Sorry, Mike, but fair's fair.) But the point is, Brad went home and Brad didn't deserve to go home, and I hope they all miss him because his voice is hot. It's this weird voice, and since MTV reruns everything like a bazillion times just to make sure that nobody in freakin Timbuktu misses anything, check him out. I could listen to him forever. Which I know seems really weird, if you know his voice. I don't know.

Last, I have to comment on the "I'm Carrie Bradshaw" phenomenon. Maybe I should break it gently to all the girls out there who believe they're Carrie Bradshaw: Carrie Bradshaw is not real. There are two people who can claim to be Carrie Bradshaw: Candace Bushnell, woman CB (hint hint) was based on, and Sarah Jessica Parker, who played her. Other than that, nobody is Carrie Bradshaw. Even those two women claim that they are not Carrie Bradshaw. So please. No matter how many times you claim your heart's been broken, and no matter how many fashion trends you claim to have created, you're not Carrie Bradshaw. Life is not Sex and the City. Sure, I like the show and all, but people wonder why it's gotten such a bad rap. Duh. Because every time you turn around, someone is saying, "I can't help but wonder..." and talking about how their situation is just like Carrie's. Yeah, I just bet.

Actually, let me leave you with - wait for it - my own failure.

Boston University has finally entered the modern world and thank the sweet Kenneth Elmore, I will have cable television when I return to Warren this Thursday. When discussing the cable addition with some other RAs in the office before break, a few said, "Oh, I'm gonna have to get a coaxial cable." I was like, "Wait, we need to get a what?" And this other RA, Mike, a very nice guy, goes, "What, did you think you'd turn on your TV and cable would just come in from the air?"

Umm, yes?

Yeah, I know, moronic. I can't help it. Remember, I thought I could have my own cooking show while making peanut butter and jelly.

And you know what really just ices the whole freakin cake? In my family, I'm the person that they go to for technical and computer questions. I'm dead serious. My mother has said to me, many times, "Can you look at this computer? You can fix this." Right. Me, being a person who once answered the question, "What's your version of Windows?" with "Microsoft," and who still doesn't really understand what an operating system is anyway.

Failure? Failure.