"You are your own worst enemy." "She's smart, but she just doesn't apply herself." "She's bright, she just doesn't pay attention." I was bored. Bored out of my mind and there was nothing anyone was suggesting that was helping me to sit down long enough to do the work. The problem was, I could listen to the teacher's lessons in class all week and retain 90% of it until the test on Friday. But why listen to the person whose so-called "problem" you're trying solve? No one ever does, but I digress. I was bored. Every time I opened my books to do my homework, the repetitiveness just seemed so, monotonous. It was nice that my mother would sit and do my homework with me every single night, a luxury most children these days don't have whether wealthy or poor. But I digress. I was bored.

And then came the I.Q. test. I'm not sure now which teacher or staff member suggested it, I just know that they saved my life. I had been depressed much of my life to that point and I needed relief. I was ecstatic when it was finally was suggested that I get to "move on up." Not being at all arrogant or smug, I just knew early on that I was different, I had felt it. I sometimes used words that the other kids didn't understand, and I was ostracized for it. I wrote, a lot, and I sang. I listened to Jazz and Classical music on my own without someone suggesting it. It was these things that kept me from falling apart when I lost my father and then my mother before I was 11. But I digress. Once the placement was solidified, I was happy.

Originally, we held M.G. classes in a room in our school, from third grade to about sixth grade. The teasing from the "regular" kids wasn't so bad then. We only left class once a week and we saw them during recess. When we got to seventh grade though, we were given two new teachers because the group of us had gotten so large. We also got bussed to another location. Soon, the teasing was reaching Napoleon Dynamite status. The trade-off, though, was incredible. I learned about marine life and the environment, architecture, music, theater and so many other beautiful things. We hatched chicks in an incubator, although only one survived, and learned things about life I would never have learned in my usual curriculum. That was so long ago. At that time, we still had music and art in our schools. We learned the soundtracks to Broadway musicals and took weekly trips to the Free Library. We had computer class and special guests in during "regular" courses, such as a weekly D.A.R.E. program.

I think back to those times and wonder where I would have been without even those basic, inspired classes before M.G. came along; the things I come up with make me shudder. Students now have no outlet for their creativity, a gross oversight in today's overstressed, overweight, oversexed world. Do I digress? Perhaps, but truly these are things we must address in a society where a majority of our children are depressed and drug-addicted. They have lost touch with their dreams and their creative minds. I remember being in M.G. class and thinking that I could do anything, and then going back to my regular room during the week and realizing just how mundane things could be. That was in the eighties (oh gawd, there I go, dating myself again), can you imagine how hopeless our children feel now?

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