put your hand down, hermione (and other useful phrases)

READER DISCRETION ADVISED. I WILL BE USING AN INORDINATE AMOUNT OF HERMIONE GRANGER GIFS BECAUSE IN THIS INSTANCE (AND IN SEVERAL OTHERS) SHE IS MY SPIRIT ANIMAL.

I'm smart.

And if you decided to stop reading after that sentence, that's fine. Most of the people in my elementary and junior high school classes would have probably stopped after that too. Mostly because I finally articulated what they themselves had been thinking ever since they met me.

I'm smart. And I used to get really, really embarrassed by it.

I guess it all started in the third/fourth grade. The slash serves as a divider between the three weeks I spent in the former before I moved to the latter. Which was a decision that has literally shaped my entire life. (And which, in retrospect, my mother said she would never do again, but it's okay. I still love you, mom.)

I looked like this for most of elementary school.

"Oh! I know this one!"

While everyone else basically looked like this:

"She's answering another question?"

But, hey, I was excited. I was being challenged, and I liked it.

There were kids who made fun of me. They called me "stuck up" because I skipped a grade, refused to be friends with me because of it, and it was okay, because I had other friends who didn't really care.

But it all came to a head in the seventh grade, when a girl told me flat out we could not be friends anymore because she hated it when people found out I was an 11-year-old junior high school student. I again was "stuck up" because I was smart, because I liked to answer questions, and it apparently hurt her feelings.

For the record, it was never my intention to be rude. I didn't answer questions to make my fellow classmates feel stupid or unqualified. I answered them because there is a certain rush I feel in understanding a small portion of this very big world. And to everyone reading this, I apologize if I ever made you feel this way.

In an effort to appease this girl, we went to the school guidance counselor, who gave me the following rule:

I was not allowed to tell people my birthday.

*condescending hermione stare*

Yeah, that was a real thing.

Apparently because I was born in 1995, everyone else who claimed '93 or '94 as their birth year would be incredibly offended if I let them know I was a mere child among elders. I was being rude by being smart, by being a little ahead of the curve.

And that brings me to my main point.

WE NEED TO STOP "SMART SHAMING."

I see being intelligent as a talent. I was not endowed with the ability to multiply large numbers together, bake a pan of cookies without forgetting at least one ingredient, or walk up a flight of stairs without getting winded.

But I'm good at learning. And I think that's pretty great.

This doesn't mean people who find learning to be their talent get to  show it off - that's super, duper annoying. I mean, we all had overly obnoxious Hermione Grangers in our classes (because if I'm honest, I might have found her a little annoying, too).

I feel ya, Ron.

Here's the thing, though. We ask those with more acceptable talents - painting, piano playing, being really good at running and throwing a ball at the same time - to share those with other people, and we tell them they are selfish when they don't. But for those of us who can process information well, who are good at learning and remembering, we are asked to shut up, to keep quiet, to stop making everyone else feel inadequate.

And as a result, I often feel inadequate because one of my only talents is often seen as a burden or a nuisance to other people. And that really, really hurts.

And it makes me look like pre-first year Halloween Hermione.

Coming to college was a huge shock for me. After the seventh grade, I stopped answering questions in class because I figured it was the easiest way to stop people from making fun of me. But then, in one of my first university courses, when professors told us we would be graded on answering questions, I figured I'd try speaking up in class again.

And it's thrilling. Teachers appreciate it when their students speak up, and my classmates don't mind quite so much.

I still find it hard. Answering questions now tends to give me slight anxiety attacks. But I'm learning to work through it, because learning is great.

It feels a lot like this, especially when I get a question right.

And I think that's bloody brilliant.

| M |