The Letter B

Posted on June 22, 2003 in Attitudes Book of Days Childhood

Note: This is part of a series based on exercises from A Writer’s Book of Days. It’s something of a rebellion against the Friday Five and similar tupperware content memes.

Today’s topic: Write about a letter.

My mother told me that colleges looked at your records all the way back to the first grade. One mistep along the way, I was told, and you were permanently marked for failure. It must have been love of learning that lead me to keep going, even though I believed that it wasn’t worth my while to try very hard if the minds of registrars had already decided my fate.

My mother studied my every report card and read the teacher’s reports. I remember bringing home a card filled with Bs in Junior High School. I thought I’d done well. She informed me that a B was practically a failing grade and offered no incentive other than the lack of her approbation for getting an A.

Some kids worked under a system whereby their parents gave them so many dollars for each A, so many for a B. Mom told me that the only thing she’d paid for was a report card of straight As: $10. I got one once in my senior year in college. She made excuses and I received nothing.

Since then I haven’t been much interested in selling my real talents for money: I give them away because I believe that no one pays for what I am good at anyways.

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Tomorrow’ topic/prompt: Write about an hour of the day.