A Puritanical Sinner

midterms ignominy

Back in senior high school, I was top of the class, class and club president, and an Associate Editor for the school pub. Never played second fiddle to anything. Always obtained coveted straight A's that always felt like a walk in the park. Teachers adored me; put me on a pedestal. So did my benighted classmates. The glory was one hell of a drug and I felt invincible.

Well, it was fun while it lasted.

It hasn't been a full semester in college, yet my accrued intellectual luster from high school has already been steadily fading in dull hues. So dull in fact, it no longer feels like merely starting on the wrong foot, but a turning of the tables.

How laughable is that? A once distinguished intellectual, now a mere onlooker in the midst of greater intellects.

Have I gone as nescient as the people about whom I've spoken ill, by virtue of their feeble minds?

Lo and behold, I am to be classed amongst them now. It's a colossal pill to swallow, but it seems acceptance is key as to not cross the proverbial line of no return. Or the dark pit of despair lurking and waiting for the other shoe to drop and fall right in, pulling me along with it.

Do not be mistaken, I've ideally conceived this indomitable endeavor of never growing weary of this trajectory--this road which I now find to be rather riddled with potholes and troublesome bumps. Right at its end, I discern an insurmountable impasse. These account for a reality that I've learned to suppress by deluding myself into a care-free vista where the road is smooth and well-paved.

Who wouldn't like to tread upon such perfectly refined path? As opposed to the winding, bumpy, and slippery road of reality?

I, for what it's worth, truly believe ignorance is bliss. A flight of fancy sounds good when everything seems to be falling apart. That way, no one asks you if you're doing okay.

Yes, I am fine. I am not on the verge of snapping, breaking, falling. Totally.

But never before has a Psychology class imprinted such perfect semblance of reality. My ideal self, as I learned, is incongruous with my real self. The former has taken liberty to soar to exorbitant heights, leaving the latter on all fours across the lowest of grounds, scrambling to take flight also. Whether or not with success, remains to be seen.

It is neither that I've an inflated ego, nor that I think too highly of myself. If my post-hoc (a fancy word for a justifying realization when it's too late) assessment is correct, I'd set the bar way too high; the expectations and goals far too colossal and, with the rate at which I'm going, I daresay unattainable.

If there is one thing I hated heretofore more than anything else, it would be people who have a mislead sense of self-assurance that they will be able to get their hands on whatever it is they want. I suppose now I must subject myself to the same degree of enmity as I did them.

It's clear my incompetence is rearing its ugly head, and I'm refusing to accept the fact that I have receded from the glory of my senior high school days. Because thinking about it is mentally taxing.

Where did all of this come from? I scored pretty low on my midterm exams.