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In An Idle Comment
I was getting C’s in all my courses in Great Neck North High School. I didn’t really know it. The only time I worried about my report card was when I brought it home. I don’t know if my parents really cared. One time I dropped the card in a puddle and changed the grades. Not much. A “B” here or there. It didn’t matter. Or I don’t remember that it did matter. My parents didn’t seem to care much about grades. I don’t know why. They were rich. My dad had done well. I was neither here nor there, an afterthought, a grade on someone else’s paper. In my senior year I ran into Jimmy Cogell in the hallway. I hardly knew him but he said, “You’re not as stupid as everyone thinks.” I was shocked, appalled, awakened. I suddenly realized the image I was presenting of myself as a dummy. I didn’t want to be what I seemed. I was popular. I dropped all my friends and started to study five hours a day. I got mostly A’s straight through my PhD. Cogell who was nothing to me changed me from a failure to a high grade aficionado. He was my inspiration. For the next decade I’d bring home my grades to my parents and they celebrated. They deserved it. They were there for me even when they weren’t and they let the sunrise of the day unfold itself on the beach of tomorrow. I was a crab. I knit picked the waves with my claws. I studied so hard that I had to wear glasses. Failure was my inspiration. I found myself in Cogell’s idle comment. I did not need a good school. I needed a good comment.
David Lawrence David Lawrence has published over 700 poems. He has three books on Amazon.com--Lane Changes, The King of White Collar Boxing and Obama in the Sky with Democrats.
Email: David Lawrence
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