Underachiever

I've always been an underachiever. If you look at my report cards for basically my entire schooling life, they all say pretty much the same thing... he's smart but doesn't work to his full ability. I guess you could say I'm the poster child for 'potential.' It's strange though because when I do put effort into something I usually do pretty well. My biggest achievement in college was when I studied for one Economics exam. I got 110% or something on it, beating all the 'smart' kids. I like to bring that up from time to time. It's either that or my massive winning percentage on NHL '93.

I usually get my work done, but not under the best of circumstances. Back in high school I wrote a paper on A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court. My teacher liked it so much and said it was such a great paper, I should enter it into this yearly contest they had on that sort of thing. I didn't tell her I had written the entire five page paper on the bus on the way to school that morning. Luckily my handwriting is normally horrible, so writing on a moving bus didn't make it any worse. I think when I like something, I put a lot of effort into making it the best it can be, but for the most part, I don't like much. I also probably have some undiagnosed case of ADD but that never came up. I just talked too much and never paid attention.

My crowning achievement may have been in fifth grade. I know, it's sad I peaked when I was, what, 10? But what I did for one project is still talked about today. We were supposed to make a shoe box farm for class. Basically you take a shoe box, load it up with dirt, put a little farmhouse on there, 'plant' something (like cotton balls or carrots or something) and hand in. We must have had a week to complete it. Needless to say, I waited until, oh, the morning it was due to think about it. I literally had to be in my carpool in about 15 seconds when I realized I hadn't done the work. So I grabbed a huge shoe box, took some dirt from a potted plant in the living room, threw it in the box and ran out the door. I get to school and some time that morning we all have to show and hand in our work. I walk up, show my shoebox to Mrs. Stringberg, who takes one look at it and asks me what this was. I look at her and with a straight face say, 'this is a farm after a drought.'

Must have been the next day my parents got called in for a conference about my shoe box. Back then, for reasons I don't recall, I had two 5th grade teachers, and one student teacher (who I don't remember exactly, but I know she was hot and I probably would have pulled a Debra Lafave with her. Aw who am I kidding, I would have passed out if she had come on to me, much like I do now with women. Umm, back to my story). So Mrs. Stringberg was the one who called the conference. Mr. Carboneau was the 'main' teacher and he was the one holding the meeting while Mrs. Stringberg stood behind him. He pulled out the box, showed it to my parents, then repeated what I had said it was. And then, much to my delight, he started to laugh. He said it was arguably the most brilliant thing he had heard in his years of teaching. He said that I definitely had a quality about me that would come in handy in my later years.

Mrs. Stringberg didn't seem too happy with the turn of events, but Mr. Carboneau was the guy in charge so there was nothing she could do. I didn't get in trouble for the shoe box, all I had to do was actually make a real one. I went with the cotton. To this day my mother still brings up the story from time to time. Something about how my mind works in very strange ways. I'd like to think that day was less about underachieving, and more about coming up with a smart ass response to a legitimate question. Which is how I've lived my life since.