When I was young, I would lay in
the snow at recess on my back looking up at the clouds for the entire duration.
I would do nothing but lay there with my thoughts. This was both a form of
relaxation and entertainment. I would think of things that confused me, such as
the infiniteness of space, why the stars seemed to follow my parent’s car, how
the sun was so big but could be blocked out by my thumb, and why the other boys
would say the girls gross and ran away, when I thought a few were pretty and
nice. I would think of strange conspiracies. Perhaps I am a part of a non-human
race of beings that has lived but only one day, and my life and the existence of
others I interact with are only a dream of that being. Is it possible that I spontaneously time
travel, yet retain all the memories and emotions that I went through during
that time making it seems as though I went through it at regular speed in
retrospect? I would think of some of the more basic physics problems. Does a
ball tossed in the air ever really stop moving as it falls back down? I
reasoned that for a moment in time the ball must have stopped completely. How
long was this moment? I decided that the time the ball was motionless must be
the smallest number imaginable, because if it weren’t for the fact that it must
stop to change directions it would never appear to stop, but to change directions
instantaneously. Of course the other children would sometimes notice that I was
laying there motionless for long periods of time. They would gather around and
ask “Is he dead”. I’d shake my head. “What are you laying there for?” I would
reply, “I’m tired”. I had a strange superiority complex at that age; I didn’t
believe they would understand.
I’d say my intelligence peaked in
the third grade and has been in decline since. Not since then have I dedicated
so much time to thinking. I would wait impatiently for the end of the school
day, not just because I found school unenjoyable, but also because of the bus
ride home where I would just look out the window at the driveways passing by. I
learned more on the school bus than I ever did within the walls of the
elementary school building.
On the bus, I would rest my head on
the window and stare outside. I would imagine a skateboarder riding at the
speed of the bus through the ditches. He would jump over every driveway and tag
every mailbox; I had always thought it was funny if the bus driver stopped in a
place that would suspend the skateboarder in the air for long periods of time.
Sometimes, rather than visualizing the skateboarder, I would make a small “tss”
during the time that my window would be within the view of a driveway between
ditches. Instead of the “tss” I may have also tapped my fingers or foot or even
held my breath depending on what felt most natural at the time. These are
things that only my body and eyes would do to prevent boredom. My mind and ears
would be elsewhere. I would get wrapped up in the conversations of those around
me. I would debate with them, and give my own opinion. I would debate with them
from the opinion of others around me. I would imagine these other children’s
home lives, based on the things they say and how they said it. I would do this
all in my head, I never said a word. If I were to hear a group of other boys
talking about something that also interested me, my initial reaction was not to
join them, it would be to think on the subject. Many of the children on my bus
didn’t know my name. I always felt it was strange if they asked, because I had
gone so long without telling them or being asked. It seemed that if I they
already hadn’t known, that it wasn’t important for them to know. It seemed too
little too late. I would often sarcastically give them a fake name, which
caused a lot of confusion as most children don’t understand sarcasm. To this
day, when I met new people, I find that it’s difficult to introduce myself
using my own first name.
I grew out of most of this during
middle school. My seventh grade teacher once told my mother “He doesn’t seem to
talk much, but that’s the type that do well in high school and college.”
Unfortunately, by high school I had become fairly sociable. I joined extracurricular
activities. I began dating girls. I started texting, uncontrollably. I stopped
thinking. When I would daydream, it was no longer about physics or philosophy;
it was mostly about girls and sometimes video games. However I still value the
company of myself. Sometimes I find myself walking around campus for no
particular reason, or taking the long way to class. I actually enjoy my job
vacuuming the cafeteria floors late at night. The sound of the vacuum drowns
out all distractions and I’m left again with just my thoughts. I really hope I begin
having more of my elementary school thoughts with the amount of opportunities I
have, and I can become smart again.
***I wrote this at 7:00am. Without
sleeping the night before zzzz****
