Hi, I’m Hannah and welcome to my blog. I am 27,
live in London with friends, and am an underachiever by most standards. Kenneth
W. Christian, a psychologist who has gallantly crafted his career out of other
people’s underachievement, writes that the more gifted a person is the more likely
they are to fall far short of their potential - a statement that, if true, would
definitely raise the likelihood of me being a genius. (Actually my IQ is about
135, which wouldn’t comfortably allow me admission to Mensa but is almost as
high as Madonna’s, apparently.)
Some of the things I have done in my life
include solo travelling in Central America, Mexico, the USA and Europe, being
engaged (to one man), married and divorced (another man), volunteering as a
part-time lead cook in a homeless shelter, and owning three pet rats. I’ve had
numerous low-paid jobs in admin and service, have lived at nine different
addresses since the age of 18, and have thrashed out my troubles to approximately
seven different counsellors. Oh, and I’ve managed to spend five years at
university without graduating.
How might I explain myself, then? Just a workshy,
self-pitying brat? I’ll start at the beginning, and please forgive all this
self-absorption.
Memory is a notoriously fallible thing; but nevertheless,
I’m sure I remember being at playgroup, nursery and starting school. Other
recollections I have from around the same time include the fall of the Berlin
Wall (I was impressed by all the graffiti on it and watched it fall in a spirit
of general excitement, because it was nearly Christmas), Margaret Thatcher
being prime minister (I thought it was great to have a girl prime minister,
until my mum informed me she was horrible) and Nelson Mandela being let out of
prison (my mum forced me to stand up and be silent while observing the news
item on TV, which I thought was stupid).
Anyway, as far as school goes, I remember
feeling uneasy about it from the very start. I was cripplingly shy and self-conscious
as a child and would tend to run to the corner with a book, or curl up inside a
coat to play with imaginary friends (who were usually composed of Teenage
Mutant Ninja Turtles – not that imaginative). On the whole, I viewed authority
figures with contempt and disdain; I did not like being patronised, told who I
was, what I was, what I would/could be, or what to do. I felt different from
other children, who all seemed to find life a cakewalk, so the idea of
competing academically was quite agonising. It was gratifying to be praised when
I did well, but if someone else did better I would be overwhelmed with envy, shame
and feelings of inadequacy, which I found difficult to cope with.
This, combined with resentment at having to
follow teachers’ instructions and difficulty focusing because I was always
daydreaming, meant my primary school experience was less than straightforwardly
happy – and I often resisted doing my work properly. I had also been moved up a
year at the age of six, which meant I found the teacher less patronising but
also increased my sense of social alienation among “older” kids (I was born in
September so they weren’t actually very much older, but it seemed that way at
the time). “The negative tone of this report reflects my frustration at seeing
a child with Hannah’s ability fail to thrive in the school environment, and I
hope that as she enters year six she will become more positive about herself
and her work,” was one teacher’s end-of-year verdict.
Then I went to a large mixed comprehensive - or
should I say one of those schools that called itself comprehensive but actually
had a selection test - and didn’t thrive there either. The pattern continued,
with more than one teacher commenting that I was the oddest case they’d ever
come across and that they just didn’t understand me. When I was 13 I decided it
was finally time to buckle down and give schoolwork a proper go; it had got to
the point where that would cause less hassle and stress than being told off all
the time. Plus it was being impressed on us that getting bad GCSEs would be a catastrophe
for our future prospects – much in the same vein as becoming a teenage mother
or contracting HIV.
Sporadically
making a bit more effort still didn’t stop me writing rude, bitter,
hair-raisingly scornful comments in my school books. The girl who, aged ten,
included such words as these in her final school project ‘My School Years’:
“I hope these accounts have managed to paint
a picture of a teacher who cared little for the children in her care, and a
teacher who cared only for her salary.”
“Mr B said he wouldn’t have minded if I’d
said he was stupid, but calling him a liar was too much. Well, now I’ll say it. MR B IS
STUPID. And he will be, forever more.”
…was
still going in her early teens:
[from
my year 9 maths book] “I cannot do
exercise 2I or the 5 questions, because I don’t understand removing brackets.
This is because I was not listening in Wednesday’s lesson, which in turn was
due to the fact that I was catching up on my beauty sleep (through no choice of
my own – it is a reflex reaction when one is BORED to high heaven). Add this to
my inability to do maths beyond about level 3, and there’s a good reason for
you.” (The teacher crossed out “level 3” and wrote “Change to level 7 at
least”.)
“14a. Please check this question as it’s
complete b******s. We should not be subjected to sad losers with hangovers
writing any old thing.”
“Pythagorian Triples. NB Don’t ever get the
impression that I’m doing this because I want to. It’s just slightly – VERY slightly
– less boring than staring into space during maths lessons.”
[from
my year 10 work experience diary] “I do
not want, need or expect to learn anything. This is half the reason why I didn’t
bother with that Key Skills s**t. The other half of the reason is that Key
Skills and Targets, in any form, belong at the bottom of the garbage bin of
most patronising, ridiculous, STUPID, pointless, mind-numbing ideas ever. I
mean I can REALLY see myself in 10 years’ time going to work thinking ‘Hmm. Now
my ‘application of number’ needs a little work, but I’m quite confident about ‘improving
own learning and performance’’. I will most likely be thinking, ‘What shall I
have from the vending machine today?’”
Nevertheless, after about a year of catching
up, I began to excel – for a short while, in humanities subjects. I unravelled
again at 15 and spent a lot of time scratching my arms with a compass in the
school toilets, but managed to do enough to get all my GCSEs at grades A or A*
- other than a B in maths, a subject that (as you can see from the above
extracts) I despised with biblical fervour. I had wanted to go elsewhere to do
my A-levels but ended up staying on in the sixth form, as I was shy and unconfident,
it was the path of least resistance and I had a handful of good school friends
(incidentally, said friends are now a doctor, a pharmacist and a senior
economist).
Sixth form was better in some ways; I finally
got contact lenses after years spent walking around unable to see because I was
too vain to wear glasses, and I got my first boyfriend (who broke my heart, but
as I had previously thought I’d die a virgin, this was a small price to pay). But
after the first term or two, when the novelty wore off, my work habits were an
abject disaster. I woke up every day with the intention of doing my best, but
procrastination had me in an iron grip. During my GCSEs I had learned the
unfortunate lesson that I could still get an A just by waffling at the last
minute with a few big words thrown in; in sixth form the temptation to do this
grew ever greater, and I sailed closer and closer to the wind.
Deep down, I just didn’t see myself as a
competitor for the kids I was at school with – the outgoing, well-put-together
offspring of doctors and solicitors, for whom success seemed a given. I had
hazy, idealised daydreams about what I might want to do in the future - namely
saving the world - but didn’t grasp then that no-one ever saved the world by
being vague about it. I couldn’t really picture myself as someone with a great
career, so I suppose I lacked a crucial source of motivation that others had. I
also never read anything too highbrow because this would make me feel insecure
and uncomfortable – worried that I didn’t have the intelligence of the author,
or of other readers’ interpretations. (I still feel like that when I read, but
these days I try to suck it up.)
Despite all this, I actually gained three
A-levels and one AS-level with straight A’s - I can show you the certificates if
you don’t believe me, haha. These grades are entirely deceptive and owe much
more to the fact that I chose soft subjects (English Lit, Sociology, Psychology
and Philosophy if you must know) and played the system (which was less than
academically rigorous, much as it pains me to agree with the right-wing press) than
to anything approaching hard work.
I left school at 17, in 2003. Looking back, a
metaphor comes to mind of a girl starting out along the wide, open road of
opportunities – yet shackled by weighty baggage. I was highly confused,
insecure, ill-educated, lagged behind in terms of social skills and was
poleaxed by many years’ worth of ingrained bad habits (not least eating habits;
I have always struggled with my weight, too).
Part two – which covers what has happened in
the decade since I left school – is a little thorny. But I promise I’ll upload
it sometime soon.
