Somewhere, deep in my childhood, there was a moment of parental skullduggery, a strained silence that was all but clandestine. All but, because I knew something was up, something about me that was not for my ears. Don't you hate that? Those whispered truths, just out of earshot?
My best friend's mother, and closest neighbor, a school psychologist, was only slightly less oblique, and thus only slightly more helpful, in this moment, and generally, when it came to the infuriating, opaque mysteries of adulthood. The G-word was in the air.
IQ Tests. The one test whose score they don't, as far as I know, let the tested see, not right away. There was something about mine, my troubled gut told me, that disturbed the adults in my life. Maybe I can see their point. I was already alienated, depressed, withdrawn, shy, lonely, introverted, awkward, psychoanalysed, plump and grumpy. What good would it do to let me know that here is yet another quality I possess that would forever separate me from my peers?
Except that I knew already, of course, that something was different about me, but I guess I didn't have a name for it. And then there were the stern, well-meaning, almost pitying lectures about how wrong it was to flaunt our privileges, which were notable. Were they worried about creating a monster? Is that why they preferred keeping me in the dark to helping me cope?
