i started thinking about how a mind learns today, and even though i maintained a B+/A- avg all the way through college, i know i was a bad student. i was just smart enough to slip through the cracks, though it's nothing i'm proud of. if i could do it again, with the aid of coffee or whatever i need to stay focused and absorb, i would. it's just that general learning settings didn't work for me.

this is how it went:

i was always asleep. like narcoleptic asleep. i could walk into a lecture and be asleep before the professor began speaking, waking up as everyone packed up to leave. i had a good way of disappearing so the teachers never bothered me, but i was rarely awake, unless i found the material drivingly interesting (anything related to psychology/spirituality, but not religion. therefore, i logged almost no waking hours in science classes, accumulated). i even knew how to prop my head up like i was reading, and could sleep through a whole class that way.

this was the worst in college. i could sleep so deeply as to be dreaming bizarre, quirky, fantastical dreams. they were like little video clips spawned by david lynch or dali that completely disoriented me when i woke up. often, i would doubt the existence of this reality because the other seemed so much more colorful and full of life.

i made up the knowledge doing all of the assigned readings with great concentration and diligence. all math and science homework i copied off guys i bullied into helping me with a playful dominating seduction. they really couldn't say no. because i knew i didn't deserve a good grade, i would study the night before the final to cram as much cursory knowledge into my short term memory, and I was willing to live with at worst a C in science classes. People have always been amazed at how I get away with test taking considering I basically glean very little from attending class.

i'm very good at retaining written word for a short period of time, turning ideas into mnemonics so i could pass any tests. I tend to forget shortly after. this was how i passed out of my language requirement while trying to graduate early. basically, i did 5 semesters at michigan (took fall of my 2nd year off when i tore my acl a few weeks in). i had some ap credits and went to school year round, taking classes at berkeley one year (for english requirements) then usc the next (film). i had to take a years worth of classes my final semester, and the only way to get everything in was to double up on classes, which the university didn't seem to notice. so one of the classes, i only went to twice--the first day to pick up the syllabus, the last day to take the final. (i crammed in the reading the week before the final). i was also simultaneously shooting an ambitious thesis film that took up almost every waking hour and severely limited the amount of sleep i got. at the end of the semester, as it looked like i was all set to graduate, i realized i hadn't fulfilled my language requirement.

michigan requires two years. i had taken the spanish evaluation exam when i first entered, and had passed out of two semesters. but it's not offered in the summer, so i would have had to come back for a fourth year of college, because of one class i needed in the fall, and one class i needed in the spring. that drove me crazy. the school policy is that i can only take the test once upon entrance. they wouldn't let me take the test again. i read through the policies and found a loophole. if i could prove that i had a learning disability and this wasn't accounted for at the time i took my initial language test, then they had to let me retake the test.

look, i'm not someone who likes to take advantage of things. but i needed to get out of school. the academic environment doesn't help me learn optimally and kills my self-esteem. plus, my family was imploding back in california and they were making me come home every month to witness the turmoil, and i couldn't take being tugged between two worlds anymore--my tumultuous family life from which i came, and the independent world of possibility where i was trying to find myself.

my brother has Asperger's, compounded by ADHD. i knew that when they had taken our CAT scans to compare brain function when we were kids, they saw the same activity in my brain denoting ADHD as in his. i remembered that. so it wasn't hard for me to take a test and get diagnosed. hell, anyone who has met me can probably tell i'm ADHD, unless i try very hard to focus and hide it, which is really mentally draining.

so i went back, showed them the diagnosis and paperwork, and i was scheduled to re-take the test a week after my graduation ceremony. so i walked, getting my diploma without knowing whether or not i would have to stay for another year just because of two classes. i did come to terms with it though. michigan only gives full degrees, no minors, but if i had to stay, i would just get a third degree in psychology. i only needed 8 classes.

i bought an ap spanish book to help me cram, and went in and took the test, praying that my short-term memory didn't fail me. i felt pretty confident about it, knowing i only needed 70% and i was done with college.

the guy fed my answer sheet through the machine, and when he came back, he looked embarrassed. sorry, he said. i looked and it said i'd only gotten 54% correct, meaning another year of school. i stared at it for a long time. 54%??? could i have overestimated the confidence of my knowledge and completely been delusional about my answers? it didn't make sense.

are you sure this is right? i asked him.

yeah, you failed. he said.

failed.

the most devastating word in my vocabulary.

and it came out of the mouth of some buck-toothed punk.

i felt my ears get hot and my eyes started stinging.

i didn't mind coming back for another year and getting another degree while i was at it (i loved psychology anyway, though i struggle with statistics). but how was it i scored worst than when i first took the test?

suddenly, i was confident that didn't make sense.

you need to check this again, i told him. there's no way i only got 54% on this test.

machines don't lie, he told me.

i thrust the sheet back into his hands. go check it, i said. like there wasn't going to be an argument.

he rolled his eyes and went back and checked. i waited with my arms crossed.

a few minutes later, he came back, apologetic. i'm really sorry, he said. i matched your answer sheet against the wrong test. you got an 83%. Congratulations.

oh my god. i'd graduated.

in the cheapest, most meaningless way possible.

so that's how i got out of college.

i wheeled and dealed. i took classes that overlapped, showing up just for the first day and the final to do well enough to pass and get the credit. i slept through lectures and then got the geeks down my hall to explain the information to me. anything that required writing, i was the queen of bullshit. words are seduction and i would write the craziest essays and papers in a few hours, always doing this stream of consciousness, typing as fast as my mind can go. I always wrote them within days of getting the assignment, often the same day, then turned them in weeks later without rereading. some instructors would call bullshit on me for not telling them in detail how i got from point a to point d. but for the most part, the stuff i was dropping sounded good enough for them to buy into. A's for anything written was easy.


the falling asleep was always a problem with lecture classes, but it was harder to hide in discussion. so the only way to get me to pay attention in a discussion format, was for me to have a crush on the instructor and intellectually spar or engage with him or her. sometimes it was shameful who i made myself generate crushes on so i could be motivated into proving i was intelligent enough to get a good grade. men or women, old or young, i fought hard in those classes to make myself interested and always got a's in those. i ended up spending as much time hanging out with graduate student instructors as my peers.

in hindsight, i think i realized if i didn't go fast, i would lose my momentum and get swallowed up by the academic system. it was just so hard for me to swallow information that way, and i struggled incredibly with focus and attention. yet, i'm infatuated with learning and collecting knowledge. i still continue to take classes to this day, around 4-6 a year because it's important in my life to continually expand intellectually. but i do feel guilty sometimes that i wasn't able to make the most out of my academic career, and even though i saved my parents a year in out-of-state tuition, i also feel like i wasted their money because i didn't retain very much academic information. i do have regrets about how i wasted my education and am constantly reminding myself that just because i can find loopholes and get out of a lot of situations, it can often be to my detriment because i'm missing out on the experience and what can be gained if i followed the rules and forced myself to focus.