Papers

I remember once a middle school science exam, teacher said: you can write whatever you want behind the paper I’ll never see it anyways. Maybe to ease our fear from writing stupid mneumonics? But I thought It was litterally a thought space, so I wrote what I had in my mind at the time, I don’t remember what I said it goes something like this:

A paper to prove I was born

A paper to prove my death

A paper to prove I’m smart

A life between papers…

The next day after science class, teacher asked me to have a side talk, my friens thought that I did something horrible because last time she asked me aside it was because I drew anime doodles on the side of my book, It was terrifying because she has that strong boss lady aura and “If I look at you, you’re dead” face.

So what did she wanted? I thought she was gonna call out how smart I am and that I have to participate more in class (every teacher told me that at the time but my rebellious self rejecting school by doing nothing but the bare minimum to pass and still got high grades cuz im smart ehe). Plot twist, she didn’t, the teacher asked me “how did you think you did on yesterday’s exam?”

“Great” i said with anxiety instead of pride

“To be honest with you, you did surprised me, you are the only one who got full mark on this one” I felt soo happy here because who the hell can get a full mark in her class?!

She continued “but one thing I have to discuss with you about your paper”

I entered fight and flight mode, as I was thinking whether I doodled something and forgot to erase it or something, She wasn’t even looking at me during all that talk, just flipping the papers, she pulled out mine, and read to me what I wrote, I wrote it impulsively because I was bored waiting for the exam time to finish and go out, not for her to read it and judge me, she started telling me about how she got her degree, and to be fair, she really suffered to get that science degree, I think she was a physics major -sorry that Im too old to remember middle school- but she ended her flashback moment with this “…so my degree is a mere paper, but behind that paper is the teacher I am, you seem to underastimate the value of papers, and you’re right, the paper itself does not have a value, but humans are the ones to give value to paper, you and I gave that exam paper its value, get it?”

Her words touched something in me at that time even though I couldn’t really know it, but she was telling me that I had a surface level outlook on life and the value of so many things aren’t in their material or physical existence but rather in the meaning behind them.

This was a life changing moment for me, because the first thing I thought deeply about after her class was the fact that being in that class that chalanged me academically, and being with such a smart teacher who would pick up my view on life and actually try to talk about it like an adult conversation, it was meant to be, she is THE teacher for someone as careless as me.

She always wanted to find a way to get me -and everyone else in someway- to care, again I was doodling on my book all the time, don’t focus because I can study night before the exam at home and make it with full mark in the usual classes, I don’t participate because I didn’t see the value of school beside the easy acadamic validation, she made sure for every one to paricipate either alone or as part of the group in group activities, she encouraged questions, and I remember going to her after class a lot, for stupid questions really but she praised my questions as smart -not praising me directly which made me coming back- but she also was pointing on me everytime I was distracted which made me feel horrible because one time she wrote my name on her notebook to take off a mark because I wore my cap!! And another time because my hair wasn’t tied?!! It was roller coaster of science, mental war, but I’m grateful because I remember her class out of all school memories, either for how fun a challenging class was or for her talks with me alone…

and she made me unlock the “Deep thinking” skill and “Look behind face value”

Now being the philosopher I am can never stop thinking about the fact that “crime and punishment” entire plot was about the mental war as a punishment for the main character’s crime, and if anything the prison punishment was his mental freedom and that’s why he didn’t mind it, in a way every character had their prison that they got freed from by the end of the novel ,and thats how everybody knew dostoyvesky is a storytelling genius.

Unnecessary I know, but yeah, this is a core memory of mine and hope it light up something in you <3