Let’s start with Latin. My class was the first to take Latin all 4 years of high school (vs just the required 2 years for college applications). One of my favorite activities – the weekly vocabulary quizzes, 50 words and definitions each week. Every year we got a new box of 500 vocab words. I loved taking out each week’s assigned 50 and working my way through the entire box each school year. I can also clearly remember that box falling out of my hands in front of my locker senior year. Talk about embarrassing! Translating was not easy for me, but I took it on like decoding a puzzle and loved the challenge.
Next up – Biology. I am proud (?) to report that my tests were used as the answer key because I always earned a perfect score. I was always good at memorization tests. One of my favorite Biology activities was dissection. First a frog, then a cat. I thought I would have a hard time with the cat, but it honestly didn’t seem like an animal to me. I can remember picking off all of the fat to get to the organs thinking that if this stray cat had that much fat, I could not begin to imagine how much fat my cat had in its body. I loved inspecting the organs looking for any issues. And I clearly remember being super respectful and putting the organs back inside my cat and stitching him (yes, it was a male) back together once our learning was done.
If could go back to my high school days, I would tell my teenage self to embrace that nerdiness because it is my true self. I can honor that inner nerd with my special interest in true crime as an almost 50-year-old woman. In my latest podcast listen I learned more about the Reed technique and how it leads to false confessions and when a directed verdict is warranted in a trial.
So, to all my friends, don’t try to hide your real self. Be you, even if that is a nerd who likes Latin, Biology, or True Crime.