"Misunderstood " by Brandon Y

When I was a kid, my teachers would say I talked too much in class. For me, it wasn’t about disrupting the class or bringing attention to myself. I was an enthusiastic kid that liked school even though not everyone perceived me as that. My sixth grade teacher didn’t particularly like me. I had no clue as to why but it didn’t bother me. Every Friday we used to do a timed vocab quiz and there was a silent competition among the kids in the class of who could finish first. I am super competitive and I tried so hard to get first every time we did this. I finished first one time all year and I was so excited I jumped out of my chair and yelled, “First!”. My teacher glared at me and told me to sit down. I brushed it off as another mystery as to why he hated me so much. After the first trimester, the teacher sits down with the student’s parents and discusses how the first trimester went. I had gotten straight A’s and never caused any trouble in my eyes, yet when my parents and my teacher had the conference my teacher told my parents that I liked to bring attention to myself in class and didn’t know how to humble myself. As I look back on it now, six years later, I know that what he said wasn’t based on observations but emotion. But at the time I took what he said and thought that maybe I had been a problem. From that moment on I became quiet, seemingly reserved, because in my mind being silent was being humble and not talking would keep people from seeing me as an attention seeker. So, if you see me walking down the hallways with my earbuds in all the time, the habit started as a result of trying to keep myself occupied to create the perception of being the opposite of an attention seeker. If you’ve had me in a class you know that I’m the kid that sits in the back of the class and will probably say one word all year but it’s not because I don’t care, I’m just more focused on what the teacher

has to say. When we’re having a conversation and I seem quiet, it’s not because I’m shy. I’m just more interested in listening to what you have to say. A lot of people perceive me as spoiled and an attention seeker because I wear overpriced clothes. But get to know me and you’ll never see me showing off my clothes on social media, you won’t catch me bragging to people about how much my jacket costs. In fact, I’ll tell you I got my clothes from Goodwill because I sincerely don’t want to be perceived as arrogant or spoiled. Ever since my sixth grade teacher told my parents I had to learn to humble myself, I’ve worked to keep myself out of the spotlight, be as unknown as possible, and be as silent as possible because that’s the only way I knew how to be “humble” and if there’s one type of person I hate it’s the one that likes to brag and show everyone up. A lot of people still see me as a guy with rich parents and as someone who’s always trying to be cool. My parents are middle class and I worked 36 hours a week during the summer to get what I wanted and save for college. Do I like to dress nice? Yes. Do I buy overpriced clothes? Yes. Do some people see my silence as not caring? Yes. Has my personality changed since sixth grade? Absolutely. I can understand where people might misconstrue my personality as distasteful. But at one point I stopped trying to explain myself to people and this may be the last time I try to get people to understand who I am. If there was anything I would want people to know it would be that I worked for everything I have and I’m a normal guy who’s lived his life making sure people don’t see him as boisterous but as a guy who loves his friends, loves life, and doesn’t try to be something he’s not. To many the criticism of a sixth grade teacher may seem insignificant but it influenced me to become who I am today and although my outer shell has completely changed since my childhood, inside I am still a fun-loving, loyal, normal guy who doesn’t have much to say but is eager to listen to what you have to say.