"Describe a mistake you made or a challenge you faced. How did you respond to that mistake or challenge, and what did you learn from your experience?"
I went back and forth on whether or not to post this one, because it really is quite personal. I wrote about a mistake, and since it wasn't all that long ago, and I wasn't all that young, I feel a little leery of sharing.
Understand that I am not a very touchy-feely type of person in real life. Large displays of affection generally make me feel embarassed. I cry all the time at books and movies, but I don't cry in real life all that often. I try, generally, to keep my moods in check. So sharing something, especially something I'm not proud of, is difficult at the best of times.
So anyway. I could have copped out of this, and wrote about how big of a mistake pretty much my entire sixth grade year was, since I decided it would be a good idea to become friends with the "popular" group of girls, and I was pretty much miserable for the first half of the year. But that would be making myself a victim, which feels wrong. It feels insincere. And as you'll all see, this entire story is about being honest.
So it was freshman year. I was in French class. We'd had to do some sort of group project, and I forget who I worked with, but it was definitely someone I knew reasonably well, which makes the entire thing that happened mildly less mortifying.
Anyway, so Madame is handing our scores back, and I notice that despite the fact that I scored one point lower than my partner in a category, I have the same score as her overall. Which meant Madame had added the points up wrong.
Now, not as any sort of justification, but have you ever had a teacher that drilled it into your head that if there's a mistake in your favor, you shouldn't tell them? Especially when it's a small mistake. Well, I had a teacher like that freshman year, and I'd had teachers like that before, and I wasn't sure if Madame was a teacher like that or not at that point in the year, so I guessed. Of course, I guessed wrong, and obviously my own desire not to lose a point played into all of this; still, that was part of my reasoning.
I would also like to acknowledge how stupid this whole thing was right here. I mean, it was a point. I have a feeling it wasn't even a point that would change what letter grade I got on the project - maybe make it an A minus instead of an A. The point (ha!) is, it wasn't worth lying about. But again: I was a freshman. I didn't understand how unimportant that point was. I was just starting out high school, and it had been told to me over and over how much harder high school was than junior high, so I treated it like every point was the one that would eventually get me into college or not.
So anyway. Madame asks if there's anything anyone would like to say, questions about scores, etc., which should have been my cue to speak up, but I didn't.
Somehow, she sensed this or something, because after making that announcement, while people are kind of chattering, she comes over and asks our table if there's anything wrong. And I can't lie to her when she asks that directly. So I tell her, in my bumbling and inadequate French what's wrong, and she goes, Oh, yep, that's a mistake, and then she holds up my paper and says to everyone, "Check, make sure your score adds up, Anri just found a mistake in hers." And then she looks at me over her glasses, and asks me in a low voice, "Were you going to tell me otherwise?" And what can I say? So she gives me this really disappointed look and walks over to mark the change.
I wanted to become invisible, right then and there. My partner had heard, and was looking at me, and I was turning bright red (fun fact: when I get embarassed, the tips of my ears get really how and turn red. It's weird). To top it all off, she comes back and returns it to me and says, "I'm feeling nice, think of it like a holiday bonus," and gives me the paper back - she didn't take away the point. But the look she gives me while she does it - I never, ever wanted to see that look again.
For the rest of the year, I thought Madame remembered and was judging me. I still sometimes think she does. And I know my partner remembered, at least for a time, because I do remember it being brought up after a little bit of time had gone by.
So yeah: mistake I made. What I learned? That old saying about honesty is true. Be honest. Always. Omission is a form of dishonesty. And never try to hide anything from Madame.
(Now that I think about it, this probably also qualifies as the most embarassing thing that's ever happened to me. So now I have an answer for that question, should it ever come up.)
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