you're so smaht

A recent conversation had me pondering my relationship with my own intelligence while on the recumbent bike this evening. I'm sure it's no surprise to any of you that, despite any objective evidence to the contrary, I think I'm pretty damn smaht. In fact, I'm so sure of it that it's impossible to insult me by calling me stupid, because I simply won't believe it at a gut level (unlike, say, if you were to say I'm fat, incompetent at any number of things, or batshit crazy, any of which I might agree with on any given day.)

My confidence in this area was probably instilled by years of getting good grades without having to work at it and was probably reinforced by years of people telling me in a surprised manner, "you're really smart!" when they were led by my big breasts, little girl voice, or bad Boston accent to be expecting otherwise. I never minded that, by the way. I always liked shattering people's expectations with that, much as I liked their surprise when I revealed my nasty sarcastic side after my quiet, shy mannerisms led them to believe I was "nice." Anyway, I've always been secure that I was smarter than most other people and that I could learn anything I wanted to. (This despite the fact that someone spent, oh, probably eight years explaining the stock market to me, and I never quite got it. See "objective evidence to the contrary" above.)

So, I was thinking about this today while working out, and it brought to mind another Pointless Andrea Anecdote. You, dear readers, get to be the recipients of it.

When I was in college, I did a clinical rotation at a well-known Boston hospital where the preferred teaching technique was to have you do something you weren't actually qualified to do without close supervision, then castigate you when you invariably screwed up some portion of it. Ah, summer of '84. Good times. I think I had a migraine every day from May to August. But, anyway, triumph through adversity, or however that saying goes. I made it through and even ended up taking a job at this same hospital later on.

Both while I was a student there and while I worked there, we had a young-ish neurologist in our department who was a complete waste of a human being. To briefly illustrate, we never had a single conversation in which his eyes rose any higher than my chest level. (And, I might say, he was French Canadian. Like my nemesis, Eric Gagne. And my douchey ex-brother-in-law. And Celine Dion. Coincidence? I think not.) One day when I was working there but hadn't quite graduated yet, I did something that even he had to admit was very right. "Miss Insert-my-maiden-name-here, you're getting smarter," he said.

Now, to fully appreciate this next part, you need to picture me in my feathered-banged, blue-mascara'd, Good Will Hunting-accented, Tello-wardrobed 22 year old glory. Got that picture affixed in your mind? Good.

I looked at him very very coolly and said, "No. I have always been smart. What I'm getting is more knowledgeable." And then I turned around and walked away.

It still makes me smile to remember that. Damn. But, nevertheless, the point of this pointless anecdote is that even pompous condescending pieces of crap like him never shook my faith in my own intelligence.

(Also, I'm realizing the theme of most of these pointless anecdotes is that I have a need to record every time in my life that I had the right comeback when it was needed, not six hours later. Don't worry. It's a relatively short list.)

xoxo