Vivian Yoon - Her Little Genius

 

 

 

 

I grew up across the street from my high school. Every morning, I would bow goodbye to my grandma on the porch, and I would walk across the street to school. She would stand there in her orange and cream pajamas and watch me while I went. Even though I could feel her eyes on me the entire time, I never turned around, because I was too busy thinking the same thing over and over again, “How did I get here?” 

 

So, ever since I was a little kid, my grandma, she would tell everyone she knew that I was so smart. I was like a little genius. She would constantly bring up the fact that I started reading at the age of two, or how as a toddler, I would just strike up conversations with strangers. My parents didn't think that these two things made me a genius, but they did want me to be smart. My dad, he would do this thing where he would quiz me using these trivia cards for kids. The stakes with these cards were so high, because every time I got a question wrong, it was devastating. Like, it was somehow proof that I wasn't a genius after all. But when I got a question right, it was the best feeling in the world, because I could see the pride in my dad's face. All I wanted to do was chase that feeling of him seeing me and seeing what I could do. 

 

But then, my parents split up, and there were no more afternoons with the cards. I was now living with my dad and my grandma. My dad was busy with work. I barely saw my mom. My grandma, she mostly stayed in her room where she watched Korean dramas and American baseball. [audience laughter] 

 

Anytime she would come out of her room to where I was, she would always say the same thing to me in Korean, “Gongbuhaeya yeolsimhi hae.” “You have to study hard.” She wanted me to get into a good school, and get a good job and make lots of money, which it's fine and expected for a Korean grandmother. But it was also something she said to me every single time she saw me, which was multiple times a day, every day. Eventually, it got to be so suffocating. Like, the pressure was too much, and I started to feel like I couldn't even breathe without her telling me to study. So, I started to avoid her. 

 

 

Eventually, she caught on, and we saw each other less. Things got pretty lonely in that house. My parents would sometimes forget my birthdays. I was usually in charge of making dinner for myself. My specialty was Chef Boyardee ravioli. Mini, not regular. I had taste. [audience laughter] 

 

I watched a lot of TV. My favorite shows at the time were these old sitcoms from the 1980s and 1990s, like family ties and growing pains, shows about happy families doing stuff together. I idolized the teens in these stories. I couldn't wait to go to high school and do all the classic American things they did, like walk across a grassy quad while holding your textbooks, or go to football games with friends or stress out about who is taking who to prom. 

 

But when it came time for me to go to high school, my parents decided that it would best for everyone if I went to the school across the street from my dad's house, an Inner City High School that didn't have any of those classic American things I wanted. There was no grassy quad. The entire school was concrete, and asphalt and chain link fence. I didn't even think about going to football games or prom with friends, because I didn't have any friends. At this school, I was just one faceless kid in a sea of thousands. I felt completely invisible. 

 

And then, one day, I was sitting in my biology class. Everyone's doing that thing, where you take turns reading from the textbook. It's my turn. I start reading. When I finish, I realize the entire class has gone silent. The teacher is staring at me. He writes me this note, and he hands it to me and he says, “Take this to the fourth floor,” which is confusing because this building only has three floors. [audience laughter]

 

But I do what he says. I go up the main steps. I go to the third floor. I turn right. I see this plain, unmarked door that I've never noticed before. I open the door, and I see this narrow stairwell leading up. There are these giant, colorful dinosaur murals on both sides. There's this security camera blinking down at me. I get to the top of the steps, and I push the door open, and I step out onto the roof. The only thing around are these two big blue double doors. When I push them open, I see this giant classroom. It's got like floor to ceiling bookshelves lining the walls. There's natural light streaming in through the windows. It looks nothing like the rest of the school below. There are all these kids just walking around, hanging out. 

 

Like, one group of kids is looking at this anatomical skeleton in the corner. There's another group over here discussing Eastern-European politics. And then, I hear one kid say the phrase “Amorphous blob.” And it hits me. This is where the nerds are. [audience laughter]

 

So, the fourth floor, as we all called it, it quickly becomes my home. I find out that the teacher here, Mr. Holland, he coaches something called academic decathlon. Decathlon, it's this yearly competition where schools all over the country compete in a series of 10 subjects. Literature, art, math, science, etc. But there's one subject that's different, Super Quiz, because Super Quiz is a live event held in front of an audience. It turns out our school is actually pretty good at Super Quiz. The decathlon kids are like royalty on the fourth floor, okay? They get these custom blue and white letterman jackets with their names stitched on them. They get all these perks, like free pizza on Fridays. [audience laughter]

 

Everybody knows who the team members are. So, when Mr. Holland asked me my sophomore year if I want to join, I'm like, “Hell yeah.” Because remember, I'm starving for attention at home. So, the fact that this adult sees something in me and wants to invite me to join this super exclusive group of kids that get special treatment, I'm so in. 

 

So, I join the team. We study all year. It's finally competition time. The first two days of the competition go by in a blur. It's just a bunch of kids taking a bunch of tests in these big rooms. In our downtime, our team scopes out the number one seed that year, Taft High. Everybody on my team is super intimidated by the team captain at Taft, because there are all these rumors about him, like how he's getting a full ride to Stanford, and how he got a perfect score on his SAT’s and how his family doesn't even own a microwave, because his mom cooks home cooked meals every night using the oven. [audience laughter] So, yeah, he's scary. [audience laughter] 

 

But me? I am more intimidated by the second in command at Taft, because I have seen this kid wearing purple Ugg’s. And in my mind, you cannot be the kind of kid that wears purple Ugg’s unless you have the most loving and supportive parents who encourage you to do things like express yourself. [audience laughter] And every time I see this kid in his purple Ugg’s, my mind instantly flashes to his home life. I just picture his mom picking him up from school and saying, “How was your day, honey?” As she makes him Ants on a Log, and PB and J's. But not too many snacks, because dinner is already on the stove. I compare that to my own life, where I come home after school to an empty house and eat canned food in front of the TV. As I think about that difference between our two worlds, I feel myself disappearing, like that picture in back to the future, I just feel myself fading until I'm not there anymore. 

 

We get to the morning of Super Quiz. I put on my blue and white letterman jacket, and I catch a ride to the venue with my friend, because my parents are busy. When we get there, our coach leads us into this back room where all the teams are waiting for the event to start. Everybody's talking. We're all nervous. Except for purple Ugg guy, he's totally fine. [audience laughter]

 

Suddenly, we hear music, and the announcer and we realize the opening ceremonies have started. One by one, all the teams start walking into the auditorium holding their school signs, and they start walking the floor. Finally, it's our turn. I step inside and I see all these people in the bleachers cheering. There are these student desks lining the floor in threes, like little canoes. Our team finds our spot on the sidelines and the competition begins. 

 

I walk up to one of the desks. I sit down. The proctor reads the first question out loud. I realize I know the answer. So, I bubble it in furiously. Time runs out. The proctor announces the correct answer. I take my pencil and I wave it around my head to show my teammates that I got it right. The crowd erupts, and it feels like all of that applause is just for me. It's the best feeling, like getting those trivia questions right with my dad but times a thousand because all these people are seeing me and seeing what I can do. There are nine more questions and I wave my pencil nine more times. And at the end, I stand on stage with my teammates as the announcer declares us first place. [audience cheers and applause]

 

So, our teammates, we are all hugging and cheering and high fiving. And then, slowly, they all start to walk away to join their families who had come to see them. But I just hang back with my coach, because no one had come to see me. I look around, and I see purple Ugg guy with his family. I'm right, they totally love him. [audience laughter] Even though his team didn't win, I see his mom say to him, “I am so proud of you.” When I get home, my dad's out. My grandma's waiting by the door. She wants to know how it went. I show her my medals and I tell her we won. She wants to know more, but I tell her I'm tired. I go into my room, and I cry myself to sleep. 

 

The next Monday, we all show up to school. Everyone's excited. We're making big plans for next year, how it's going to be even better. But then, our coach walks in and he says, he got an offer to coach the decathlon team at a different school, at a better school and he's not coming back next year. And he leaves. 

 

The rest of high school for me, it's like a haze without decathlon, without my coach. I go back to feeling invisible. I hang out with the wrong crowd. I start ditching school. I barely graduate. I don't even go to my own graduation, because I'm not sure that anyone from my family will come. And then, a few weeks later, I pack my things and I move out. As the years go by, I still visit my grandma from time to time, but I keep the visits short, because that house just holds so many difficult memories. 

 

And then, one day, I'm at home, and I'm looking through this box of old photos and I see a picture of me with my old decathlon teammates. We're wearing our letterman jackets, and we're cheesing for the camera, and I start to wonder, whatever happened to my jacket and those medals? So, the next time I visit my grandma, I ask her, “Do you know what happened to my things from decathlon?” And she says, “Yeah.” She leads me down the hallway, and she opens the door to her bedroom, and I'm hit with that familiar smell of old books and mothballs. 

 

I see all the furniture is the same since I was a kid. The old wooden dresser in vanity, the little nightstand where she kept her radio and her newspaper, the tiny silver TV she used to watch Korean dramas and American baseball. And then, she points behind me, and I turn around and I see all of my medals pinned in a row. And hanging up next to them, my blue and white letterman jacket with my name stitched on them. 

 

I realized this spot on the wall is directly across from her bed, which means she has been staring at these every day for the last 10 years. I turn to her, and I say, “[foreign language]?” You kept these all this time? And she says, “[foreign language].” Of course. And in that moment, all these memories just come flooding back. I picture her standing there on the porch, watching me walk to school, hoping that just once I would turn around and look at her. 

 

I think about that day after the competition, when I came home with all my medals and I could tell how badly she wanted to know what happened and how much she wished that she could have been there. I think about how I had never even thought to invite her. I imagine her standing in that empty house after I had left, collecting those medals and carefully pinning them up one by one, because even after all that time and all that distance between us, she was still so, so proud of her smart granddaughter, of her little genius. Growing up, all I wanted was for someone to see me. It turns out someone had. I just hadn't seen her. Thank you. 

 

[cheers and applause]