Gifted

One year during elementary school, my brother and I attended a magnet school for gifted children. It would be more accurately described as a twisted little torture factory staffed by bureaucratic minions where clueless stage parents sent their self-obsessed, horrible children. But I digress… I knew I should feel fortunate, especially since it required sacrifice on the part of my parents, but I hated it there. Those kids were from a different world and their parents were attorneys and surgeons not blue-collar beat cops and stay-at-home moms. I didn’t speak their language, wear their clothes, or fit into their caste system. There were only two bright spots in my genius-academy experience: I was a teacher’s aide in the kindergarten class, which sealed forever my desire to teach, and we had a college student helper who could see things for what they were, often standing between me and the in-crowd. Like during track-and-field day on my mom’s birthday. I mostly dreaded those kinds of contests, but this day was different because the winner of each race would get a prize and I needed a present for my mom. I got my heart set on a ring with Ronald McDonald’s face on it--knowing my mother would love it. The race was run, I lagged miserably behind, and the kind student slipped me the ring for “Best Effort.” Present problem solved. In Vera B. Williams' A Chair For My Mother, a girl desperately wants a present for her mom. It’s a daughter thing.

http://www.kidsreads.com/authors/au-williams-vera.asp

http://www.amazon.com/Chair-My-Mother-Vera-Williams/dp/068800914X