Late Night: Look, It’s Entitled High School Me!
Popout
Seriously, I think I wrote something this snippy and spoiled in high school, but it’s still in my diary (I TOLD YOU TO BURN THAT, MOM) and not in the pages of the Wall Street Journal: Yeah, this is how I used to think, because nobody but nobody is put-upon like a girl born white to middle-class parents in America, for serious. How dare I not be able to get into Harvard? How dare I not get everything I want? It’s almost JUST like being gay or Asian! CRAZINESS.Like me, millions of high-school seniors with sour grapes are asking themselves this week how they failed to get into the colleges of their dreams. It’s simple: For years, they—we—were lied to.
Colleges tell you, “Just be yourself.” That is great advice, as long as yourself has nine extracurriculars, six leadership positions, three varsity sports, killer SAT scores and two moms. Then by all means, be yourself! If you work at a local pizza shop and are the slowest person on the cross-country team, consider taking your business elsewhere.
What could I have done differently over the past years?
For starters, had I known two years ago what I know now, I would have gladly worn a headdress to school. Show me to any closet, and I would’ve happily come out of it. “Diversity!” I offer about as much diversity as a saltine cracker. If it were up to me, I would’ve been any of the diversities: Navajo, Pacific Islander, anything.
Here’s some stuff I learned in the intervening 20 years:
1. Your ethnic background isn’t a goddamn costume. You can’t put it on to look good for the admissions