Free Write: Spelling Scares

"Alright, kids, line up against the wall. It's time for public humiliation."

In elementary school, I was in the spelling bee twice. Two years in a row, I beat all my other classmates and won the chance to compete in the school-wide spelling bee. Two years in a row, I lost in the second round. Two isn't my lucky number, apparently.

The first year, my losing was a matter of negligence. I was completely unaware of the day of the bee and I didn't study at all. Out of the blue, my runner-up came up to me and said, "You'd better not be sick tomorrow because I don't want to have to compete." I was like, "What's tomorrow?" I had no idea it was time for the spelling bee already! I was caught completely off-guard, and I felt like such an idiot. I didn't even get the chance to cram-study for the bee, because it was my sister's birthday and we spent the whole evening at the Lion House. I was close to tears all during the cake and ice cream. The next morning I got up in front of the school and I just went for it. I lost in the second round. I was embarrassed, but it wasn't the end of the world. I shrugged it off and didn't let it get me down.

Then the next year I beat my class again, and I was filled with a sense of redemptive purpose. I studied so hard to do better this time around. My sister was competing with me, having beaten her 4th-grade class, so we helped each other practice. We were especially proud of our ability to spell the longest word on the study list. I still have it memorized. D-E-I-N-S-T-I-T-U-T-I-O-N-A-L-I-Z-A-T-I-O-N.

This is exactly how I pictured my winning moment. Except my principal didn't have a mustache. 

But, alas, the day came to compete. I got up there all proud and confident and ready to win. I totally nailed my first word and waited for the next round, beaming. Then came the second round. "Luxury. L-U-X-E-R-Y. Luxury." I almost went to sit back down, but the prompter said, "Incorrect."

I just stood there, thinking I'd heard wrong. Or that the prompter had heard wrong. I couldn't lose. I was too well prepared this time.

"Open your E-A-R-S, Ref!"

Then it hit me that nobody was correcting the prompter. They were waiting for me to sit down. I really had done something wrong. I thought, "No. Wait. Start over. Give me another chance. I can't lose! I can spell deinstitutionalization!"

But it was too late. I walked numbly off the stage to join my dad, who had taken time off of work to watch the spelling bee. He, of course, gave me a hug and told me I did a good job and that he was proud of me, but I just couldn't believe it. I sat next to him and watched my sister take her turn. She also lost in that second round (which I'm half-convinced she did on purpose because she has a photographic memory and a tendency to handicap herself in order to make me feel better). She came to sit with us and she knew I was upset so she gently told me "It's okay."

I burst into tears. We didn't sit through the rest of the bee. My dad had to take me home because I was too mortified and embarrassed to face my classmates. As is typical with elementary-age kids, my friends were quick to tease me. I had some of the highest grades in the class, and they pounced on my weakness as soon as I went back to school. "Carly I can't believe you lost again. You got two tries and you lost!"

It was terrible. It took me months to live it down, and the shame continued to sting for years whenever I thought back on that day. In my youthful naiveté, I considered it to be one of the worst days of my life, second only to the day that my grandma died (that's seriously what I wrote in my journal--it was that traumatic). I was used to being good at school, especially when it came to spelling.

Anyways, now I'm in college, and guess what has popped back into my life? Spelling tests. As an editor, I'm supposed to have this perfect eye for detail. So when I was applying for a summer internship this weekend, part of the application was a list of thirty or so commonly-misspelled words (including misspelled, which, ironically, is one of the worst offenders).

I'm conscious enough about words that if you were to just ask me how to spell something, I could rattle off the correct spelling without hardly even thinking about it. But these tests are so trippy. With the exception of some very obvious misspellings (like predjudice--as if every girl doesn't know exactly how Pride & Prejudice is spelled), most of then were very hard. Like ommitted. It's so close to committed that your mind tricks you and makes you think it's fine. (It's not. There's only one M. I checked the dictionary as soon as I'd turned in the test.) I kept looking at those words on that sheet and thinking, "Well, I think that's wrong, but is it?" Now that I'd seen it on paper, my mind had conflicting ideas. If it's on paper, it's spelled right...right? I kept trying to write out the word in the margins, as if my fingers would have the muscle memory to give me the correct version without my help. Or as if the pencil would act on its own and be unable to write a lie, like in "Liar, Liar". Neither really happened. It wasn't a very effective tactic.

Gettin' real tired of your tricks, English language...

I just think it's silly that spelling still psyches me out. I'm fairly positive I got all the words right on the test, but it's still one of those things that makes my heart pound and my certainty shake. It just goes to show that I still have a lot of learning to do, and that life is all about progressing and improving.

Now if you'll excuse me, I'll be in my apartment. Reading the dictionary.