I have been told countless times from my friends, family, and basically everyone I’ve ever talked to for more than twenty consecutive minutes that I have a tendency to think too much about everything. And when I say everything, I literally mean everything. But ironically it’s from the mouths of the same people that I hear I also have a tendency to underthink everything, if that’s even a word. I don’t get what they mean by this, of course; the two statements totally contradict one another. It doesn’t make sense, yet for some reason I’m expected to understand what they all mean. Whatever. I’ve given up on trying to figure it out. So when I heard we were doing a self-deprecation piece, my mind (as usual) immediately split up into a gazillion different thoughts. I was psyched that I wouldn’t have to spend seventeen hours “overthinking” about all of the other possible quirks and bad habits I have that would be worthy of their own paper, but the more I thought about it, the harder it was to decide. Do I say I think too much? Do I say I don’t think at all? Should I tell a story that really lets my inner dumbass shine through, or should I just tell about how all I do with my life is make list after list after list (long story)? Ultimately I chose the shortened version of the story of my first (and only) high school interview, because, well, you’ll figure it out.

I remember all too well the afternoon of December 16th, 2013– I’m just kidding, I really have no idea what the date was. I do remember it being sometime in December, though. It was cold and cloudy, just a regular day in the lovely state of Massachusetts. I was sitting in my english class when Mrs. Dwyer told me I was being dismissed. I got really nervous because I had no idea why I was leaving school. Did something happen? Did someone get hurt? are we going to Disney World? Only as we were pulling up to the tall brick buildings that it was the day of my Bishop Feehan interview.

I was dressed the same way I dressed every day in 8th grade: a baggy sweatshirt with faded print, a pair of jeans, and my black converse (my mother described my looks as ‘sloppy’– me? I’d say it was more of a ‘casual’). Mascara clumpy, skin pizzafied, and hair ratted and thrown back in a lame excuse for a ponytail, I looked like a train wreck walking through the main entrance. A middle-aged woman directed me to a hallway lined with chairs that looked almost as fancy as the kids sitting in them. I sat down and studied the suit and tie that the boy sitting next to me was wearing. Oh, this outta be great. By the time it was my turn, I was half asleep and starving. I got up and crossed my fingers. How bad could it be?

Answer: pretty damn horrible. For starters, I walked into the wrong classroom, leaving a poor girl at a loss for words after poking my head in and awkwardly backing out of the doorway. When I finally reached my designated room, I was greeted by an elderly woman sitting properly with her hands folded across her lap.

Hello, Abigail. It’s a pleasure to meet you. Please, take a seat so we may begin.

Sup?

Jesus! Her face switched from a polite stare to the face you make when you are being forced to be nice to someone you hate, that universal fake smile. And in that moment a roar came from my stomach. A loud, embarrassing growl that lasted like five seconds for God’s sake! Did that really just happen? Oh my God, this is bad. Look at her face, she already doesn’t like you and you’ve said one word to her!

The next few minutes only lasted a few hours. In all honesty, it wasn’t as bad as I thought it would be. We talked about swimming, and school, and my grades, and all that other stuff that I don’t really remember, since the whole thing was all a blur. I know that if I were to write out every stupid thing I said to that poor teacher, this would be one long paper. I’ll just say that with all my toungue-tied, inarticulately worded answers, I was surprised that I made it a whole 240 seconds without a “That’s good for today, we will get back to you,” or “That’s enough, I think we have everything we need to know,” or even just a straight up “Sorry, but you aren’t really what we’re looking for”. Then again, it wasn’t really necessary for her to say any of those things verbally when her face was doing a pretty good job of telling me by itself. At this point we had covered all topics but one: God. I had already known that this was gonna be the killer from the second I realized Bishop Feehan is a Catholic school.

You look a little nervous there, sweetie! You’re doing just fine, I promise. Do you go to church?

Well...uh, no, not really.

And why is that?

Well you see, with swim and all I’m wicked busy, and Sunday’s are kinda just my sleep-in day. I mean! Damn it… no–wait! Scratch that, I mean–

Oh, um, well do you believe in God?

Well, yeah, I’m kinda Catholic-ish. Like, yeah, I believe in God and all that stuff.

And that was the end of that. We both kind of just sat in silence for a few seconds, not making eye contact or anything, just sitting there awardly. I wiped the sweat off of my forehead and readjusted on my seat, silently begging for her to let me go home. Words cannot describe how bad I wanted to leave. Lucky for me, she felt just as awkward as I did, and as soon as she could regroup her thoughts, she politely thanked me for my time and told me she’d get back to me and blah blah blah you get the point. It was probably the most uncomfortable was to waste time I have ever experienced in my life, and for the rest of the night, all I could think about was how awful and embarrassing it was, and I felt like crying, and my life was ruined, etc. etc. etc. But looking on the bright side; at least I got to use it for something, even if it’s to make fun of myself for a grade.