The Grade Puzzle by Anonymous

A

To be the best, there must be nothing left to gain. A is the sharp tip of a needle that points upwards at the sky from the very top of the highest mountain. To be the supreme conqueror of the world, you must reach the highest point of that mountain, place your flag, and stand on that very needle to declare your valor. You spend your life ascending the mountain of evaluation. At some points, you must crawl, scrabble, and cling to the jagged rocks just to survive. However, once you stand proud on the needle, all you can do is look down below at the deep chasm that becomes your fate if you fall. You must not gloat. You must not be proud. Not even a breath can pass your lips. In order to sustain your balance, you must keep a blank mind with a steeled composure. But how can you when the weight of the world seems to pull you down, down, down into the sinking chasm? Fear strikes you like lightning, and now you fall. To be the conqueror of the needle, you must have the ability to fly. That is the only way to avoid the terror of the fall. Personally, I know no one with that ability. 

B

Second is the first to lose, a phrase commonly known. However, I find that ridiculous. Second is the placeholder for dreamers. There are two types of second place: one a student who labors to bring their struggling grade up from the depths of despair, while the other is a student who fell from the top. These two students are consumed by polar emotions. The first student is ecstatic, as they have nothing to lose. Their grade was saved, and, not only that, they brought it to a brilliant score of B, just one step from an A. Now they have a goal, a dream: “Get an A next time.” The other student has everything to lose. Devastation rains in their mind. Anything less than perfect is disgraceful, and this score is a sign of their shortcomings. They were so close, yet they slipped, and now they can never forgive themself. Now they have an obsession, a nightmare: “Become the best again.”

C

Why is it that Walt Whitman High School insists that being mediocre is bad? Why is it wrong to be neutral? In my high school years, I found myself looking at C with a sort of pity. C doesn’t get to be special. It doesn't get to be anything but the middle. However, despite my pity, I can relate to C more than I would like to admit. That feeling of being stuck is exhausting—like dragging your feet through heavy, wet sand, only your legs are tied to a thousand pounds of weight that are anchored in the ocean in front of you. Your goal is just in front of you, but you're stuck, simply stuck. You can try to struggle and push through, but your feet are solid in the sand. You are so desperate to move somewhere, anywhere, but it's impossible to move. You are stuck, and you can’t change that fact. However, I can't come up with a single reason why it isn’t a wonderful thing to be at the beach and never have to leave.

D

Light finds itself lost in the chasm. Hope finds itself lacking. Time does not exist. How long it's been since the sun touched your skin is lost, how long you've been falling is untold. How long it's been since you were on the very summit of the great mountain you so desperately wanted to stay on is immense. Maybe you never even made it to the top. But, in the depths, we all find ourselves with the same feeling—despair. The darkness consumes you whole, and it assures you all you have to do is give up. Suffocates you until you are forced into submission, until you are owned wholly by the depths that contain you. You can try to look up but the distance is just too far to comprehend. It's only reasonable to succumb to the ever nearing ground. Your peers have invested their whole lives into the climb, and all you can do is watch from below. No one will drop a rope. No one will lend you a hand. We all are on the same journey to the top, yet we never find the kindness in our hearts to take our eyes off the goal and simply look down.

I

I was in 8th grade. I had received my report card and skimmed it, and the “I” caught my eye. I had missed so much school, and therefore tests, that the teacher couldn’t even grant me a proper failing grade with what she was working with. I wonder, did she know she was right? Did she know I was as incomplete as I? I had been so detached from my peers, my surroundings, my life, that I felt like I was watching my life through someone else's eyes. Isolated. I missed the old me—I who loved school and I who had the drive to succeed. Where did she go? I felt so alone. Where did I go when I needed her? Who am I? I am me.