Home-Skoolled

Note: This memorandum draws from the author’s personal reflections on severely traumatic circumstances in early life. Please respect the trials the author has faced in overcoming such a difficult background.

            Walking through the grocery store the other day, I saw a mother trailed by her twenty-eight kids, all following in silent, slavish obedience. With pity, I realized they were probably home-schooled. Aggressively, the boys bared their teeth and growled in what could have almost resembled smiles and laughter had I not first recognized that they were undersocialized, given that they wore their pants so high that I couldn’t even see their boxers. How would they ever get a date? Long-haired and lanky, the girls wore no make-up. I was embarrassed when I realized I was looking at their actual, bare eyelashes. Having been home-schooled, they would have never learned in middle-school how revolting it is to leave the house without applying at least one bottle of mascara and either fuchsia or lime-green eye shadow. Walking past, my friend gave the mother a sidelong stare and whispered, “I’ve heard of people like them. They must know the Duggars.” Although I had concerns the moment I laid eyes on the family, my consternation grew when the six-month-old lost his cool, broke the façade of composure, and began to howl. Those honest, wailing tears confirmed my caring fears: the children were undoubtedly abused. Oh, yes. They were definitely home-schoolers.

            I, too, lived in such bondage for the first fourteen years of my life. Because I only participated in dance, piano, musicals, Sunday school, AWANA, co-op, taekwondo, babysitting, SCUBA diving, summer clubs, community outreach groups, field trips, and cotillions, there were days when I had to spend multiple hours interacting with no one apart from my family. Since I was never socialized, I literally got excited about interacting with other human beings. Without the mob-like guidance of wise friends constantly by my side at school, I never had the opportunity to truly look up to and emulate important world leaders like Britney Spears, Hillary Duff, or Miley Cyrus. Instead, I turned to inconsequential figures such as Mother Theresa, Eric Liddell, and Harriet Tubman. This observation alone makes it fair to state that home-schooling robbed me of any meaningful childhood.

            And that second part of home-schooling? The “schooling”? Yeah, that’s a total joke. If a home-schooler tells you they have an education, don’t believe them. No home-schooler has spent the necessary eight hours per day learning important school stuff, like how to stand in a cafeteria line, how to lie to a teacher about homework left in the band hall, or how to wait for those leisurely hand dryers in the bathroom to evaporate molecule by molecule of residual water on hands that are dirty again by the time they finish drying. (By the way, speaking of bathrooms, when I saw that family in the grocery store, one of the girls told her mom she needed to use the restroom. I almost offered to explain to her how public restrooms work since I figured she wouldn’t know how to use one, but then I thoughtfully decided against it, since the girl might be terrified if she had to speak to someone.) No, home-schoolers don’t get an education. I didn’t learn to read until I was four. Throughout the early years, I had to learn math at a pace that adjusted based on how confident I felt with the material, when instead I could have spent two weeks on content I understood immediately and one day on the most difficult topic of the year. This one home-schooler in my community did get National Merit, but I’m pretty sure that’s only because he checked the “home-schooled” box as his background ethnicity. (It’s all about affirmative action.) Plus, there’s no way a home-schooler could score well on the SAT anyway, given how limited his vocabulary tends to be. Without regular use of even basic four-letter words, how can anyone expect to develop a broad vocabulary?

            So, please, the next time you see a home-schooler, give them all your charitable pity. Make sure not to talk to them and to avoid any eye contact, though. You might just scare them out of their wits.