School
(page 5)
You have to stay in school. You have to. You have to go to college. You have to get your degree. Because that's the one thing people can't take away from you is your education. And it is worth the investment.
Education is not just about going to school and getting a degree. It's about widening your knowledge and absorbing the truth about life.
The funniest memory that I can recall about my school days has to be one incident that involved unfinished homework for numerous days. I didn't do any of my homework for days and days at a stretch, and kept stalling my teacher that I was extremely unwell and was under heavy medication.
I was a smart kid, but I hated school.
The principle goal of education in the schools should be creating men and women who are capable of doing new things, not simply repeating what other generations have done.
I remember there were days when — and this is kind of gross — I would sleep in my uniform to save time in the morning and then get up and go to school... it didn't matter because I didn't have to impress anyone, and I didn't have to look cute in class.
At Columbia Law School, my professor of constitutional law and federal courts, Gerald Gunther, was determined to place me in a federal court clerkship, despite what was then viewed as a grave impediment: On graduation, I was the mother of a 4-year-old child.
I was performing at a New Jersey high school, and I asked a class of 2,000 students, 'How many of you love mathematics?' and only one hand went up. And that was the hand of the maths teacher!
My mother was the greatest mother in the world. She thought I was the greatest thing on two feet. I'd come home with a little composition I had written at school, and she'd look at it and say, 'It's wonderful! You're another Shakespeare!' I always assumed I could do anything. It really is amazing how much that has to do with your attitude.
My favorite holiday memory was sitting at home all day in my pajamas during winter break for school watching a bunch of old Christmas movies like 'Jack Frost' and 'Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer' with my siblings and parents.
I count myself well educated, for the admirable woman at the head of the school which I attended from the age of four and a half till I was thirteen and a half, was a born teacher in advance of her own times.
Honestly, I wasn't that girl in high school who people spread rumors about.
