I did not know you were supposed to study for the SAT.
This was, at least partially, my fault. My high school had a mandatory semester-long SAT prep class where we learned a few vocab words and test-taking strategies. We also took practice tests. I could have-should have- figured it out.
I went to private school, though my parents could not afford to send us to private school; the annual tuition for the five of us was about the same as my dad’s pre-tax salary. I do not know what, if any financial aid we received. My grandparents might have paid. We did not talk about money in my family.
But we went to private school, wore Ralph Lauren clothes purchased from the outlet, had our electricity, water, and phones turned off frequently, and lived in a hoarder house with piles of clothes, filled with fleas and dog urine, everywhere. My mother started highlighting my hair after I turned six and my toddler blonde became muddy.
Appearances meant a lot to my mother. I know that I overshare online. It’s an overcorrection to a childhood spent living one way with tremendous pressure to appear as though things were different, perfect.
When you apply for private school- or at least when you applied for private school in the late 90s and early aughts- you take a series of aptitude tests that are intended to indicate your general intelligence and help the schools place you into the appropriate classes. You are not supposed to study for these tests; I assumed the SAT was the same thing.
This is not an essay about the SAT, this is an essay about my parents.