Smart Kids Anger Me

Let's get a few credentials out of the way. I have a bachelor's degree in Communication from a top university and was able to graduate with a 3.7 gpa according to my resume. I do not consider myself an intellectual giant by any means, in fact I often surprise myself with how lame my mind can be at times. Somtimes I can't even concentrate enough to listen to someone's story and then I turn around and ask a question that they just answered if only my dumb-ass was listening. At that point, I appear very stupid. Nevertheless, on the whole I remain above average in intelligence which makes the following complaint a legitimate one.

I was at a party recently and this little girl (daughter of the hosts) couldn't have been more than 5 years old. She was enrolled at some Julliard caliber music school here in Manhattan and had accomplished musicians for parents. So she's probably a little smarter and advanced than the average 5 yr-old. But that is no excuse for what ensued. Not knowing her and having a liking for well-behaved children (emphasis on well-behaved, I'm not a afraid to smack a child that's not mine in public), I decided to make small talk with her. Upon finding out that she had recently lost a tooth, I playfully asked, "Oh that's good...did the tooth fairy come for you?"

Now I think I'm about to score huge points and perhaps get a warm hug from an adorable child. Not so. She adjusts her mood and tone, points her finger at me and says, "I happen to know for a fact that there's no such thing as the tooth fairy." My own psychological reaction was that of a perplexing change, something like, "Yeeeeaaahhhh...I'm gonna go ahead and ask you not to make me look stupid in front of the other guests."

Here I am, a grown man, trying to get on board with some goodwill towards a child, and she comes back with a factual correction and makes me look like a jackass in front of everyone? I'm not having that. My actual reaction was that I shut up right then and there and went back to whatever cheese spread I was eating, desperately hoping that no one saw me get schooled by a 5 yr-old prodigy who apparently can't have any fun.

However, my gut reaction was simply to respond, "Okay, no tooth fairy...fine. How bout this economy we're in right now? Your thoughts? Personally I think it's a fiscal problem with too much guesswork being done by greedy bankers, and the exchange of dead assets from the gov't back into the private sector is not the solution. What do you think?.......What's that?........Oh that's right, you don't know shit about economics! Maybe you should have stuck with the tooth fairy when I gave you the opportunity. Now get out of here, go skin your knee so that I have some indication that you're an actual child."

What kind of child at age 5 is not on board with the tooth fairy? And how am I, a reasonable adult, supposed to know that she's not? But because I wasn't, I got shown-up in front of all the other guests. I wanted to throw her ass into the top part of her grand piano, then close the top and have a fat friend sit on it while I knock out a little Linus and Lucy on the keys.

There's such a thing as being too smart for your own good when you'e that young. If it were a little boy, that's the kind of kid that's gonna end up getting an F in P.E., because his parents couldn't correct his physical growth well enough to keep him from striking out in kickball (a shameful thing). Needless to say, he'll be picked last every time on the field/court and even at that he'll often be asked to "sit this one out."

So a lesson to every parent and every child prodigy...If I say there's a tooth fairy, and you're 5 years old......there's a tooth fairy. End of discussion.