So, when I ordered my psych book from Amazon.com used, I really should have expected that someone else's name would be there. But I kind of didn't. It had such an impact on me, that I had to write a story involving it. This story is mostly true, in terms of Meagan Williamson, but I haven't finished the psych book yet, I'm only on chapter 10. I could use some feedback on how this story/essay makes you feel, since I want to sharpen it up a bit.
I remember when I first opened Introduction to Psychology: Gateways to Mind and Behavior 11th edition by Dennis Coon and John O. Mitterer and saw your name on the front cover, Meagan Williamson. I felt glad, as if there would be someone to help me along as I read.
I remember being in awe of you, Meagan Williamson. Your sunny yellow highlighting overlapped the rote midnight text so brightly and cheerfully. You lit up all the important things, not just the bolded words, and you made all the never ending paragraphs fade under your unique disposition. You had your own personal aura to every single section, and I wanted to find out how I could highlight more like you, Meagan Williamson. So, I followed your guidance, with my static orange highlighter.
After I reached the second chapter, I wondered how I could ever live without you. I was never any good at biology, so the chapter on biological psychology seemed like a demon ready to rip me to shreds with its endless descriptions of the hypothalamus and parasympathetic branches of the nervous system. But you changed all that, Meagan Williamson. You shined the light into the dark cave of knowledge that I was always afraid to enter. And, with your help, I ventured in, deeper and deeper and deeper.
But then, you disappeared, Meagan Williamson. I’ll never forget what it was like to open to chapter 3: “Child Development” and gaze at blank page after blank page, with my static orange highlighter in hand. Everything seemed more confusing, more pedantic, and I was just a feckless high school student lost in a maze of ends in a three-hundred-and-sixty degree pattern around me. My highlighting grew both dimmer and more infrequent, as I lost the help of your guidance.
The next few chapters were listless and dull. But it was not my fault, or the book’s fault; it was your fault, Meagan Williamson. I was so used to pages with your cheerful yellow highlighting, that I never even bothered to know what it was like to highlight a page all by myself.
But I knew I had to move on. I knew that I could not reminisce on your bright yellow highlighting forever. Gradually, chapter four turned to chapter five, chapter five turned to chapter six, and chapter six turned to chapter seven. I learned how to highlight all by myself, with only my own wits and my static orange highlighter to guide me. You, Meagan Williamson, faded from memory. My static orange highlighting grew stronger and stronger, and I forgot all about you.
Then, you came back, Meagan Williamson.
Of course, it was chapter 9:”Conditioning and Learning.” You just skipped the chapters “States of Consciousness” and “Sensory Perception” to go straight to Pavlovian dogs and Skinner boxes. All the while, I thought about how you had betrayed me. You left me back at the beginning of the book, because you didn’t think that “Childhood Development” was important. But it was important to me, Meagan Williamson. I didn’t think I could ever put up with you after you did that to me.
So, I trudged on, all by myself. Then I noticed that your cheerful and bright highlighting now looked so very faded. I began to see how flawed you were, Meagan Williamson, how you highlighted entire paragraphs, how you never glanced at the optional reading boxes, and how you highlighted the miniature-fonted captions under the pictures. I began to wonder how I ever put up with you for those first two chapters.
But it didn’t matter, of course. That was the last chapter you ever marked, Meagan Williamson. Three chapters out of twenty, not counting the appendix. Did you ever feel like a failure, only reading fifteen percent of Introduction to Psychology: Gateways to Mind and Behavior by Coon and Mitterer? Probably not, and that’s what I hated most about you. You just didn’t care. I thought that you enjoyed reading about psychology as much as I did, and that we could bond over that. But you didn’t, so we couldn’t, and I thought we could never bond over anything.
I kept reading, since I wasn’t about to let you stop me, Meagan Williamson. I never even looked back. My static orange highlighting now ruled supreme over the entire text, and all that remained of you was a faded yellow paragraph peppered here and there (taken as a mean.)
After I finished the book, I noticed that you wrote your name on the back cover in black permanent marker, Meagan Williamson.
It looked like an epitaph, Meagan Williamson. That epitaph would scream, “I failed,” to everyone who clutched this 11th edition psychology textbook by Coon and Mitterer in their claws. Everyone will say “Oh, this idiotic girl who can’t even finish Introduction to Psychology: Gateways to Mind and Behavior with her faded yellow highlighting.” Everyone will despise you, for the failure they see in your faded yellow highlighting.
But I won’t despise you, Meagan Williamson. Everyone else will think that you are a failure, but I won’t, because I believe in you. While everyone else will look at you and see your faded yellow highlighting, I will not, because I believe that you are more than your faded yellow highlighting. I believe that you are you, and you will always be you, and you will not be faded yellow highlighting.
Everyone will shout me down, with cries of “How can you believe in this pathetic girl, with her faded yellow highlighting?” and I will shout right back at them “Damn it! I believe in you, Meagan Williamson!”
And they will call me crazy, Meagan Williamson, believing in a girl with faded yellow highlighting. But I will not back down, and I will not ever stop believing in you.
Because I love you, Meagan Williamson.
Food for thought: Who is Meagan Williamson?
Now, for a more broad question: Who is Meagan Williamson?
