It doesn't have to be my problem for me to stop. It's more about how reasonable I think their problem is, how much I have invested in their happiness, what the level of effort is for me to stop pressing that button, and quite probably also my mood.

Again, yep. Key word: varies.

I think smarts can be intimidating, but (espcially in teenagers) it can be attitude rather than attributes which puts people off. My brother is a smart guy and he claimed all the wat up to his late 20s that people didn't like him because he was smarter than they were. What was really happening was that his sense that intelligence was the most important measure of a person and that he had impatience and sometimes contempt for people who fell short was more evident than he knew.

Robin, yep - and it would take a lot more perception than most teenagers have had time to develop, to realise that when the realisation would do them the most good.

Uh oh. I may be Robin's brother.

What was really happening was that his sense that intelligence was the most important measure of a person and that he had impatience and sometimes contempt for people who fell short was more evident than he knew.

I see this all the time in fandom, and saw it all the time growing up gifted and in gifted ed. Heck, I had the guilty-as-charged epiphany about that at some point, and with it, released most of the bitterness about Other Children into the wild, because I'm certain I was just as annoying to them as they were to me.

When I see it now, I just want to hit people with a huge clue stick that says brains are no excuse for being rude and unkind. (AKA, never assume that being better at something makes you a better or more worthy person.)

When I see it now, I just want to hit people with a huge clue stick that says brains are no excuse for being rude and unkind. (AKA, never assume that being better at something makes you a better or more worthy person.)

And the corollary: don't assume that because you can't perceive the intelligence in the person you're making the assumption about, it isn't there.

It's all in the perception.

Drabble. Yes, 100 words.

By What I Am Not

Here, take my wallet. Look through it. No, go for it - it's okay.

What do you see?

Credit cards. Drivers license. Donor card. Receipts. Money.

What's missing?

Pictures, of course. I have a husband I love. I have a child, same. I have family.

Long ago, when part of me broke and petrified, I stopped carrying pictures. Once, I did; in 1975, I had a plastic insert in my wallet. When I flipped it open, there were eight pictures of you, me, us.

No pictures anymore, not of husband, child, myself. So, define me by what isn't there: invisible.

Nice, Deb.

And a hundred words exactly. That ought to make somebody happy. I'm just not sure who.

You maybe? Satisfaction of meeting a challenge? And the rest of us, not so much for the nice round number, as for getting to enjoy it - but with the added little frisson of getting to watch someone do something a little bit hard in field they are good at.