Jessie liked her cactus plant. It sat on the windowsill in her bedroom, where it got plenty of sunlight. She never watered it much, but then she didn’t have to. Sometimes, she would just sit quietly by the window and stare at her cactus.
Her parents had tried to get Jessie to cut back on the hours she spent in front of the computer. They had even asked her to quit using her laptop in favor of a notebook computer. Jessie wasn’t the most studious girl in school, but she knew her grades were still better than most of the other kids. Her parents didn’t seem to understand that she was working hard on her studies and trying to do the best she could.
She had done well on the tests, so they shouldn’t be so concerned about her grades. That’s what they always said, but she wasn’t so sure that her parents really understood what that meant. They didn’t understand that she was learning more from the computer than she was from the other classes. She could study from her notes much faster than she could study from textbooks and workbooks.
And she had to do her work fast, or else her friends would copy the answers. And sometimes they wouldn’t even bother to copy the questions. She’d been through this before, and she was getting tired of it.
It seemed like every week, there was a new test coming. If she didn’t do well on one test, it would affect her grades for the next several weeks. So she needed to stay ahead of the curve. If she didn’t, her parents would get very upset with her.
Her father had told her that there were some very important people looking at her grades and she had better do her best to stay in the “A” range. The other day he had come into her room and sat on her bed, scowling at her as he said, “I want you to know that you have a lot riding on these tests.”
“What are you talking about, Dad? You’re talking like I’m on some kind of scholarship or something.”
“Well, if you don’t do your best in these tests, you’re not going to have any chance of getting one.”
Jessie had rolled her eyes and said, “Dad, you’re really starting to sound like a cliché.”
Her father looked puzzled and said, “What’s that mean?”
“I don’t know. It means that you’ve become a boring old fart who repeats the same thing over and over again without really understanding it. What does getting a scholarship have to do with my grades?”
“That’s just it. I think you’re right. I don’t really understand it either, but it seems to me that if you don’t get good grades, you’re going to be left behind.”
“I don’t get it.”
“What? It’s simple. If you don’t get good grades, you won’t get a scholarship. But you’ve already got one, so I don’t see what the problem is.”
Jessie shook her head and sighed, “Dad, I’ll probably have a lot more opportunities for scholarships if I do well on these tests.”
“Why is that?”
“Because if I get good grades, the people looking at me will know I can do the work. Then, they might look at my transcripts and realize how smart I really am.”
“Oh,” he said, as if he finally understood. “So you’re going to go out of your way to get good grades now so that you’ll have an easier time getting scholarships later?”
Jessie smiled and said, “Something like that.”
He had leaned over and kissed his daughter on the forehead and said, “That’s good. We both know how much you love school. I’m proud of you.”
“Thanks, Dad.”
Then she had gone back to her computer to keep working on the next test. She hadn’t thought about what her father had said since then. Now, as she looked at her cactus, she thought about the possibility of losing her scholarship.
It seemed to her that she had been doing pretty well for a couple of years now. It was true that she hadn’t done well on all her tests, but she was pretty sure she could do well enough on the next one. She wondered if she could really pass that test and whether her father was right or not.
It wasn’t just because her parents had been putting so much pressure on her. She was actually worried about it. It was almost like she didn’t really care about the money, but she knew it meant a lot to them.
She thought about it for a while. Then she pulled out her notes from the last test and started studying. She didn’t feel like looking at the cactus, so she turned her back to it as she studied.
She looked up again at the plant, and it suddenly reminded her of something her father had said. He had said, “We’ve got to make sure you do well on these tests. We’ve got to keep you moving forward in life.”
It sounded like something she would have heard him say back when she was in school. It was almost as if he was speaking directly to her. She thought about that for a minute, and then decided that she didn’t really believe what he had told her. It didn’t seem possible.
She pulled out her notebook computer and started writing some notes about the test as she continued to stare at her cactus plant. It was just like a computer screen. If it could do what computers could do, she figured she could do fine in the test. After all, it had all the answers right there on it, and if she didn’t understand something, she could look it up later.
It was like having a tutor right in your house. It was almost as if the plant was a machine that she could use whenever she needed to study. She began to think about all the times she could study with the help of her computer and cactus plant.