attenuate (v.) - 1. to make or become thin or small 2. to weaken 3. to rarefy or dilute

SAMUEL

The first time she told me I was worthless, I was shocked. No one had ever said anything like that to me. I was eight years old and up until that point most everyone I had met had told me that I was special, that I could be anything when I grew up: an astronaut, an astrophysicist, an astroid even! If I had said, mommy, daddy, when I grow up, I want to be an astroid, they would have said, something like, I'm sure you will, Sammy, if you put your mind to it! All you have to do is believe.

The second time she told me I was worthless and wouldn't amount to anything, I couldn't believe it. I had never done anything wrong or bad to make this woman mad at me, to make her think I was anything but the perfect little boy everyone told me I was. I did my homework, I passed my tests, I got to school on time, I helped, I volunteered, I did everything I could to endear myself to her, but all she would do is tell me how useless I was.

The third time she told me I was worthless, that I had no business in her class and might as well go home, I realized that she had something against me, that she hated me. This wasn't just the insecure fears of a little boy; this woman hated my guts! "I hate your guts," she said one day when everyone else was working on their multiplication tables. "Do you even know what 6x6 is?" she asked me. "36." I said. She looked me, up and down. "I hate your guts," she said.

The fourth time she told me I was worthless, not in so many words, I told my parents. They said they couldn't believe a teacher would say something like that. I said I couldn't believe it either, but it was true. They called the principal. The principal said she couldn't believe it and that she would talk to the teacher right away. The teacher said it wasn't true. The principal told my parents, my parents told me, and the next day, in school, my teacher stood me up in front of the rest of the class and told them what an idiot I was and a liar and how lying idiots like myself would never amount to anything - then she made me stand in the corner where I stood, crying, for an hour, while everyone else went outside.

The fifth and last time she told me I was worthless--I started to believe her.