Dis-appointment: One Appointment We Can't Skip

Seems I've developed a thing for failure. Not in a "Hitler-got-his!" schadenfreude kind of way, though. No. In fact, I think I could make a pretty good argument that my jonesing for failure has maternal roots to it.

Eric, who is smarter than the collective genetic makeup of Mark and me, bumped into some failure this spring and, while my heart ached for him, my brain had a different reaction altogether.

He'd spent two months preparing his application for the Johnny Carson Theatre Arts New Media program, a surprisingly exclusive club, despite its pop-culture name. Three letters of recommendation, two essays and a mediated collection of his creative works later, he found out that he wasn't accepted.

When I heard the news, I grew curious. Obviously, my heart ached for him. And yet. . . . While I already knew Eric was a standup kind of guy, I watched closely to see what disappointment would look like on him.

I made up a reason to stop by Ideal Grocery that afternoon, just so I could see Eric Holt in "disappointment" mode. I didn't mention a word about the rejection. It was his news, after all. And then, like the sun bursting through the endless gray of winter, Eric smiled and pulled me aside in aisle 3, among the pasta. And there, he told me that he didn't get into the program. Fessed up without water torture or not-so-subtle prompts from his mom. And he talked about trying again and making a new plan until then.

I could not have loved him more than I did at that very moment.

Ever since surprising myself by enjoying the Justin Bieber concert last summer, I've become a bit obsessed by the notion of being wrong. What happens to us when our expectations aren't met? What do we do after we fail or are found wrong? I feel so strongly about this idea, in fact, that I made it the journalism-class mantra this year. "Be wrong."

We spend far too much time in education convincing kids that failure is a bad thing. That being wrong is something to be punished. What a crock of poo. Turns out that I have learned far more from the speed bumps and disappointments in my life than I have from all the victories--all three or four of them. And I must have learned the lessons fairly well, for I don't really spend much time wallowing in it.

Somewhere along the line, I even found the strength to find good in utmost failure--a miscarriage. Almost 20 years ago, when the excitement of my first pregnancy was replaced by blood and loss, I somehow found hope. Turns out, hope is a constant companion of the youngest in a large family. A few days after miscarrying, I remembered how my own mom had lost a daughter--Elizabeth Louise--shortly after birth.

Had she lived, I doubt I (the youngest of five) ever would have gotten a shot at life. Can't imagine my folks would've had six kids.

So, maybe this obsession with failure started even before I started. Maybe it was infused within me, a single cell in a floppy, irregular embryo.

Wherever it started, I'm glad it's there. And I appreciate the lens it provides me, the one through which I can watch others as they figure out what it means to be imperfect humans, too.