I was in a mixed 2nd & 3rd grade class when the team decided not to grade skip me back in the 1970s. I suspect that my small size and poor motor coordination were factors in that decision. For years, I had it stuck in my head that they did not skip me because I could not catch a ball. I still can't. I have structured my life in such a way to avoid projectiles of any kind!

As a result, I got through school with abysmal work habits and almost no social life. My social life blossomed--and my GPA tanked--when I was in college, where I envied the kid who got to go at the age of 15. He dated several of our classmates--he's been married to one of them for about 20 years--and went on to get a PhD from Yale about the time most of his agemates were graduating from college.