Plucky Letters to US soldiers in Iraq

10/7/2004

Dear Charlie and Buddies,

My dear friend and fellow lunch lady has a teenaged son embarking on the potentially humbling task of applying to (begging) various colleges to accept him as a student and give him lots of much-needed grants and financial handouts. This is no small task, given the fierce competition presented by utterly ruthless baby-boomer parents, who will do nothing short of trading their kid for a newer, smarter one if that's what it takes to be able to casually say, "Oh, Jason? He's at MIT. We considered Yale, but the engineering program they have just couldn't capitalize on his extraordinary abilities."

Should you happen, at any time in the near or distant future, to wish to attend college at a respectable university you may need to submit the prerequisite Admissions Essay. Thus, I have constructed one for general purpose use and encourage you to blatantly plagerize it at will.

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A Possible College Admissions Essay
By Suzi Q. Peabody Jones


When I was six months old my parents and I discovered that I have a knack for just about everything.
A precocious infant, I often escaped my crib and ventured into the city to visit the Municipal Museum of Arts and Sciences. Sometimes I simply rode the bus around town for hours on end examining the various architectural styles extant in our fair city from the perspective of my self-engineered public transportation safety seat, without which I might not have survived several serious bus traffic accidents and a city-wide flood of epic proportions. (Fortunately, I had installed an emergency floatation device in preparation for just such a catastrophic natural calamity.)

In 1987 I won the United Soviet Socialist Republic National Spelling Bee as an exchange student in Moscow by properly spelling "entrepreneur" in perfectly accented Russian. By the age of two and a half I had designed and patented my own teething ring, which operates on principles of thermodynamics in conjunction with random motion on a sub-atomic level. It is a little-known fact that my teething ring inspired the initial scientific inquiry into string theory physics.

At the tender age of three I took control of the Tots & More Day Care Center in a bloodless coup. During my administration, Tots & More grew to include 47 locations in the greater metro tri-state area, and operated at an impressive 40% profit margin. Equally impressive was our 99.7% Potty Training graduation rate, due in large part to the success of my Pavlovian Potty Conditioning™ techniques. The grateful mothers of chronic bed-wetters send me fan mail to this very day.

When I was in second grade I discovered my ability to chew gum and mentally perform complex mathematical algorithms simultaneously. In third grade I assisted future vice president Al Gore in inventing the internet. (Sadly, he never attributed any of the credit to me and we are no longer on speaking terms.) Later that year I discovered a cure for Sub-Saharan Athlete’s Foot Syndrome, which was no small feat. I am thus considered a living legend across much of the African continent. My name and likeness are emblazoned upon the soles of many of the most popular African-made shoes.

I won my first Nobel Prize at the age of 10 and used my winnings to finance the construction of a fully-functional nuclear power facility of my own design in a vacant lot near my family home. That same year, the per-share stock price in my Time Travelers R Us travel agency’s IPO rocketed from $4 to $894 in a single afternoon, despite negative media distortions about a few pesky genetic mutations. Coincidentally, my Traveling Circus and Freak Show enterprise was a huge success the following spring. More recently I have discovered the unifying theory of the universe, solved the puzzle of gravity, and proved the existence of God and UFOs beyond the shadow of a doubt.

I have done all of this for the express purpose of convincing someone in the admissions office of the university of my choice that I am worthy of an education beyond the 12th grade level. Should I not be accepted, I hope to follow in some other loser's footsteps, attend film school, and pursue a career as a successful waiter/ bartender/rock band groupie. Thank you for your time and consideration.
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If that proves unconvincing, simply manufacture proof that a trace of Native American blood circulates in your veins. Works like a charm.

Much Love,
--An Army Mom