Daddy, Why Are There Red Numbers?

Since kids are receiving their report cards for the school year, I decided to dig up mine from high school and show it to my son.

“Daddy, why are there red numbers?”

I looked at my wife, then we both laughed.

“Those are failing grades,” I replied. “That’s the time I didn’t study well in school.”

My son paused for a while. Then he also laughed.

Now we’re all laughing.

I remember the first time I had red marks on my report card. And how scared I was to show it to my parents.

And now we’re just having a good laugh thinking about how I ended up with a 65 in music? (I tell everyone my music teacher just guessed and pulled that grade out of thin air.)

Good thing grades are just markers of how you performed on a specific test at a specific time. And it doesn’t go beyond that. It tells you your score, but it doesn’t determine your future and what you can become.

Our worth will never be determined by red marks or numbers on a piece of paper.

So if today was a red mark day, leave it as it is. There’s always room for a better day.

And you can always start again tomorrow.

And be assured that life, like a good teacher, will never guess or pull grades out of thin air.