High school sophomore.

Back then, everything was clear,

but on that day, my head was so clear that the fog in my mind cleared,

and I felt a bright light.

On that day, I took a mock test,

and for the first time, I scored in the national rankings.

At a local high school where they put up a banner saying, "One person went to Seoul National University,"

I became a god to teachers and classmates.

My dream major was always medicine.

When I was in elementary school, I dreamed of being a scientist, a pianist,

and changed my mind about my future career.

But around the time I entered middle school, my father's business went bankrupt,

and I concluded that being a doctor was the best option.

I think I learned it from TV or novels,

but doctors can gain prestige, earn money, and serve others,

so I thought it was the only profession in reality that could lead to a life that could be called "success."

I marked Seoul National University's medical school,

and even when I took mock exams and the results showed I failed,

in that small school,

I was full of confidence, with the label of "top student" stuck on my forehead.

I secretly laughed when I heard that a senior from the year above me,

who had been one grade higher than me in every subject,

had applied for a special admission to Yonsei University's medical school instead of Seoul National University's medical school due to her nervousness.

"You must have been relaxed because you were from a wealthy family."

It was a time when the Chosun Ilbo would publish articles about a student from a poor family who passed the entrance exam to Seoul National University.

I didn't hide the fact that I was poor,

and I wore the fact that I was good at studying, even though I couldn't afford tutoring, as a badge of honor.

I was overweight and not pretty, but I was overflowing with self-esteem, so I wasn't envious of pretty girls.

I failed the CSAT.

I scored more than 40 points lower than my mock exam score.

I applied to three universities, even saying I wouldn't go even if I passed, including Chung-Ang University's medical school,

but I failed them all.

I wasn't very discouraged.

When the teachers looked at me pityingly at the graduation ceremony,

a kind of pain stabbed me,

but I was confident that I could do well if I tried again.

As I became a re-taker, I withered away day by day.

I wanted to go to a famous academy in Seoul.

They treated the fact that they offered exemption from the entrance exam as a great privilege.

For the first time, I resented my poor parents.

I started re-taking the exam at the only academy in the city I grew up in,

which allowed me to study without paying.

The re-takers, including me,

learned to be cynical about the world and became adults.

The feeling that the space I was in revolved around me disappeared for a moment,

and a cold, sharp air enveloped me.

As I learned how to not be intimidated by people around me,

I gradually became an adult who wasn't what I had dreamed of.

Becoming an adult meant giving up a certain amount of brain function that I could focus on at my own will.

It was difficult, and I didn't want to spend the whole day doing nothing but solving math problems.

With a score slightly lower than my senior year,

I finished my re-taking year,

and I pretended to be cool, saying, "I'll just go to Yonsei."

I got a CSAT score that would have gotten me into Chung-Ang University's medical school.

(College entrance guidance is a bit different these days.)

A despair different from my senior year came over me.

Because I hadn't given it my all, my self-loathing was even greater.

When the academy instructor, who offered counseling,

said, "Why don't you try medical school here, here, and here," with a look that said he didn't have much hope,

I felt something hot flare up.

Without consulting anyone,

I applied to Seoul National University's Natural Sciences department.

I had spent my teens studying my butt off,

but wasn't the world being too much for me?

Why are you doing this to me?

As if in a last desperate attempt to win against the world,

I jumped to the outskirts of the path I had been walking on.

I sold my dreams and became a Seoul National University student.

I told my parents, who hadn't learned much,

that I wanted to become a female scientist.

My parents were just happy because it was Seoul National University.

It was a little nice to see my parents, who were struggling, happy.

My studies, which I started without much will, were not very enjoyable,

so I just went to classes, went on school trips,

and hung out with girlfriends I didn't really get along with,

got weird haircuts in Sillim,

and picked out cheap clothes in Dongdaemun.

Thanks to playing around and experiencing various cultures,

I wanted to work in broadcasting or journalism by the time I graduated.

Friends who didn't have much interest in their majors

crawled into graduate school as if their majors were their hopes,

and I left my major full of love and hate behind and joined a media study team with many students from other universities.

The senior from the social sciences department, who had a different style from the natural sciences department, looked cool to me.

When he reached out his hand, I quickly grabbed it and became his girlfriend.

After my short relationship with his three legs,

I was shocked for the first time in my life, so I skipped the study session

and skipped my last semester classes and locked myself in my room.

My grades, which had been in the 3s,

dropped drastically in my last semester.

I graduated,

but it was twenty times more bitter than my re-taking year.

The wandering of a penniless unemployed person began.

Because I couldn't choose my own path,

I followed my parents' choice, which I had been trying to be independent from all this time.

I used the teaching license I had taken without thinking and started preparing for the teacher qualification exam.

It was the most boring study I had ever done.

The newly learned education was connected with psychology,

so it was interesting in its own way, but it was a small part,

and I faced my majors that I had said goodbye to with a sense of relief.

When I took out the basic textbooks I had looked at during my miserable first year,

I felt like I was retaking my whole life.

Even when I heard that my classmates had passed the exam,

it wasn't surprising anymore, and in that year,

I failed the exam spectacularly.

It wasn't a close score either.

I needed to make money, so I worked as a temporary teacher for a year.

I felt a sense of fulfillment while teaching students,

but I still felt like I was floating.

It wasn't easy for me, who hadn't been socialized enough, to act properly as a young temporary teacher,

and my efforts to connect with middle school students were awkward.

The medical school system was established,

so I flipped through the pages, wondering if I should go to medical school now,

and I continued to wander around, making money here and there,

until I landed in my current job,

where people told me I was "wasting my education."

It's a low-paying job,

but they say it's a decent job for a woman to have while raising kids.

As I ended my long relationship that had accompanied my wandering,

I started going on blind dates at the end of my twenties.

I hung out with girlfriends who weren't elitist for a while,

and by then,

my face had become almost unrecognizable from my high school days.

I was often told I was pretty when I went out to a place after visiting a salon and wearing nice clothes.

I didn't try to be pretty during my formative years,

and for someone like me who wasn't pretty,

even that was a small joy.

At one of the countless blind dates,

I was sipping iced coffee at a hotel coffee shop with a "man with exceptionally good specs."

The matchmaker explained the man's father's, uncle's, and siblings' professions and his father's account balance, saying,

"It's a rare prestigious family,

and if it works out, it's like being filial to your parents."

My cynical self scoffed at the matchmaker's idea, but I got dressed up again and went out.

The "man with exceptionally good specs" worked at a good company, was clean, and laughed easily.

I liked him too.

He said he liked me for an unknown reason.

He told the matchmaker

"I've finally met a woman with both intelligence and beauty."

He said he told the matchmaker that.

He was unlike his siblings

and didn't graduate from a prestigious university,

but the fact that I graduated from Seoul National University

made me think that maybe my "intelligence" was a data entry error.

Marriage was so quick once I decided to do it.

When I went to his house, which was overly spacious, with small orchid flower pots filling the balcony,

his mother greeted me wearing a hanbok with a rustling sound,

gently hugging me.

"It's only now that I see my daughter-in-law. I'm so happy. I'll love you dearly."

While the drama-like words whispered in my ear,

I was enveloped in a small shock.

A luxurious cushion, like the ones you'd see in a historical drama, was presented to me,

and I sat on the cushion and received a tray carried by two ladies.

"Should I help?"

"No, do it later. Our baby has a kind heart."

"The painting on the wall is really nice."

"You can tell that you have an eye for art. There's no better painting in the whole world than this one."

Every time I talked to his mother, father, and siblings,

I felt like I was just visiting a drama set.

"Don't you think my family is great?"

"Yes, they're all very cultured."

When I answered him that way, I was being sincere.

My father, who often swore, especially when he was driving,

or my mother, who sometimes made me embarrassed by acting like a typical Korean woman who only cares about her own family,

or my younger brother, who loves games so much that I can't see any 2D hidden in them, no matter how hard I try,

compared to them, his family seemed very "cultured."

His mother said to me,

"Other people tell me to find a daughter-in-law with a prestigious family and a good job,

but I didn't like that from the beginning.

It's important for a woman to take care of her husband and family.

Why would I need that? I intentionally chose someone from a family without that kind of stuff."

So that was why I was going on a blind date with a "man with exceptionally good specs."

I felt attracted to him at first sight, but there was no chemical reaction.

We talked on the phone every day and met often, but I didn't develop any feelings beyond liking him.

As the wedding approached, my feelings turned into discomfort.

Discomfort, discomfort, discomfort. It grew bigger and bigger each day,

and I woke up from sleep with a loud "quack"

and wanted to run away somewhere.

Suddenly, I missed my old boyfriends so much I wanted to cry.

But I didn't get off the car taking me to him.

"My life hasn't turned out this way. I want to at least get married properly,

and see how happy my parents are.

I've just been causing them worry since I started re-taking the exam."

Like the night I applied to Seoul National University,

I quietly gritted my teeth.

My parents seemed to be in a frenzy, something I hadn't seen in years,

and were fully invested in my wedding preparations.

They said they would take the emergency fund I had saved up from my meager salary,

and that they would take care of the wedding costs.

They bought wedding gifts according to the in-laws' preferences, even though it was more than a year's worth of my father's income.

My heart fluttered and my hands trembled as I spent money at fancy stores.

On the day we bought dishes and silverware for 1.3 million won,

I remembered the time I agonized over whether or not to buy a textbook in high school,

thought about it twenty times, and turned back, and I got choked up.

My parents invited all their relatives, even their cousins.

The hotel wedding venue chosen by the in-laws charged more than 150,000 won per person for food and wine.

I told my friends not to come, saying, "Why bother?" to reduce the number of people.

On the wedding day, as I looked through the door of the bridal waiting room

at the crowd of guests,

I thought about how I had to pay for lunch for all of them with the money my father had earned through labor,

and my hands, holding the bouquet, became sweaty.

I had hoped that maybe the groom's side would pay for the wedding costs considering our family's circumstances,

but I didn't bring it up at the humble engagement dinner.

We started our married life in the apartment my husband's parents had bought for him,

and I often invited my friends over.

To my friends, I was categorized as "the friend who got married well because she became pretty."

Women in their thirties who had become "realistic"

openly said that my hotel wedding and apartment were their dreams.

Was this the same psychology as the time when people lined up at my desk in high school

to ask me math problems?

I asked myself meaningless questions as I looked at my friends.

They don't know that I, who wants to sleep in,

gets up every morning,

makes breakfast for a man I don't love,

and wants to run away to the other side of the world every day.

On weekends, when the cleaning lady leaves,

I become the cleaning lady at my in-laws' house.

I cook diligently,

put the food on the enormous plates,

and see if my food is eaten without complaints,

and sometimes I get nervous about the sidelong glances.

In my life that I gave up on too early,

I'm accepting my punishment, day by day, for being able to live off someone else for free.

I'm much more pathetic now than I was when I failed college, the teacher qualification exam, and couldn't prepare for medical school.

I don't know how to go back.