Recently, I switched doctors, and that was a big hullabaloo for a lot of reasons, not the least of which was the questionnaire I had to fill out at the new office before my first appointment. So many questions. Did I smoke? Did I have a medical history of like, anything? How many surgeries? Wisdom-teeth extractions? Was I a dog person or a cat person? What was the middle name of the oral surgeon who removed the wisdom teeth and what did I have against cats, anyway?
I didn’t mind, except it was a little frustrating to turn all this intel back in and not get any sort of, I don’t know, score. What did this jumble of information say about me? Surely there’s someone behind the curtain making an assessment back there, but I never get to see it. It’s so millennial of me, I know, to want feedback, and instantly.
Fortunately, there’s the internet, which is fallible in just about every way except that it will give you answers, of some caliber, and very, very fast. You can definitely get a score for physical health on the internet—you can get lots of them. Then pick the best one to feel good about yourself, which is what I did in the parking lot right after seeing the doctor.
Here’s what one of the ones I took said about me: “You are the healthiest person of them all! You dedicate your days to know [sic] that your health matters and you may even know the little tricks and secrets no else does! Continue your hard work and pass your advice on to others who will benefit from it.”
Look, I knew I was good but I didn’t know I was that good. Marisa DeAngelis of Playbuzz knew, though. She wrote the quiz. You’re all thinking it: Harvard Med, right? You’re close. According to social media, Marisa’s a graduate of Sayville, New York’s Sayville High School.
Are online quizzes still a thing? Well, yes and no. They’re still a thing the way malls are still a thing. In the way horoscopes and the Hard Rock Cafe are still, somehow, both things: not a particle of substance, but we still all go along with it out of habit.
People do take the Myers-Briggs seriously, which I know was created by real scientists using real science and isn’t so much a quiz as it is an “introspective questionnaire.” I know so because its adherents tell me so, but also I can never forgive the adherents after a beach weekend in 2007 when I drove all the way up to Delaware to find everyone in the house sitting around a laptop taking, one by one, the Myers-Briggs. I can’t remember what my type was. I don’t care enough to remember it. And, apparently, that is a type. The type that doesn’t care. There’s another type that can change back and forth—or, to put it another way, the absolute lack of type. That is a freaking type.
So far as I can tell, the whole point of taking a Myers-Briggs test is so you can read aloud the results you create about your own self and announce to anyone within hearing range, “That is so me. Wow. They just nailed it.” And then you go along as you always have, assured that the things you already do are the habits best suited to you. Most of us aren’t looking for real change, especially if it’s the kind we have to work to implement ourselves.
A quiz you can take on the internet: “How Northern Virginia Are You?” I took it. I did not do great. But the questions were so lame. Which of our local airports is busiest? When was the term Northern Virginia first mentioned? Come on. They’re all spectacularly chaotic. And the 1860s? Where’s your proof?
I’ve spent a lot of time in NoVA, OK? I won’t rattle off numbers but trust me, you’d be convinced they are numbers. Are you a real Northern Virginian? Let’s find out.
In Manassas’s Haydon Elementary, circa 1995, fifth-grade teacher Mrs. Reynolds ran a popular after-school math club. What weekday afternoon did it meet and how come Jonathan S. always got first dibs on the Rubik’s Cube?
My cousin Cait (older than me by 15 months) grew up in Kensington, Maryland, a 45-minute drive from my home in NoVA. We shared the same Beltway, weather patterns, sports teams. Why did everything about her life seem so much cooler than mine? Why? Why?
As a child, I had one dog. What was his name?
The pop quiz is a beast of a different nature, isn’t it? I remember one that a college-lit class T.A. gave us. I was so mortified for not having done the reading the night before that I couldn’t even turn it over to read the questions and gave it back blank, resigned to my fate as an English-major dropout. I know how that sounds. People are supposed to drop other, more difficult majors to fall back on an English major—because in an English class there are, supposedly, no wrong answers. Well, no. I assure you there are wrong answers, and you’ll find your way to a few of them by not doing the reading the night before a pop quiz.
That was the worst of them. The best quiz I ever took was on OKCupid, where I met my husband. The way that one worked was you had to answer your questions to read the way the other person had answered his, and there was some indication at the time that he’d already gone. Although, I remember thinking, I didn’t need his answers. I’d already pegged him so hard, this guy. He was so wholesome, always answering messages within minutes, usually parenthetically explaining his own jokes to make sure they couldn’t offend.
Come on, I thought. What’s online dating, anyway? One huge first impression with echo-chamber potential for misinterpretation. A sense of adventure is a prereq.
Would I date a serial killer?
Of course not. Is he paying? Do I know he’s a serial killer? Which restaurant? Of course not.
Do I believe in witchcraft?
I don’t not not not not believe in witchcraft.
What should be done with my body after I die?
This is taking a dark turn. Do you have any good defense spells?
Is it OK to answer your cell phone while out on a date?
Never. And don’t test me. I run with a mixed crowd.
With all of these quizzes, what are we hoping to gain? A sense of our own superiority, compatibility, reassurance in what we already suspect to be true? How Northern Virginia are you? To whatever your desired degree, I am sure. Personally, it’s not something that keeps me up at night. But if you’re worried, here’s the cheat sheet. Look it over and wake up tomorrow feeling a little more connected to your region, or at least one person living it in.
I think it was Thursdays. Because he was smarter than us.
An as-of-yet-unsolved central mystery of the universe, but there are theories: Her mom made the best grilled cheeses. They had a hammock. We were allowed to walk from her house to 7-Eleven and buy candy.
His name was Princeton—Prince, for short. We didn’t name him. We’re not uppity. But it suited him, because he was the best.
(May 2018)
