As a teacher, I use an assortment of tools, including the ever-popular test.  Akin to the dentist’s pick, the exam is a useful device: it can probe the weaknesses in a student’s understanding, establish areas of strength, and— to some extent— provide motivation.  Don’t want the pain of a little metal poker sticking you in a dental soft spot?  Brush and floss.  Don’t want the pain of a vocabulary quiz jabbing at your lexicographical cavity?  Study and read.

So tests are useful.

Recently, though, I was reminded of a second type of assessment pain, dimly remembered from my student days, an anxiety that grows in the interstice between the completion of the test and the announcement of results, like mold in the grout between tub tiles.  After the multiple choice ordeal or hand-cramping essay, we wait, aware of the possibilities, truths that are buried in the exam results; yet we are dependent on the grader and his ability to cram grading into his life, to see if we passed or failed or earned marks somewhere in between.

When I was a student, I dreamed of a time without tests.  Adulthood, I reasoned, doesn’t require me to put pencil to paper, doesn’t require me to remember and regurgitate facts, doesn’t demand that I draft that essay by the following day for a major grade.  Now that I’m in the land of adults, of course, I realize that the tests have moved beyond pencil and paper, for the most part.  And the grades are hazier.  No clear-cut 93% on my essay.  Just a self-judgment, followed by a few words from readers.

Sometimes, though, we do take tests that promise clear results.

Several times in this blog, I’ve written about my decade-old argument with cancer.  I haven’t mentioned my bout with the same malady a year ago, mostly because the experience felt too raw.  And now, it may have returned for a third time.  I am waiting for another set of results: several weeks ago, one of the markers in my blood was elevated, so I repeated the test.  I could have cancer again.  Maybe.  Or maybe not.

I’d like to think that the waiting gets easier.  Now that I’ve moved beyond pencil and paper, I should also move beyond the mold of anxiety.

I can’t though.  Like my students, I am hoping and fearing the results.  I am waiting.

Robin Follet lives, writes, and cartoons in North Carolina.