Last Friday, 35-year-old Charleston resident Naomi Katz was heard telling a group of her peers that she was a gifted child, again. This declaration was Katz’s most recent effort in a long history of incidents to bring the conversation back to her prodigious childhood.
The episode in question took place during a casual gathering of friends at a bar for after work drinks.
“Naomi told me she was a gifted child the first day I met her,” says close friend Parker Shane. “And that was 12 years ago. She has mentioned it at least six times a year since then.”
Despite potential concern for being seen as repetitive or stuck in the past, Katz defends her choice to place her childhood accomplishments at the forefront of her identity.
“I tell people I was a gifted child because it’s essential to them understanding who I am today,” said Katz. “I think when people meet me, they intuitively know I went to a school for gifted children, at least on some level. I’m just confirming it for their sake.”
Katz’s friends are unconvinced by her explanation.
“She was just an advanced reader,” says Shane. “It’s cool, I guess, but we’re all reading at the same level now. The adult level, because we are adult women.”
Katz’s other loved ones simply fear that her disproportionate emphasis on her youth is stopping her from realizing her present potential.
“I know Naomi was a gifted child and I love that about her,” says Katz’s husband Nick Dern. “But I also think she’s a really gifted adult, and that’s more important than anything in the past. She’s smart, she’s witty and she’s doing great things to help the community. She amazes me every day.”
When Katz heard her husband’s comments, she dismissed them immediately.
“That’s sweet, but honestly I don’t really care what he thinks of me now,” Katz said. “It’s very important he understands the main thing about me is that I was shaped by the reality of being a gifted child.”
Katz currently works as an elementary school teacher in her local district, where she reports none of the students are reading at the level comparable to her ability at their age.
“I wouldn’t have been sufficiently challenged if I had been in this class,” said Katz. “But that’s probably because I was a gifted child. There are no gifted children in my class. When a child is gifted, you just know immediately.”
At press time, Katz asked that the reporting indicate she read Dostoyevsky’s Crime and Punishment in fourth grade and that it was a “fun read.”