I was but a lad of 7 or 8, I’m guessing. Dad brought me somewhere on an errand where we met an older dude – a farmer, I think – and he started chatting with me about something. Maybe about how something on the farm works. I remember he spoke to me for quite a while.
Afterwards, on the car ride home, Dad told me how proud he had been of the way I interacted with the man. He said I was respectful and seemed very interested in what he was telling me.
I have no idea why I just thought of this. Maybe it stuck with me because Dad was an asshole 95% of the time.
When I was a young boy, perhaps 10 or so, I was in school and asked my teacher a question about animals and because of it she said I had “a very inquisitive mind”. (I don’t remember what the question was or if she answered it or not.) I didn’t know what the word “inquisitive” meant, but I assumed it was a good thing.
I got home and asked my mother what the word inquisitive meant and she said it meant I was always wanting to know more about how things work. For some reason I felt proud of myself and I’ve been trying to learn new things about the world ever since. It’s why I went to college and got a degree in Zoology and it’s also why I joined the SDMB.
When I was about 12, one of my older cousins (about 18 or so, I think) and a friend of hers were casually talking to me about something, I don’t remember what, and I said something about how most of our bodies recycle with time and so we are not physically the same person.
My cousin’s friend stared at me completely surprised and my cousin said something like “Oh yes, that’s my cousin Frodo, he’s like that”.
I’ve always been proud of being “like that”.
Another more recent example but probably the one I’m more proud of was about 15 years ago, when a coworker, who afterwards left to work in Google, told me after reading my code, “Programás lindo” (You code beautifully), I may have that engraved on my tombstone, hehehe “Here lies Frodo Baggins, he coded beautifully”
I had a science teacher in high school that demeaned and belittled everybody who dared question him. He was the baseball coach, and all of the kids were scared of this guy as he was also physically intimidating. One day I answered one of his tough questions and he told me I must have just made a lucky guess, so I told him in front of the class to go fuck himself and that I was just smarter than he was.
He just glared at the class and told them that I was the only one that had the guts to stand up to him and that they were weak sheep and would sleepwalk through their lives if they didn’t follow my example and question authority. I’ve lived my life like that ever since, not afraid to question my so-called superiors and it has paid off well .
I created a similar thread in 2013. The first post is my compliment story (now 40 years ago). The people who paid us these compliments probably had no idea that we would remember (and thank) them forever.
When I got my first “professional” job after I graduated from college (1992) my mother (RIP) said to me, “They’re going to love ya!” That has always stuck with me.
In high school, my history teacher told me her goal in assembling a quiz was to end up with one that I wouldn’t score 100% on. It was one of the first times I realized someone outside my family thought I was smart.
1975 - I was 21 and in the Navy, several years before women were allowed to serve aboard ships. I was working mid-shift at a training squadron where many of the women were resented for “taking shore billets” away from the men. So we had to go above and beyond to prove ourselves worthy as technicians.
One night after I’d been the one to solve a particularly perplexing system failure, my team leader told me he’d be proud to go to sea with me on his team. He wasn’t being flirty or suggestive - he was actually impressed that I could do the job just like one of the guys. Fifty years later and I still remember.
Now, fast forward to the mid-90s - I was working as an engineer doing structural modifications on a P-3A for the Navy. After much fretting and fooling around, I came up with a simple but elegant solution for a support in an area with several constraints. The cherry on top was when the mechanic installing it said it was a really good design - THAT was a big deal, since those guys typically didn’t much like engineers, especially the female ones.
I acted in a play in college (Pinter’s The Birthday Party) in which my character was supposed to have a nervous breakdown (under Pinteresque interrogation). After the performance, my professor (an actor himself) said he was so concerned that I was throwing a fit onstage for real, he thought about stopping the performance to get me medical help.
One of my summer jobs when I was in college was working as an intern at NASA Goddard. One day, my boss came to me and said “You are a ‘clear thinker’ - what is your take on this problem?”
I always appreciated that.
This was 48 years ago or so.
Not so much a complement, but your tale reminds me of something that happened not too long ago:
For my folk’s 50th anniversary, they took us to England and Ireland on a tour. One of the stops was in Wales, at the town with the really long name - Llanfairpwllgwyngyllgogerychwyrndrobwllllantysiliogogogoch.
There’s a gift shop (of course), and a small museum with a working loom. I was watching the loom work, and the old caretaker came over, and I started talking to him about the mechanics of it (I’m an Engineer). We talked for quite awhile about the design of the shuttle and how the timing worked and what happened when they needed to change the thread, etc., etc.
After we were done, my dad, who was across the room watching us said “you really made that guy’s day!"
In my first year as an Asst. Prof., a colleague told me ~ “FtG, you’re a lot smarter than I thought you would be coming from a state university.” (Yes, they were an Ivy Leaguer.)
It was intended to be a compliment. Anyway, we remained friends and wrote some papers together. At the last conference I attended we went out to dinner together with another person.
This one is relatively recent, 2022, but I actually have the quote in my OneNote and I read it when I need a confidence boost.
I was working on a project and getting no traction to advance it. I kept highlighting the need to bring on other people (a multidisciplinary thing) and the timeline crunch and risk to the project was getting more severe. A senior director blindsided me with questions and implications that I didn’t know what I was doing in a meeting and I was kind of thrown under the bus as no one else had been paying attention to this work, but I knew I was right and persisted by going to my boss the next day and detailing everything. My own director called him out, though he never apologized to me directly, he apparently did to her. My management supported me, and eventually this guy clued in and paid attention, and allocated the resources I’d been asking for.
So, work progresses over a couple of months. As we are getting ready for a Readiness Review to move to another stage, this same Senior Director decides to join in a planning meeting and says
“I have no doubt mnemosyne will have her shit together, are the rest of you ready?”
I guess I had impressed him, in the end. Neither one of us still works for that company, but that comment felt pretty good. Good riddance otherwise.
In 1991, when I was about to go on Jeopardy!, I mentioned to a co-worker that, although I didn’t expect to become a five-time champion (which was as far as you could go at that time) I hoped to win at least one game.
He replied, “No matter how well you do, James, we’ll be very proud of you.” I was very touched by that. I’m welling up a little, just remembering it.
A few years ago, my father mentioned being at some gathering and someone approaching him because of Dad’s last name and asking if he were related to me. When Dad confirmed the relationship, the guy said he had been a friend of mine in junior high school (1967-69). He added, “He was really smart.” (When Dad told me his name, I recognized it, although I can’t remember it right now.)
I have no idea how I could have given anyone the impression of being smart when I was in junior high. But it’s nice to think that someone thought so, even if they were only a junior high student at the time.
The compliment that popped into my head when I saw this thread was from my junior year of high school. First period study hall, December 1, 1970 to be precise.
This girl who was in my study hall who was a year ahead of me came up to me and said, “You know who you are?” “No, who am I” “You’re Eros.” “What?!” “You come in here bubbling, effervescent, you just have to be Eros.”
(In case you’re wondering, I kept a journal back then, otherwise I wouldn’t remember that much detail. Wherever you are now, Landon, I still remember that, and still remember you fondly.)
I was coaching an in- house girls 10u softball team. We won the championship that year. During the celebration, one of the parents said to me “It took me half the season to figure out which one was your daughter.”
Back in grammar school we were all lined up, as usual, by twos. The Sister Superior was walking down between the ranks, in a bad mood. She stopped next to me and said “[CalMeacham], you’re so smart you’re dumb!” And then she continued on her way.
I have no idea what made her stop and say that. It’s certainly not a compliment, but it was memorable. I definitely haven’t forgotten it.