cheat! liar! scandal!

Last night, I had a total nightmare.

I dreamt I was taking a Latin exam that I hadn't prepared for, and was failing miserably.

It was horrible, because I have never taken a Latin exam for which I didn't spend hours arduously sitting on my ass in some straightbacked library chair, pouring over handwritten flashcards and copying declensions over-and-over-and-over until I'd given myself carpal tunnel syndrome.

Coming into an exam unprepared I reserved exclusively for my trademarked depressive funks, eg the Depressive Funk Circa 11th Grade Pre-Calcululs (the only time I've ever turned in a blank exam after five minutes of doodling absentmindedly on the answer sheet). I also winged my Reformation exam in graduate school (I answered the questions; just didn't prepare for the exam) and for a French midterm exam in undergrad. Oh, and my GREs.

But Latin?! You would have had to have dragged me forcibly from my little library carrel after massive doses of thorazine and locked me up in a padded room for me not to have prepared for an exam.

The dream was also horrible, because it had some weird declension I'd never heard of before, and I actually resorted to cheating.

Incidentally, this is is the first time I've ever had a nightmare about Latin and I am devastated. My dreams about Latin always involve receiving books about Cicero, or the second declension, or winning university honors. Sometimes i just dream I'm declining nouns, just like back in undergrad.

I'm scandalized, and slightly puzzled.

There's a metaphor here for something else, but I can't figure out what it is.

Or I can, and just don't want to admit it.