Mamacita says:  Many years ago, I was teaching Public Speaking in a small farmland high school in southern Indiana. My students’ assignment, one week, was to give an informal “how-to” presentation, a brief demonstration of something they personally knew how to do.

That week, we all learned how to crochet a chain stitch, how to do macrame, how to carve a simple wooden toy, how to change a tire, how to juggle, how to put a belt on a broken vaccuum cleaner, how to put a zipper in a skirt, how to make various color combinations of Easter egg dyes with food coloring and vinegar, and how to make homemade ice cream.

We also learned how to put a suppository up a cow’s butt, how to take a horse’s temperature with a rectal thermometer, and how to neuter a bull calf.

It was a really interesting week. I’ve never been able to look at a rubber band or a razor blade the same way since.

May we all have this same dream.

Careful, grammatically-correct language and an almost poetic speaking style will always get my attention. It’s an assumption on my part, of course, but I associate good grammar with people who actually know what they’re talking about. Martin Luther King, Jr. definitely knew what he was talking about, and he knew HOW to present it.

Not every student is ‘more alert’ in the mornings. Believe it or not, many students are nearly comatose early in the morning and their brains spring into action later in the day. This is not always a result of staying up late playing video games, etc. Some people are just wired for night. I’ve often wondered how different standardized test scores would be, if our students were allowed to take them at night instead of so early in the morning. Dawn. You know, when a lot of old people administrators are awake.

I’ve read that while younger children are still usually early risers, the average high school student would greatly benefit from school from noon till six.  (This article says that even 8:30 a.m. would be a step in the right direction, but that wouldn’t have helped me much.)

But noon?  That would have been so wonderful for a kid like me. Even better, for a kid like me, would have been high school from 3 till 9. P.M. I would have been wide awake and alert and ready to learn.

Sadly, such scheduling would not be possible for a variety of reasons, most of them stupid, such as some old principal saying “We’ve never done anything like that before.” Or some old coach saying, “When would we practice?” Like I care about that. (You can play games in the morning. From 7:30 till noon. You know, when you’re more alert.)

The most insidious reason of all, the reason many schools can’t have after-school programs, the reason many schools can’t have field trips during the day, the reason many schools can’t have after-school detention, and the reason many kids can’t stay after school for ANY reason, good or bad. . . .

. . . is because of the bus schedules. They are carved in stone.

I am not putting down bus drivers in any way. Many of them are working two jobs, and can only drive a bus during certain hours of the day. I am, however, totally putting down the mentality that can’t seem to separate convenience of scheduling from welfare of student population. Hire more drivers. Split up the routes. We all have to make adjustments in our jobs when circumstances force us to;  heaven knows I did. When are we going to make adjustments in our school day?

Another issue, of course, is the sad fact that many families rely on older kids to take care of the younger ones after school. Sigh. A different schedule would knock that into a cocked hat.

Employers would have to make a few changes, too. But what’s the difference, really, between a fast-food shift of 5-9 and 6:30-10? Some adult would get an extra hour and a half’s pay?

And, of course, many administrators are getting up there, age-wise. And old people keep early hours. Again, so what?

Teachers with young children? That’s a hard one, because I used to be one of those. But I adjusted for various schedules and so can anyone else. In this town, anyway, there are lots of daycare and sitters who are happy to work later in the evening. Not everyone shuts down at three!!!!!

But again. Adjustments for the sake of our kids. Why are they so hard to make?

Honestly. Sometimes I agree with Plutarch.

“Being about to pitch his camp in a likely place, and hearing there was no hay to be had for the cattle, ‘What a life,’ said he, ‘is ours, since we must live according to the convenience of asses!’ ”

What brought all of this up? My students today were talking about how wonderful it would have been to go to high school and be alert. It’s not that they didn’t try to be alert. It’s just that for some people, 7:30 in the morning is NO time to be talking about algebra.

I am one of those people.

My name is Mamacita, and I am a night owl.

There are many like me, and we have no rights.

Call the ACLU immediately.

(I have a hard enough time talking about grammar at nine thirty. But my night classes? My 2:00 classes? I’m on top of those, and I even remember what we’ve done in them.)

Equal rights for vampires! Support the ERV!

And how about putting our kids first, for a change?

You know.  Those people, places, events, and stories that EVERYBODY knows?

Or, rather, these days, knew. . . .

The universe is incomprehensible only to those who don’t have any imagination, and imagination is available only to those with the ability to make connections.

I’ll go a step further, so get your dukes ready to put up.

After a certain age, the ability to make connections is dependent on one’s personal choices.

Small children are prisoners in their homes, and must rely on their parents, or other adults, for their surroundings and what they’re exposed to.  Good parents, of course, make sure their children are surrounded by fairy tales, nursery rhymes, stories of all kinds, poetry, plays, lively discussion that requires knowledge and invites participation, encouragement, sharing, generosity, etc.  Poor parents set their kids in front of the TV and go about their business.

It is only by exposure to the universe that we can hope to make sense of it, and discover that sense is the least of it.

The more we know, the more we CAN know.  This requires vocabulary.

The more words we know, the more connections we can make.  The more connections we can make, the more we can understand.  The more we can understand, the more we know.  The more we know, the more we want to know.  It’s a cycle, a not-vicious circle of wonder and wit and whimsy and understanding and the wanting to understand more and more and more.

Sadly, all some people want to know is when Jerry Springer is on tonight, what’s for dinner, and who won the game.  Their children’s questions are answered with variations of “How would I know?” and “Don’t bother me; I’m exhausted.” and “Ain’t that what you go to school for?”  And worse.

We are facing a planet run by people who know nothing that isn’t literal.  They are very good (or not) at bubbling in answers, making their mark heavy and dark, but who have no idea where the planets got their names, or why William Tell shot an apple off his son’s head, or what the words “homogenized” and “pasteurized” mean on the milk carton.  Heck, tons of “educated” people couldn’t even pronounce “homogenized” or “pasteurized.”  Or read them.  Or know that the words on the outsides of our food cartons, bottles, etc, indicate what’s inside.

Or that Humpty Dumpty was far more than an egg.  Or even that he was an egg at all.

Our nursing homes (well, not mine!) will be chosen by people who speak only one language (you know, the proper one. . . .), can’t read music, don’t know the point of origin of anything, give up at once if something is difficult, don’t have anything whatsoever memorized (except the TV Guide listings), will tip the coat-check girl more than they’re willing to pay the babysitter, and think Jeopardy is boring.  The fate of the planet will soon be in the hands of people who will have to Google every simple thing because they don’t have the skills or schema to hold anything much in their heads.  They know what kind of bedroom furniture Brittney or Angelina or Lindsay have, but they couldn’t name a single living scientist.  Music consists of four chords and a lot of near-rhymes.   They know jokes about Helen Keller but they don’t know who she really was.  Or even THAT she really was.  They can’t write cursive, or read it.  And they’ve got thumbs like Popeye’s from texting 24/7 instead of paying attention to the world.  Many of them wouldn’t know who Popeye is.  Or that those big constantly tapping thumbs are “opposable.”  Or what that even means.  Of the world of inferentials, they know nothing.

This current trend of schools not requiring memorization, homework, or the actual earning of merits has got to end.  There are already far too many stupid people in the world; we don’t need any with a diploma in their hands.  A person who doesn’t earn it doesn’t deserve it.

A diploma is only for students who have proven knowledge.  A diploma is not for showing up, self-esteem, or keeping friends together.  An employer has the right to assume that a diploma represents actual earned merit, and that every holder of a diploma is literate enough to not only survive in this world but also to help others survive.  I have no problem whatsoever with holding students in a particular level until they themselves, with no outside help, prove “master enough” to earn the right to move up a notch.  Promotion is not a right; it’s the consequence for earned proof of literacy.

By not requiring that our students earn as much knowledge as possible, and by not requiring that students prove it, we are ensuring that our planet will be flushing itself down the toilet of repeated history, misunderstandings and lack of understanding, and the extolling of ignorance as the norm, instead of the shameful and easily remedied thing that it actually is.

Bring it on, youngsters.  If you have the schema to do it.

P.S.  I am not afraid of the word “stupid.”  It is NOT the same thing as “ignorant.”  We are all ignorant in many areas, but we are only stupid if we refuse to try when we have the chance.  And yes, there are an awful lot of stupid people out there.

P.P.S.  If you are not a careful reader and try to accuse me of being insensitive to special needs students, please see the above paragraph.

I worry about the future for different reasons than most people’s reasons.  I worry about the future because present generations aren’t learning about the past.

Seriously.  Our students don’t seem to have anything to make connections to, these days.  They believe ridiculous things on Facebook updates.  They don’t associate Lincoln with the Civil War.  They think the Disney versions of fairy tales are the original versions.  They don’t know that the Little Mermaid died.  They don’t know any nursery rhymes.  They can’t finish a line of poetry.  They don’t know why Paul Revere rode through the streets.  They don’t understand the difference between a comparison and a contrast.  They are uncertain about antonyms and synonyms.  Most of them have never used a thesaurus.  Some of them have never heard of a thesaurus, and when they hear the word, they think it’s a dinosaur.  Most students think a dictionary is good only for a definition, and if they don’t know how to spell a word, they can’t find it.

I worry about a future wherein the so-called “educated” population has nothing filed away in their heads, but rely on Google to find out the simplest things.  I worry about a future that has me picturing, in my head, surgeons googling the whereabouts of the spleen with the patient on the table.  Already, we have a population that doesn’t know how to do math without a calculator.

TV shows make stupid people seem like the norm, and ignorance seem like the ideal.  Our schools are emphasizing conformity and punishing creativity.  Physical ability is trophied even while much of the population’s physical ability is atrophied.  Academic success is pretty much ignored lest some kid’s self-esteem suffer because he/she can’t do “it” as well.

Excellent work that, a generation ago, would have been put up on the wall so all could see and benefit and honor it, is now hastily shunted away because not everybody can do that well.  Kids who can’t do that well now no longer have examples of what things could be like if they worked harder, etc.  Bright, fast kids are advised to slow down, and ignorant teachers “reward” them by giving them more of the same or, even worse, relegating them to the hallway where they spend the day tutoring slow kids.

I worry about the future because people know nothing about the past these days.  I worry about the future because people are spending the present letting other people think for them.

What kind of future is in store for our children if they are not taught about the past, and encouraged to do things more than one way, and encouraged to apply and connect this with that, and that with the other?

Education is about connections.  If our students have nothing in their heads, lives, or experiences, what sense can they make about anything?  How can things be relevant if there is no relativity?

I’ve had students who couldn’t follow the directions on a box of brownie mix.  Oh, they could read the directions, but they weren’t sure about teaspoons, tablespoons, and measuring cups.  Imagine.

Speaking of “imagine,”  I’ve had students who had a hard time imagining anything because imagination requires connections, too.  Image-ing is possible only with prior knowledge – schema.  How can we create the “magic” part of “i-mage-ing” unless we know as much as possible about as many things as possible?

The more schema we can bring to the table, the more connections we’re able to make.  The more connections we make, the more we can understand.  The more we understand, the more we learn.  The more we learn, the more we know.  The more we know, the better able we are to cope and improve the universe.  Not to even mention those  sofa Jeopardy wins.

As for those teachers who advocate “no memorizing, no studying, no homework, no proving knowledge or mastery, and almost total dependence on electronics,” I have only this to say.

Bullshit.  You’re all full of bullshit.

And this from Mamacita, who advocates tech so thoroughly and enthusiastically that my students who don’t use the social networking that they were told to use are left out of the announcement loop altogether.

P.S.  Dear Students:  Midterms are this week.  If you skived off class and didn’t check Twitter, Facebook, Google +, or email, you’ve got a big surprise coming.

And if you aren’t able to make connections, it won’t do you much good to show up, anyway.

Most of the time, THOSE parents never darkened the door of the school for any reason. Occasionally, one of them would actually show up for a conference, and I would sit there on the other side of the table gritting my teeth and gripping a pencil so tight that sometimes it broke, because nine times out of ten, the parent of my raggedy little starveling was dressed pretty darn well, and it was rare that he/she didn’t reek of cigarette smoke. In other words, money WAS being spent, but not on the child.

Cigarettes in the purse, no socks on the child. Beer in the refrigerator, no decent shoes for the child. Nice clothes on the adult, rags on the child.  Warm winter coat on the adult, a t-shirt on the child.

I can feel my blood pressure rising as I remember it.

Why, why, WHY, when these poor kids are constantly removed from these ‘homes,’ are they just as constantly put right back in to be mistreated just like before? Sometimes, in fact most times, ‘keeping the family together’ is NOT important. Sometimes, splitting a family apart is the best thing that could ever happen to it. When parents do not behave like adults, they have no business inflicting it on innocent children. Get the kids out of that house, and put them where they’ll be fed and clothed and loved. Any adult who would buy cigarettes when his/her child has no socks, is a monster, not fit to raise a child. Addictions? Cry me a river. The needs of children always come before any needs of an adult. And especially before an adult’s hobby, toy, or habit.  In fact, the needs of children come before ANYTHING remotely to do with an adult.

“Wahwahwah, don’t I deserve to have a life?”  Actually, no, you don’t.  Not until you have made sure your children’s needs have been taken care of, and, sadly enough for you, sometimes the bars have closed by the time you can go.  Of course, there’s always the 24-hour WalMart – you can throw a t-shirt on over your thong and your spike heels and get your cigarettes there.  Hey, you might even show up later on People of Walmart!  8-year-old Susie can watch the younger kids till you get home.  Wake her up and put her to work; she’s used to it.

Look around. Every person has a story to tell. Sometimes you can tell by their outsides, and sometimes you can’t.

Most of the time, that story has something to do with their home, and who was there, and who WASN’T there.

Some people are parents via biology or adoption, and others are parents via fate. There is no guarantee which kind will be the best kind.

I would bet money, though, if I had any money, that an adult who would put his/her own selfish wants and addictions over and above the needs of a little child, is not even going to be in the running. Shame on them. Shame, and more shame.

I do not understand many things in this world, and one of them is this: when “everybody” knows a home is not a fit place for a child, why does “everybody” talk about that fact, yet allow the child to remain in the home?

“What a shame, those poor kids, alcohol, drugs, prostitution, gambling, live-in lovers, possible molestation. . . . .” and then we watch them get on the bus, knowing they’re going “home” to hell house.

I know that mistakes are made all the time, in removing children from so-called ‘homes,’ but I think even more mistakes are made all the time in NOT removing children. Why should their worthless parents have all the rights, and the children have none?

I am so down tonight. I wish I could gather up all these kids and wash them, and feed them, and put clean socks on their feet, and intact shoes, and pretty clothes. I wish I could fill Christmas stockings and Easter baskets for them, and hug them, and give each one a doll or toy of some kind that would be their very own and nobody else’s. And if their worthless deadbeat parent tried to take it and sell it for drugs or booze, I hope a sensor in it would explode and wipe that bum off the face of the earth. Peace on earth, yes.

Read it right: “Peace on earth to men of good will.”

The other kind can bite me.

Mamacita says:  I’m guessing that many most bloggers will be posting tributes this weekend, and telling the blogosphere ‘where we were’ when the planes hit the World Trade Center. Here is mine. This is actually the second third fourth fifth sixth seventh time I’ve posted this on 9/11, so if it seems familiar, you’re not crazy. Well, not on this issue, anyway.

==

The morning began like any other; we stood for the Pledge of Allegiance, and sat back down to watch Channel One News, which had been taped at 3:00 that morning in the school library, thanks to the timer. But Channel One News didn’t come on.

Instead, the secretary’s voice, over the intercom, told the teachers to “please check your email immediately.” We did. And we found out what had happened.

I scrolled down the monitor and read the end of the message. The superintendent had ordered all teachers to be absolutely mum all day about the tragedy. We were not to answer any questions from students, and we were especially not to offer any information to them.

The day went by in a blur. Many parents drove to the school, took their kids out, and brought them home. Between classes, frightened groups of students gathered in front of their lockers and whispered, gossiped, and cried, and begged us for information. By that time, the superintendent’s order had been seconded by the principals, and we were unable to give these terrified kids any information. In the computer labs, the MSN screens told the 8th graders the truth, but they, too, were instructed NOT to talk about it to the other students. Right, like THAT happened. The story was being repeated by 8th graders, and it was being told bloody-killing-deathtrap-you’re next-video-game-style.

At noon, many of the students were picked up by parents and taken home or out for lunch. Those few who returned had a big tale to tell. The problem was, the tale was being told by children, and few if any of the facts were straight. The tale was being told scary-style, and the atmosphere in the building got more and more strained. We are only a few miles away from an immensely large Navy base, where ammunition and bombs are made, and we’ve always known it was a prime target, which means, of course, that we are, too. Many of my children’s parents worked there. The base was locked down and those parents did not come home that night.

Reasonable questions were answered with silence, or the statement: “You’ll find out when you get home.”

This, added to all the rumors and gossip spread by children, turned my little sixth graders into terrified toddlers.

As teachers, we were furious and disgusted with the superintendent’s edict. We wanted to call all the students into the gym and calmly tell them the truth in words and ways that would be age-appropriate. We wanted to hug them and assure them that it was far away and they were safe. We asked for permission to do this, and it was denied. Our orders were ‘silence.’ We hadn’t been allowed to hug them for years, of course, but there are times and places when hugs ARE appropriate. No matter, the superintendent stood firm: no information whatsoever.

The day went by, more slowly than ever a day before. The students grew more and more pale and frightened. We asked again, and again he stood firm that no information whatsoever was to be given out.

By the end of the day, the children were as brittle as Jolly Rancher Watermelon Sticks.

A few minutes before the bell rang to send them home, a little girl raised her hand and in a trembling voice that I will never forget, asked me a question. “Please, is it true that our parents are dead and our houses are burned down?”

That was it. I gathered my students close and in a calm voice explained to them exactly what had happened. I told them their parents were alive and safe, and that they all still had homes to go to.

The relief was incredible. I could feel it cascading all through the room.

I was, of course, written up for insubordination the next day, but I didn’t care. My phone had rung off the hook that night with parents thanking me for being honest with their children. That was far more important than a piece of paper that said I’d defied a stupid inappropriate order meted out by a man who belonged in the office of a used car lot, not in a position of power over children’s lives.

The next day at school, in my room, we listened to some of the music that had been ‘specially made about the tragedy. I still have those cd’s and I’ve shared them with many people over the past few years.  It is true that kids cried again, but it was good to cry. It was an appropriate time to cry. We didn’t do spelling or grammar that day. There are times when the “business as usual” mindset simply is not appropriate.

I wish administrators would realize that kids are a lot tougher than we might think. Kids are also a lot more sensitive that we might realize. It’s an odd combination, and we as educators must try our best to bring the two ends of the emotional spectrum together and help these kids learn to deal with horrible happenings and still manage to get through the day as well as possible.

Ignoring an issue will not help. Morbidly focusing on an issue will not help. Our children are not stupid, and to treat them as such is not something that builds trust. Our children deserve answers to their questions.

How can we expect our children to learn to find a happy medium if we don’t show them ourselves, when opportunities arise?

September 11, 2001 – September 11, 2011. God bless us, every one.

Twenty-two 20-minute periods, or “mods” a day. A week was 6 days, and most classes met every other day. A regular class was usually two mods; a study period might be any length, from one to four mods; labs were four or five mods, etc. Academic classes were divided into large group/small group, just like college. For example, a student might have English on Days 2, 4, and 6 during mods 9 and 10. Day 1 wasn’t necessarily Monday; it was simply the day after Day 6. Attendance was taken first mod and wasn’t taken again the whole rest of the day. Students had a huge commons area for ‘free time.’ There was a SMOKING AREA on the side of the building, and teachers had duty there! The sense of openness and freedom and personal responsibility was tremendous.

Except for the smoking area, I loved it.

All the kids loved it, except the ones who couldn’t adapt to the freedom. Kids who desperately needed, REQUIRED, a rigid routine, just couldn’t cut it. But for the above-average kid, it was heaven.

Unfortunately, above-average kids weren’t the majority.

The experiment was ruined by those kids who just cut classes every day and hung out in the smoking area or the commons, or who left the open campus at noon and never came back, day after day, or who wandered aimlessly, lost and confused, trying to figure out where they were supposed to go on Day four, Mod seven. Even though they had a schedule in their hand.

Many parents never quite understood the concept either, and objected. Mostly the parents of the kids who never quite understood the concept.

At the time, I really did think I’d died and gone to school-heaven. I envied the students. For someone like me, that kind of ‘schedule’ would have been perfection. For many kids, it WAS perfection. For the first time, a school was actually catering to the bright trustworthy kids.

It didn’t last long, of course.

It lasted two years, and then the school board decided to go back to ‘traditional’ scheduling. Unfortunately, the new building had not been designed for anything traditional; it was too open.

So they cut up all that lovely open space into little cubicle classrooms with no windows and turned into a traditional six-period high school. The smoking area stayed for a few more years and then common sense kicked in, the only time common sense was ever utilized in the history of this building.

The building was planned and built for grades 10-12. A few weeks before it was finished, the board decided to send the freshmen there, too. And then they wondered why it was too small from day one.

It’s a shame. Even though it was too late for me as a student, for the first time in my life I had been exposed to a concept that catered to the smart kids, the reliable kids, the GOOD kids, the funky kids, the quirky kids, the kids who could be trusted with a little time.

But, as usual, because of the other kind of kids (and their parents) we lost it.

I am thinking as I write this of two famous writers and their philosophies. One is Plutarch, and the other is Mark Twain.

It was Plutarch who said, “Being about to pitch his camp in a likely place, and hearing there was no hay to be had for the cattle, ‘What a life,’ said he, ‘is ours, since we must live according to the convenience of asses!’ ”

And it was Mark Twain who said, “”In the first place, God made idiots. That was for practice. Then he made school boards.”

Of course, Twain also said “I have never let schooling interfere with my education.”

Amen.

And please don’t think I am heartless, although I’m sure many of you do. I firmly and thoroughly believe in a good sound remedial program; that’s what I teach now.

I just don’t believe that the remedial and special programs should dictate or slow down the programs for the entire student body.

(Re-run from August 2005. Wow – even my blog is old!)

Your kid is raised. Stop raising him. If he’s still an immature weenie, let life hand him/her some consequences. It’s about time somebody did.

Love, Professor MeanJane

P.S. Your kid is nineteen years old and still can’t remember to bring a pencil to school. And no, he can’t borrow mine.  There are no soul-sucking “community school supplies” at this level.   If he wants a grade on a test, he can go down to the bookstore and invest in a two-dollar collegiate-licensed pencil. Yes, they are too expensive and yes, it’s ridiculous. At Target he can get a whole package for a dollar, but then he’d have to remember to bring one to class.

You are not allowing your kid to grow up, and he doesn’t have what it takes to do so himself. This is your fault. Back off. Let him struggle and fail, and then perhaps he will struggle and succeed. No, this is NOT being cruel. Cruelty is keeping your kid a kid too long, and doing all the work for him. Step back and don’t give in when he comes crying to you about how hard life is.

This is one of many reasons why I am a firm believer in mixed-age classes. At this level, I’ll have students from 17 to 80 in one room, and each has something invaluable to give to the other. I think every kid needs at least one adult who is not responsible for raising him/her, and I think every adult needs to be around kids for whom they are not responsible for raising.

Something else that’s wonderful?   We don’t really have many discipline problems at this level, and if we do, the student is escorted out of the building immediately. As such students should be at ALL levels, so our nice hardworking kids might be able to climb higher and see farther and accomplish much more, without being constantly albatrossed by discipline problems that are allowed to get worse each year by spineless administrators and parents who can’t see beyond their own child.

Remember Helen Keller, who had to be removed from her doting parents’ home in order to be educated properly, because her parents were so sorry for her that they gave in to her every whim and turned her into a smelly obnoxious beast who demanded her own way and got it in every situation. Poor little Helen, let her have it; she’s been denied so much! Annie Sullivan, however, knew better. Why can’t modern parents and administrators see it?

(Helen Keller has been in the top five of my top ten “most admired people” list since I was a small child. )

I am a firm believer in playing my best with the hand I’m dealt, but that only works when there are 52 cards to be dealt. Add “just a few more,” and the rules are changed, and it becomes a different game.

Life is good. Dig it.

And when life isn’t good, dig it anyway. If you keep digging, you’ll strike gold eventually.

Chaperone for free. That was me.

At this dance, some of the boys came up to the principal and told her that one of the toilets in the boy’s bathroom was stopped up and when it was flushed, it turned into Mt. Vesuvius.

The principal turned to me and told me to go in there and fix it.

You see, our janitor was a man of principle and did not do toilets. Or vomit. We used to wonder what he did with all that time he saved by not doing his job, but there was a tv in the janitor’s workroom that was always blaring so we assumed he was watching educational videos about plumbing and stuff.  We knew he must be in there because his other pasttime whilst on the job was shooting baskets in the gym, and that darn pesky dance had usurped the gym.

I knocked on the restroom door, got no answer, opened it a crack and called out a warning, and walked in.

The offending toilet was the one on the end, and when I took a good look I instantly realized it was stopped up and overflowing like Mt. Vesuvius. Oh wait, that was what the boys had already told us. Well, they were right.

I sent the boys to ask for a plunger, but they couldn’t find the janitor. We figured he was watching the tv in the janitor’s workroom down on the elementary floor so nobody could find him and make him do his job so the noise wouldn’t bother anybody at the dance, but nobody would answer the door when we knocked, at either workroom.

Back to me.

The principal now tells me that if I don’t get that toilet unclogged soon, it will flood the hall and we’ll have to send the kids home early from the dance, which was not possible as they were all dependent on their parents for rides, and all the parents were all at Wendy’s, celebrating three hours of freedom, and wouldn’t take kindly to cutting it short because some kid (not theirs) laid a loaf in the can.

I was told to unclog that toilet in whatever way I could.

Cut to the next scene, where Mamacita is kneeling on the sticky floor beside a toilet in a junior high boy’s bathroom, with her hand stuck in the hole up to her elbow, wiggling her fingers to help disperse the, uh, cloggage. My audience was large and ever-growing. Several boys told me it was the coolest thing they’d ever seen. Yes, I like to impress my students with bathroom humor.

Listen, I wouldn’t do that in my OWN bathroom, but I had to do it in a nasty junior high boy’s restroom during a dance. I will never be able to hear “Sk8r Boi” without thinking of that moment.

I got ‘er done. I flushed. Mt. Vesuvius was gone.

I stood at the sink and washed my arm over and over and over.  Then I mopped up the bathroom floor and the hallway with a mop made of a wad of paper towels on the end of my arm.

Nothing could happen now to make this night worse, I took comfort in thinking.

On the way home, a tire came off the truck and rolled down the hill.

Hark! Do I hear music in the distance?

“He was a sk8er boi she said see ya later boi. He wasn’t good enough for her. . . .”

The tow truck would have gotten there sooner had it not been for all the ice on the roads.

When I got home I stood in the shower for about three hours. I haven’t bitten my fingernails since that night.

I kind of expected the principal to, you know, THANK me for doing that, but I suppose “it took you long enough” will have to suffice.