This Journal
9.3 Happy and Mad

Yesterday we had Parents Back to School Night, an annual ritual of friendliness and high hopes during which parents and teachers exchange sincere smiles, handshakes and assurances that we are all on the same side. Parents follow their son's or daughter's schedule for seven-minute periods. Teachers introduce themselves and give a sense of what their class will be like. Apparently some teachers give little projects or assignments; I just stand there and jabbber for seven minutes about myself, the response notebook, homework, the glories of reading and writing, and the like. Everyone is on their best behavior so it makes for a pleasant, if somewhat long, conclusion to a full day. One good thing about living right at the school is the very short stroll that gets me home. My car hasn't moved since last Saturday. And today was Friday, leading us into a useful three-day weekend.

I didn't get out to jog last night, nor will it happen tonight. I am lazy; I am tired; I am writing this and jumping to the sounds of The Modern Lovers, circa 1975. "Roadrunner, roadrunner, goin' faster miles an hour." This is, of course, one of the singular albums, released at that most perfect moment when the fallen, rotten fruit of rock was about to burst open with the glorious noise and nonsense of these guys, The Ramones, Talking Heads, Sex Pistols, etc.

Well, they got my attention and reminded me well enough that my youth was a passing train I'd better jump...or miss. So I jumped, sort of. The Sex Pistols hit America while I was in Houston. Their show in Austin was a landmark, I guess. As a 26 year old English teacher, I was already feeling kind of old and sleepy next to these kids with torn t-shirts, safety-pin piercings, and then-outrageous profanity. I read about The Pistols and launched out for a copy of "Never Mind the Bollocks", which kicked me into a useful, wakeful state.

[Have I mentioned yet that seniors at Carmel get to go off-campus for lunch every day? Have I mentioned yet that we all get fifty (five-zero) minutes for lunch? I bring this up only to be rude, petty, and annoying to some who happen to be stuck in other situations.]

In my freshman classes today I asked everyone to write for a while about experiences they have had with handicapped or disabled persons. Most had a lot to write and were pretty eager to talk about it. I was fairly impressed by the quality of their spoken tales and their compassionate tone. This was a prelude to reading "The Miracle Worker".

The Sophomores got to think about America's first self-help manual as we wrestled with Ben Franklin's prosey quest for moral perfection. One discovery: the editors of our textbook (The American Experience - Prentice Hall) have crudely expurgated his work. They chopped out the little story Ben and his friend Collins made up in order to get Ben out of Boston. They had told the ship's captain that Ben "had got a naughty girl with child" and needed to escape the consequences. This is missing. And later, when he lists the thirteen primary virtues, every one of them is given a little aphoristic explanation ("TEMPERANCE Eat not to dullness; drink not to elevation). Each one has this - except CHASTITY, which is trailed by a glaring empty white space.

What is their problem? (They're imposing on all of us somebody's notion that human sexuality should have no place in American literature, the jerks. This is all about the politics of schoolbook-whoring, of appeasing the lunatic fringe on some state textbook committees.) I go ballistic when I think about this. Is it too much to ask that Ben Franklin (BEN FRANKLIN, PEOPLE!!) be allowed to say what he means? Who is being protected by this butchery? Clearly it is not my students. They are the victims. This is a corrupt, a rotten, text. What else has been left out?

So I have a three-day weekend to stew about this. But I won't lose much sleep over it; it's really no surprise. Right now I gotta get up and dance; they're playing my song.

"Gimme Gimme Shock Treatment".

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