THE SINGLE HAZARD OF TEACHING MIDDLE SCHOOL
I can confidently say, I am as fully prepared for any hazard associated with the rigors of teaching.
Until last Thursday.
Either I was caught off guard (that would be a lie) or I mistook the ingenuity of those in close proximity to me (much nearer to the truth).
Last Thursday, I almost died.
Last Thursday, my students nearly bored me to death.
Fortunately, my well-honed survival instincts kicked in saving me from both Death and the agonizing pain associated with his visit.
Permit me a few minutes to explain the gruesome details of the encounter.
Full disclosure, last summer, I began driving the school bus to both retrieve in the morning and return in the afternoon all of the precious cherubs otherwise known as thirteen-year-old middle school girls. I use the term “cherub” in a facetious manner to foreshadow the levels of imminent doom that descended upon my person that day.
I have thirteen female, thirteen-year-old middle school students on my morning bus. I have these same thirteen female, thirteen-year-old middle school students in each of my three morning summer school classes. I have the same students for lunch and PE. I have these same students in my last class of the day. Finally, I have these same students on the bus ride home.
Are you still with me?
That is nearly eight hours per day listening to the same thirteen girls talk about the same subject (i.e., nothing) for forty hours per week.
They collectively inhale on Monday morning and begin a sentence of infinite duration, using the word “like” a google of times and as twenty-two different parts of speech (if you think you can diagram this sentence, think again), continuing on throughout the week, without cause for rest or relaxation, ending the extended sentence close to two minutes after they exit my bus on Friday.
I knew this was an occupational hazard at the time I took this position.
That is the polite way of stating I needed the money.
Then came last Thursday.
Last Thursday involved an extended field trip from Atlanta, Georgia to Ruby Falls near Chattanooga, Tennessee, to Tallulah Gorge near Tallulah Falls, Georgia to Amicalola Falls State Park in Dawsonville, Georgia, back to Atlanta, Georgia.
This trip would be in excess of twelve hours: six hours in the bus, six hours climbing large rock formations, all while shepherding the thirteen-year-old cherubs each and every step of the way.
This trip would entail nearly 400 miles horizontally and half a mile vertically (2600 steps).
At 7am, Thursday morning, all thirteen cherubs entered my bus and inhaled.
For over 700 minutes, they spoke of one boy, Mark. Here, for legal purposes, I will not reveal the true name of the boy in question. This is for his own protection. He will need it.
I now know EVERYTHING there is to know about Mark.
Should he ever become lost or abducted by aliens, I can make a positive identification of Mark having never seen him.
For fun and amusement, try to actually repeat each of Mark’s characteristics:
“He is tall but not too tall and he likes girls his own age but not that one girl who really like is really like into him because another girl I know of because the lady that does my nails knows of another woman with a daughter who so wanted to be like close to like Mark before he knew that she must have known about what Mark knew about her and the other girl who I have like yet to mention because she doesn’t go to like my school anymore because she got kicked out for something she got bullied about online which like isn’t really fair because people shouldn’t be rude and picky and it’s just like my grandmother told me about politicians when I went to church but I didn’t really go so like that is a sin right so I want to have my nails done better than that skank I met well I didn’t really meet her but I wish I would because I would have given her a piece of my mind when I posted what I should have done so I took a picture of her and her new boyfriend which I met at the mall when my older sister who is in the Army somewhere by the way she actually knows someone who knows someone who actually saw someone get killed when doing something before she heard about this one girl who graduated with her or maybe didn’t actually graduate because she also likes this boy but he really is a man and you know about them and what they do when they are alone my grandmother told me while I was paying her no never mind because someone just texted me about what she heard about another boy who might look like Mark but really doesn’t but says he does . . .”
I had an imaginary length of rope, measured, and wrapped around my neck to simulate the lesser of all evils. Scientifically, I had weighed my options and hypothesized imaginary self-strangulation would still be covered by my life insurance but only if I could endure another ten hours before the bus returned back into Georgia.
Until that time, I mentally braced myself by repeating my name, rank, and serial number. If I had a co-pilot, I would insist he download the provisions of the Geneva Convention concerning the torture of enemy combatants and the possibility of invoking a UN Resolution for an immediate vote to end my pain and airlift me to Ramstein Air Force Base for immediate medical treatment.
If only I were so lucky.
During the caving at Ruby Falls, the girls had yet to finish their sentence about Mark. However, they did disclose his entire genome, strand by strand, both haploid and diploid, using only the abbreviations for guanine, adenine, thymine, and cytosine in case cloners could be present to duplicate all of wonders of Mark, but dilute his uniqueness in the process.
They were wearing me down.
Nine hours to go.
Did I know that Mark has the most wonderful shade of blue eyes ever documented? I do now.
Did I know that Mark once saved a baby bird from extinction, or death, or the rain, or something like that? Even if I didn’t want to.
I feel similar to a chemo patient with multiple doses remaining.
Choreographing their movements to encircle me with each step, I found their voices in a pattern of constructive interference to elevate the collective decibel levels into dangerous levels for human habitation. And I, sans any level of personal protective equipment.
Five hours to go.
The walk ascending the falls at Amicalola required counting all 875 vertical steps. I walked slowly permitting my gaggle to pursue detailing Mark’s perfect teeth to any person at the top who may harbor thoughts of a gravitationally assisted evasion plan. But alas, even when out of visual contact, the cliff walls only echoed what the girls were verifying as Mark’s cute dimples on both sides of his face.
Nails across a chalkboard and bamboo under fingernails have nothing compare to my eventual dismissal from the land of the living. My demise was assured. My ETA remained unclear.
Now the bus ride back.
This tidbit of Hell included well placed shrieks during the REVIEW of all things Mark. Still no inhalation (a physiological miracle) or punctuation to that singular of all singular sentences.
Mark had better be a real person.
And I was on Death’s door during this realization.
Ironically, even when Death came to visit, I used the last of my strength to prevent his escape. We wrestled WWE style and only by invoking an “End of all Creation Clause” did he escape in my confusion.
Note to self, should I survive the day, research the “End of all Creation Clause”. As amusing as that sounds, I did.
And that is what saved me last Thursday.
I found a reason to live. A penultimate purpose invigorating both mind, body, and soul shielded me from the last of the cherub’s remarks. I lived long enough to find closure with a first and last punctuation (a period) finalizing their twenty-two-million-word single utterance.
I came close to being bored to death.
Nietzsche had it right all along: “Whatever doesn’t kill you only makes you stronger.”
Next year, I will take the 8th grade girls and boys, all twenty-two of them, on a field trip to a dodge ball tournament.
I believe I am now immune to everything.
