A Ghastly Sight

Vocabulary quizzes in my ninth grade English classes require students to answer questions that use the assigned words in context, rather than just regurgitating definitions. Because my kids often surprise me with both the creativity of their correct answers and the hilarity of their incorrect answers, these quizzes are a lot of fun to grade.

Here's a an admittedly easy question from this week's quiz. It practically begged kids to fill in the most ridiculous possible answers - and they did not disappoint.

QUESTION: What is a GHASTLY sight that a doctor might see in an emergency room?

FAIRLY STANDARD CORRECT ANSWERS

A dead body.

A man bleeding to death.

A bone sticking out of someone's body.

A patient who is horribly burned.

A compound fracture in a person's leg, where the bone pops out of the skin.

ANSWERS THAT EARNED CREDIT, DESPITE BEING WEIRD

A: When a doctor is performing open-heart surgery.
 Probably ghastly to me, but doctors who find this ghastly are probably in the wrong line of work.

A: Somebody who is deathly pale.
I mean... I guess everyone's definition of "ghastly" is subjective, but of all the possible situations you can imagine in an E.R., this one seems relatively un-ghastly.

 A: An old guy's intesdins.
Younger guys' intestines are fine though. Bonus points for creative spelling.

A: A zombie coming out of a room.
But a zombie going into a room is preferable? Zombies are probably ghastly both in and out of hospitals, whether coming or going.

A: All the lights going out and something coming near him.
Depends what the "something" is. I do like the horror movie scenario, although it has nothing to do with his being a doctor.

A: A very mangled man.
Once upon a time there lived a very mangled man...

A: Someone impaled by a cactus.
lol

CORRECT ANSWERS THAT ARE ALSO GROSS

 A: Someone who has been shot in the head multiple times.
Impressive that this person actually made it to the hospital.

A: A person who got his guts spilled onto the floor.
Ew. Can't argue with this one though.

A: Someone's guts hanging out of their mouth.
Ew. Ditto.

A: When someone comes in and someone is burned so bad you can see there [sic] there organs. That would be horrible.
The editorial comment is helpful. Thanks for that.

A: Gangrene. Or Cherubism
I didn't know what Cherubism was before today. Thanks for making me Google that, kid.

A: Seeing a metal bar that went through someone's shoulder or face but their still alive and can see and hear you.
Phineas Gage?

A: A person's face that got burned and half of his face is melted and gone.
Harvey Dent? Gus Fring?

A: If she sees someone have a chainsaw through their neck.
Leatherface? Seriously though, bonus point for specifically identifying the doctor as female.

A: Someone with an arm turned around and bent towards their back, and a leg bent all the way to their chest.
Final Destination?

A: A man with his legs and arms chopped off from an accident.
Still trying to imagine the kind of accident that conceivably yield this result.

A: Someone's eyes  in there nose and hand in there mouth, separated from the arm.
Dude. Even Hannibal Lecter would find this excessive.

CORRECT, BUT WHAT PLANET ARE YOU FROM?

A: Walking in the wrong door and seeing a man giving birth.
I like the idea that there is some restricted area in the hospital where men give birth. I guess there must be doctors who work there too, but if you didn't have clearance or you didn't know it existed, I guess it would be a ghastly sight indeed.

A: A penny inside a mouse inside a rat inside a cat inside a dog inside a bigger dog inside a snake inside a hawk inside a bear.
You win. I got nothing.

A Look Back at my Short-Lived Sub-Varsity Football Career

Many people I know, close friends included, don't realize that I even played high school football, much less that I played for perhaps the worst team imaginable. This might be an exaggeration, but not as much of one as you would think: the Newark Academy Minutemen finished their 1996 campaign with a record of 1-8. They failed to score a single point until the sixth game of the season, which they eventually lost by a score of 30-6. They did beat Sussex Tech though - by a lot, let the record show - so there was at least some distance between the Minutemen and the bottom of the barrel.

This was my freshman year of high school. (I only attended Newark Academy for that one year, before returning to public school as a sophomore.) I practiced with the varsity team that season - not because I was unusually talented, or strong, or fast, but because there simply weren't enough players to field a J.V. team, and there were no other options. The upshot was that I didn't feel any obligation to care about my team's record: since I barely played, I was in no way responsible for its fortunes. Losses only really affected me personally insomuch as they tended to weaken morale and increase the length and difficulty of practices. Sure, I rooted for my team from the sidelines, but I wasn't overly upset when we got routed - which happened pretty frequently. After we lost to Chatham (my former school), I got chewed out by our senior captain for blithely flirting with some of the opposing cheerleaders, instead of looking appropriately bummed out.

I see that N.A. Football apparently finished with a record of 3-6 this year. Good for them!

More than rooting for a team victory, I rooted for a lopsided score one way or the other, so that I would have a chance of getting into the game. The more action I saw, the more hope I would have of earning a highly-coveted varsity letter, a truly rare accomplishment for a freshman. Most of our games were in fact blowouts, meaning that I often took the field for a late-game kickoff, or even a full defensive series. The team was so thoroughly outclassed by Montclair Immaculate that I ended up playing most of the fourth quarter. In the closing minutes, I even notched a tackle of their star tailback, which made it difficult to stifle a grin as we got back on the bus following a 42-0 drubbing.

The Minutemen were on my mind last week, when I realized that twenty years had passed since my first and last season of high school ball. Specifically, I found myself thinking about the last game of the season, the Thanksgiving game against Montclair Kimberley Academy - one of the only contests I didn't enter, since it came down to the wire. At the half, we were up 21-0. We would go on to lose 24-21. I remember our seniors openly sobbing on the sidelines as time expired. They had just led their team to a 1-8 finish, but to me, they were larger than life heroes, and it was jarring to see them so broken.

In the end, I didn't earn that varsity letter, which was kind of bullshit. I had practiced with the varsity since two-a-days back in August, and I had seen action in six of nine total games. But at the Varsity Letter Assembly, held in front of the entire school in early December, I found my name along with the names of the other freshman grunts, listed under "Sub-Varsity." I haven't heard that term since, and I remember thinking that someone had invented it specifically so they wouldn't have give me a varsity letter. Twenty years later, I've turned out fine, and I'm well aware that it really, really doesn't matter any more, but even as I'm recounting this, I feel my blood pressure rising slightly.

No-Shave November

I'm not sure whether men are naturally more competitive than women, but it does seem, based on my experience, that we compete over stupider things. In high school, every boy wants to outshine his friends athletically, academically and romantically. I know I did. It's at least somewhat understandable that guys should compete in these three realms, but friendly rivalry tends to spill over into seemingly irrelevant areas: Whose favorite NFL team beat whose? Who is the best at Golden Eye? (I assume now it's Call of Duty?) Who has the best one-liners? In third grade, I remember actually being proud of myself because I was half an inch taller and five pounds heavier than a classmate. Yes, I took pride in my weight: eighty pounds was undeniably more than seventy-five pounds, which meant that I was... five points better in the great scoreboard of life, I guess.

At some point, most guys seem to outgrow their taste for petty competition. For me, that point was the decade spanning from 2000 to 2010, which began with the end of my high school athletic career and ended with my meeting the woman I would ultimately marry. I had some wonderful times during this era, but I also can't say I miss it. I think for a lot of guys - and again, I'll include myself in this - every stupid competition seems like a direct commentary on your masculinity. As in, I am only a Man if I get this girl's number. I am only a Man if I make varsity. I am only a Man if I score at least a 1300 on my SAT's. I'm happy I don't think that way any more, but since I teach ninth grade English at an all-boys' school, I'm constantly surrounded by guys who do.

Ninth graders at my school are generally polite and respectful, but fairly or not, some of them afford extra respect to the teachers they perceive as embodying their very narrow definitions of masculinity. Male teachers who also coach sports or who have served in the military enjoy automatic street cred. At this point in my life, I'm secure enough in my identity not to want to change anything about myself in order to win approval from a high school student. But on the other hand, if a high school student finds something about me worthy of approval, I certainly won't mind. As it turned out when I began at my current school, the boys were fairly indifferent to my degrees and my accomplishments as a writer, and only marginally more interested in my experience as a wrestling coach. They were, however, fascinated by my ability to grow a beard.

It's true: I can grow a thick beard very quickly. I am neither proud nor embarrassed of this fact - just as I am neither proud nor embarrassed of having unattached earlobes. But one morning, I came into school without having shaved and a boy asked me if I was trying to grow a beard. I responded that no, I didn't think I was; I had only missed a day of shaving. Cue a disbelieving, possibly envious chorus of ooh's and aah's from twelve suddenly rapt fourteen-year-olds. I never thought that thick facial hair was particularly notable, but I also wasn't above trying to use it to my pedagogic advantage. I once told a class that if they all completed their homework on time, I would reward them with an embarrassing picture of myself sporting ridiculous facial hair. The next morning, when they produced their completed assignments, I presented them with this gem:

I drink your milkshake!

At this time of year, No-Shave November, my beard is out in full force. It's an instant conversation piece: boys I haven't spoken to for much of the year will stop me in the hallway to admire it or to ask me when I last shaved. (The answer is October 31st. "I don't need any head starts," I assure them.) Ok, so sometimes I do take a certain amount of ironic pride in the beard - even though I am ever-conscious that I did absolutely nothing to earn it. And truth be told, it gets unbearably itchy after a month, and I'm always happy to get rid of it.

But for the month of November, I milk it while I can. In the past two years, I've won two No-Shave November Faculty Beard Titles. Yes, this is a thing, and yes, it comes with a prize. Last year it was a box of Safeway sugar cookies with bright green frosting. I tweeted after last year's championship that I had more titles than Lebron. We're actually tied now, but in my mind, I'm still winning: I dropped what should have been an easy title two years ago when I caved to family pressure at Thanksgiving, and prematurely shaved.

Let's be clear on this: having a thick beard doesn't make you a Man. Abraham Lincoln had one. So did Ted Kaczynski. As far as I can tell, there is no correlation. I hope to impart this idea to my students. And I plan to keep trying to earn respect and admiration in other, more substantive ways. But in the mean time, if you'll excuse me, I have another Beard Title to win.

First and Last Political Post

I try to stay away from politics on social media. I have plenty to say about politics - How could you not during this election cycle? - but I don't want to add to the deluge of posts on Facebook and Twitter. Plus, I feel I should watch my mouth (especially since some of my students are aware of this blog).

That being said, it would feel a little cheap to just continue with my thoughts on Walking Dead, or something dumb like that, without at least commenting on Tuesday's events a little bit. So here's what I've been thinking:

I strongly dislike Donald Trump. I don't think I'm breaking any new ground when I say I think he's a bully, a sexist and a racist. Maybe most offensive to me personally, because it calls into question my value as an educator: I think he's a raging anti-intellectual. I'm going to have a hard time even acknowledging that he is indeed the president, much less embracing him.

I've never felt so simultaneously shocked and depressed after an election. In the first four elections of my adult life, I voted against George W. Bush (twice), John McCain and Mitt Romney. I disagreed with their ideas, but I always felt that they were fundamentally good people. I remember seeing McCain correct the woman at a town hall meeting who said she didn't trust Obama because he was an "Arab," and thinking that he was a real mensch for speaking up. I don't have the same respect for Trump and I don't know if I ever will, although I am going to try really hard to be open-minded.

I feel you, Man...

But today I'm actually trying to think less about Trump himself than about his core constituents: middle and lower-middle-class white people in small towns and rural communities. I lived in the rural mid-western town of Gambier, Ohio for the better part of four years, and even though it was kind of a liberal bubble, I got to know plenty of people in the surrounding towns. There was the mechanic in Centerburg who replaced my car's clutch and brakes and charged me a really fair price for the service. And there was the waitress who always served me at the High Diner in Mount Vernon. And there was my eleven-year-old little brother (in the Knox County Big Brothers-Little Brothers program) who once, after a trip to the movies, gave me some deer bologna. He had killed the deer in his backyard, and his biological older brother had helped him clean it and cure the meat.

There was also the man in the old pickup truck, with a Bush/Cheney bumper sticker, who appeared out of nowhere when my car broke down on Route 80 in Western Pennsylvania, and helped me temporarily fix my engine so I could drive to the nearest gas station.

These were all good people: they weren't some faceless hicks trying to screw up the country. And at the risk of making a sweeping generalization, I bet they all voted for Trump (even the eleven-year-old boy who is now of voting age, I guess). If Clinton had won, I would have resented anyone who used the word "lib-tard" (has there ever been a dumber insult?) or whined about the liberal elite and their out-of-touch Washington insider agenda. So while I dislike Trump, and disapprove of his being elected, I am not going to take part in any protests. And I'm not going to rail against the "dumb asses" or "rednecks" or "basket of deplorables" who voted for him. Make no mistake: I'm still really hurting from this, and I'm not sure I am in the mood to be understanding and empathetic yet. But I have a strong desire not to go through life hating half the country. I want to respect the people who voted for Trump (except, obviously, for avowed racists like this jerk who can go f themselves). At some point, I know I will want to understand why they made the choice they did, even if I won't ever agree with it.

Some Thoughts on The Walking Dead

I actually didn't start watching The Walking Dead until a couple years ago. When the rest of the world was on Season Five, I was starting from the very beginning. By the end of that season, I had caught up with the entire series, but while I had often enjoyed it, I decided by this time that I was all done. The story was repetitive: Rick's group meets some new people, they have to figure out whether or not to trust these new people, they consider whether it's possible to hang onto their humanity in a zombie-infested post-Apocalyptic world. Rinse and repeat. The seasons, I felt, were too damn long. Game of Thrones needs ten hours per season to tell an extremely complex story populated with dozens of important characters. Does The Walking Dead really require sixteen hour-long episodes per season to tell its story? Invariably, each season has some serious lulls - maybe three dull episodes for every one great one. The characterization can also be either inconsistent (as in the case of Andrea and the Governor) or sort of one-note (Merle). Don't get me wrong - it was fun at times, and there were great individual episodes (the one where the gang sees that backpacker by the side of the road but they don't pick him up, the one where Carol and Tyreese have to take care of those two sisters, etc.). But five seasons was enough for me.

I actually haven't watched Season Six, and I hadn't even heard about the cliff-hanger at the end. But I couldn't help but hear the chatter about the bloody premier of Season Seven. At first I told myself I didn't want to know the specifics, in case I ever resumed watching. But my curiosity quickly got the better of me, and I watched the big moments on Youtube.

*Spoiler Alert*

Much ink has already been spilled in the week since we lost Glenn and Abraham. I saw this little comment on a Youtube video of their death scenes: "Violets are Blue/Roses are Red/People are triggered/Because Glenn is dead." Cute. The problem, though, is not that I'm offended or "triggered" by extreme violence. It seems doubtful to me that anyone who is "triggered" by violence - even violence as extreme as the beating Glenn took - would have made it all the way to Season Seven of this series. Hell, the violence is part of what I love about the show. Remember when the gang hoisted that fat walker out of the well and its stomach burst open? That was gross and awesome.

So accurate.

Here's the bigger problem: if you ask an audience to care about a character, it is incumbent upon you as a writer to care about that character as well. This isn't to say that nothing bad can happen to sympathetic characters: Ned Stark in Game of Thrones and Adriana la Cerva in The Sopranos both suffer horrible fates, much worse than what they deserve, and their deaths were two of the most poignant in television history. By offing Glenn in such a gratuitous, almost gleefully violent fashion, the writers disrespected a character whom many fans have grown to love, and by extension, they disrespected their audience. They gave Glenn the kind of death usually reserved for random stock teenagers in slasher flicks. This type of over-the-top gore is totally acceptable in something like Final Destination. We have no emotional attachment to any of the poor souls in those movies, who are being killed by tanning beds and staple guns. There's nothing inherently wrong with those movies. They're fun, and they feed our human curiosity and thirst for macabre spectacle. But they are low art; they aspire to be nothing more than slasher flicks.

Maybe I shouldn't be judging The Walking Dead as anything more than a mindless gore-fest. It's only a zombie show, for crying out loud. But the thing is, it certainly seems to want to be recognized as more than that. And at times, it has succeeded: some of later episodes of Season Four, for example, reminded me of Cormac McCarthy's The Road. At its best, The Walking Dead succeeded because it was, however improbably, an introspective, even philosophical show about zombies.

In a letter to TWD fans before this season's premier, Robert Kirkman, the author of the comic books and co-creator of the show, wrote: "We did want you to talk. And talk you are." Well ok - mission accomplished. You got me to talk about a show I haven't actually watched in more than a season.

But the creators need to understand that all this talk will come at the expense of TWD's being considered as a serious show. When Neegan's bat came down on Glenn's head, the show formally announced what some had suspected for a while: that it had chosen Low Art and "talk" over Higher Art and respect. I was already done with this show. Now I'm even doner.

P.S. - I reject the argument that Glenn's death was fine because it was true to the comics. Comic books play by a different set of rules. TWD was free to veer from the plot of the comic books, as they have done many times before. This reminds me of the lame defense of Matthew Crawley's death in Downton Abbey (another really disappointing tv moment), that he was leaving the show and they had to kill him off. Bad tv is bad tv - regardless of what is happening outside the world of the show.

Capp-oat-ccino

Blog Assignment #5

This entry is modeled on "Big Boy," by David Sedaris. For this one, I want you to tell a story about something odd and funny that has happened to you. Like the incident David Sedaris retells, it should be fairly mundane. Avoid a big moral of the story here. Your only job is to tell the story in an amusing way.

Your must contain at least one example of each of the following techniques: parallel structure, assonance and dialogue.

Shoot for between 650 and 750 words. (Sedaris' essay is 713.)

__________________________________________________________________________________________

This story also appears on the website 404words.com, which features "palm-sized stories" of 404 words or fewer. In order to be able to submit the story to this site, I had to trim it down so that it no longer fits my suggested word count range.

Note: The website accompanies the story with what looks to be a pleasant and appetizing latte. It's basically the polar opposite of the coffee I describe in the story. Mine looked more like this:

Capp-oat-ccino

Nick and I were driving back from a rather disappointing day in Pittsburgh. It was supposed to have been a weekend, and we were supposed to have seen a baseball game, but Mother Nature had other plans. Instead, it had been a day of wandering around in the rain, and eating everything in sight, which had its merits – but ultimately felt a little lacking without the baseball.

About halfway between Pittsburgh and D.C. we stopped in Breezewood, Pennsylvania, a trucker’s mecca with some of the best rest stops anywhere. Of particular note is the largest Sheetz gas station I’ve ever seen. Needless to say, after a two hour drive, on a dark, wet evening, a stop was in order. This Sheetz seemed likely to stock just the sort of artificial, sugary cappuccino that I seem to crave only on road trips. Sure enough: the machine inside had ten flavors of Cappuccino, each crazier than the next. It seemed unadventurous to select a flavor as mundane as French Vanilla or Hazelnut. So I pressed the button for the “Brown Sugar Raisin Oatmeal” Cappuccino. I paid at the counter and eagerly awaited my first sip.

I took that sip in the parking lot, which was a good thing – because I wasn’t expecting to find solid chunks floating in my coffee. Big solid chunks, which I spat out onto the pavement. Clearly, the milk must have been curdled. On one level, this was oddly comforting – I hadn’t previously been certain that machine cappuccino was made with genuine milk. Apparently it was. However, this didn’t override the fact that I was now trying my best not to chew on pieces of this milk. I walked back inside to demand an explanation.

“There are chunks in my coffee. The milk is all curdled,” I said to the matronly cashier, placing my cup down on the counter.

“What kind did you try sir?”

“What?”

“Did you buy the Oatmeal flavor?” she asked, in what I took to be a somewhat judgmental tone.

“Yes. Why?”

It’s Brown Sugar Raisin Capp-OAT-ccino. It has oats in it,” she said, tiredly.

“What? Why?”

“Would you like to try another flavor, sir?”

Adventure over. I chickened out and filled a new cup with some boring flavor of cappuccino. Still, no regrets. I’ve already forgotten every cup of French Vanilla I’ve ever had, but I’m unlikely to forget my first and last Capp-oat-ccino.

Best of Student Comments Vol. 1

I started teaching full time in the fall of 2006, which means that I have now amassed over a decade's worth of funny anecdotes about students. These can be broken into two major categories: Funny Things Students have Said and Funny Things Students have Written. (Both of these categories can be further broken into Intentional Humor and Unintentional Humor.) For Volume One of what may end up being a recurring series, here are a few highlights from the verbal category.

Intentional Comedy

Me: [speaking to a freshman class] There is more than one way to write effectively and everyone has their own personal preferences. So English teachers always contradict each other.
Student: [under his breath, to the kid sitting next to him] Last year, my teacher told us that English teachers never contradict each other.

Me: [talking about my grad school experience at Brown] I only spent a year there. I don't really keep in touch with any of my Brown friends.
Student: Uh, Mr. Barron. I think they prefer to be called African American.

Unintentional Comedy

Me: Don't forget - your paper is due at noon tomorrow.
Student: You mean noon as in, like, midnight noon?
Me: ... That's not a thing.

(Note to self: Midnight Noon has band name potential.)

Student: Hey Mr. Barron, I know you're Jewish and everything, but did you hear we have a new pope?

(Fair point. We do have our own Jewish newspapers and cable news outlets that don't report on that stuff.)

Student: Mr. Barron, what year were you born?
Me: 1982. Why?
Student: [disappointed] Oh. I had a question about the fifties...

(I mean, I know kids have no real concept of age. But given that I couldn't have been older than 27 at the time, could anyone - even a fourteen-year-old kid - have reasonably mistaken me for sixty-something?)

Me: Has anyone ever heard of a famous book called The Sound and the Fury?
[thirty seconds of crickets]
Student: [with a surfer/stoner inflection] I've seen The Fast and the Furious!

(In retrospect, that one's on me. Was I really expecting that this reference would mean anything to a junior remedial class?)

More to come...

PS - Rolling Stone apparently wrote their own rules of concert etiquette a few years ago, and some of them are very similar to mine. They even include a bit about "Freebird." Good to know I'm not alone.

Things Not to Do at Concerts

Last night, I went to a rock show at Ottobar, a small club in Baltimore. The band was Nada Surf, a one-hit-wonder from the 90's, who unexpectedly reinvented themselves as an indie power pop band almost ten years after their initial radio success. They're one of my favorite groups, and it was my fourth time seeing them. I enjoyed the show, but what I really want to talk about is concert etiquette. Whether I want to or not, I spend a good chunk of most concerts observing the behavior of my fellow audience-members. It's not what I pay the money for, but it's kind of unavoidable. And as much as I enjoyed watching the band last night, my experience in the audience was a role call of almost every conceivable breach of the unwritten rules of concert decorum. It got me thinking that maybe I ought to attempt to record these rules, just so we're all on the same page.

To be clear, I don't consider myself the consummate Cool Concert Guy. (Actually, I felt I had fulfilled my Coolness Quotient for the evening just by virtue of showing up.) And - who knows? - maybe during the course of my concert-going career, I've been guilty of violating one or two of these rules myself at some point. But that doesn't make them any less valid.

Here are the big ones:

DON'T sing louder than the actual singer. Everyone is very impressed that you know all the words, but they paid to hear the band and not you. By all means, sing if you know the words, but it shouldn't be your personal goal to be heard above the P.A. system.

DO have regard for other people's bodies. Yes, people are packed into close quarters at rock clubs. And yes, upbeat, loud music tends provoke people to dance and jump and flail around. And yes, alcohol exacerbates the dancing, jumping and flailing. And far be it from me to tell people not to do dance, jump and flail at a concert - but there is a way to do these things without constantly smacking, jostling and stepping on the people around you. It's the whole "Your rights end where mine begin" thing. Realize that you are not alone in your room, starring for your own imaginary episode of MTV's The Grind. There are limits to what you can and should do.

DON'T pantomime lyrics to songs. This should go without saying, because it's so unbelievably dorky and annoying. But I have gotten stuck next to a pantomime before, and it sucked. Some of his moves included pointing at the band's lead singer to illustrate the word "you," and placing his own hands on his heart for "love." When you get to the point where you have hand motions for every word of every song, is it really about you? Or are you trying to impress everyone around you? (Not only do I know every word to every song, but I have gestures to go with them. Beat that!) SNL used to have a pretty funny recurring segment about the DeMarco Brothers, played by Chris Parnell and Chris Kattan, who danced to various popular songs with really over-the-top, literalized choreography. Here's them auditioning for Britney Spears. I like their take on the line "You played with my heart." But imagine standing next to these guys for two hours...

DO make sure that your dancing, swaying or general rock out is in proportion to the song. This entry is dedicated to the dude in front of me last night, who almost never stopped furiously pumping his fist - even during mid-tempo numbers. During ballads, he settled for simply raising his hand, as though waiting for someone to call on him.

DON'T yell out a request more than twice. It's probably not going to work anyway. I understand that people like to do it, and I generally don't mind it. although some people call out the names of the most obscure songs they can think of, as if attempting to prove their superfandom. That, I could do without.

*As an addendum to this rule, don't ever yell "Freebird." This joke, which was probably never funny to begin with, has clearly run its course. At this point, the only person worse than the guy who yells "Freebird" is the guy who is still amused by the guy who yells "Freebird." You're only encouraging him, dude.

DON'T ever air guitar. Seriously, don't. It's pretty much the dorkiest thing you can do at a concert. Clearly, it had no place at the concert I went to last night, though that didn't stop the guy next to me from trying to air-shred his way though a a four-chord love song. My friend Steve suggests that air guitaring is only appropriate at the Air Guitar Championships. (Yes, it's a thing and yes, I've been to them.) But actually, I'd argue that even then, the audience should leave the air guitaring to the professionals, such as they are.

DON'T assume you can return to your spot after you've left. The unwritten rules dictate that if you leave your spot on the floor - even if you have a good reason, like needing to go to the bathroom, or get another beer - the rest of the crowd is going to push up to fill your spot. I don't make the rules: I'm just the messenger. If you disappear, your spot disappears with you, and if you try to take it back, you do so at your own risk.

DON'T overdo it with the phones. Go ahead and a take a couple pictures. Go ahead and record ten seconds of a song. But otherwise, I'm with Adele: just relax and enjoy the experience. (Here's her calling out a fan. Preach on, Adele.) It's kind of a buzzkill to look around the crowd during one of your favorite songs and see nothing but phone screens.

GPS Makes Everyone into Idiots

When my cousin Wendy and I were about nine or ten, we invented a game to play on family vacations called "Let's Get Lost." The idea was that we would attempt to find the most obscure, hidden corner of the resort hotel where our families were staying, and then attempt to find our families' rooms again. At massive Catskills resorts, like The Nevele or Kutsher's, this game could sometimes prove challenging. I remember once opening a door on the seventh floor and finding myself on the roof, and trying to go back the way I came only the find the door was locked. The ultimate challenge. Our parents probably disapproved of this game, and I'm sure that hotel staff didn't much like it either, as it often resulted in our entering weird, restricted areas. But it sharpened our sense of direction. And within the contained parameters of a family resort, it was a pretty safe activity that had only an illusion of risk.

I swear my GPS tells me shit like this sometimes, just to see how gullible I am.

To me, driving was always an adult version of this game. Granted, the goal was not to get lost, but
when I did get lost (which happened on a semi-frequent basis, especially early in my driving career), it was fun to figure out where I was and get myself found again. (Provided I wasn't late for something, and wasn't actively inconveniencing someone else. Then it could get annoying.) I've always enjoyed looking at maps - especially my U.S. Atlas, which is still in my car, wedged between the front seat and the center console - and I've always taken pride in knowing where I am. In preparation for a road trip, I'll often looks at the route on Google Maps for days before my departure, scanning it for possible side trips and scenic roads. Sometimes, I feel a little disoriented if I don't know which way is north - even if I'm just hanging out, and not actively trying to go anywhere.

I take pride from knowing my way around my home city too. I made it my mission to learn the confusing network of diagonals and circles that is downtown D.C. It took me forever and honestly, I never completely mastered it. And I'm sure I've forgotten most of my little shortcuts - like when to take Rock Creek Parkway, and how to take back streets from Cleveland Park to Columbia Heights. But still, at the peak of my knowledge of D.C. streets, I wasn't half bad. It took me much, much less time to learn my way around Baltimore. From the time I was a little kid, I was impressed with my dad's knowledge of Manhattan, where he lived for most of the seventies, and I think that whether he knew it or not, he instilled in me the value of knowing where I was.

For that reason, I have little patience for people who are so reliant on their GPS that they don't know the basics of how to get around without it. I have a friend (who shall remain nameless) that lives in Pikesville, right outside of Baltimore. We met at Camden Yards for a game and afterwards, I suggested that we head to the Inner Harbor. It's a straight shot: between a ten and fifteen-minute walk down Pratt Street. This should be common knowledge to anyone who lives in the greater Baltimore area, or has ever even been in the vicinity of downtown. So I was surprised when my friend pulled out his phone and charted our path to the Inner Harbor. Yup, sure enough, it was between a ten and fifteen-minute walk down Pratt Street. He needed his phone to tell him that.

I guess some people are of the opinion that there is no reason to commit directions like this to memory when our phones can now tell us exactly where we are. I'm not so sure, though. I feel oblivious and a little childish if I ever find myself that disoriented.

You'd think, being the purist I am, I'd be opposed to GPS. I'm really not, though. I was thrilled to buy one a few years ago, just in time for a summer in unfamiliar Asheville, North Carolina. And I was heartbroken when it was stolen out of my car on just my second night in Baltimore (and even more heartbroken about my passenger side window, which was smashed in the robbery), even though I have to admit the lack of GPS helped me to learn the city much faster. I was GPS-less for two full years in Baltimore - until I bought a used 2007 Honda, with a built-in GPS unit, which looks primitive compared to a modern GPS, but does the job.

I see no down side to the "Find Location" feature on my GPS. How are you supposed to find, say, a specific barber shop or taco joint when you are driving back from the post office and you feel the sudden urge for a haircut or a taco? Unless you plan it out beforehand, your best bet if you don't use GPS is to just hope you stumble across it.

But I've learned that when I overuse the GPS, I tend not to remember how to get anywhere: all I'm focused on is following the illuminated blue line. I follow it blindly, against my better judgement: just like one of the lemmings in that old video game, who mindlessly march off hills unless you specifically instruct them not too. Not long ago, I discovered a tiny shortcut on my commute: if I take Banbury Avenue to Walker, instead of Sherwood, I can avoid one light. It probably saves me an average of ten seconds per drive, but it's satisfying to know that I figured it out. I recently turned on my GPS for something - I forget what - and followed the blue line down Sherwood, to Walker where I waited for the light to turn green. Why didn't I take my usual shortcut? GPS told me not to.

Still, I think that GPS is a great invention. But it works best as a complement to the human brain, and not a substitute for it.

Life as the Token Jew

I grew up in Northern New Jersey, which most people assume is a very Jewish area. They aren't wrong. There are at least ten synagogues within a fifteen minute drive of the house where I grew up - and at least two of them are giant mega-temples. Livingston and Millburn, both of which border my home town of Chatham, have an extremely high percentage of Jews. The same is true of West Orange and South Orange, both close by. Growing up, I heard a joke a few times that tells the whole story: Why is New Jersey the Garden State? Because there's a Rosenbloom on every street!

The Summit JCC: uniting token Jews from several Northern NJ towns.

But Chatham was always this weird dead zone, located adjacent to major Jewish communities, but largely uninhabited by Jews itself. (At least this was the case when I grew up; I think a few more Jewish families have ventured in during the last fifteen years or so.) There weren't even enough of us for one synagogue: our family belonged to a small temple in Summit, which served as kind of a regional center for the few Jewish families in Chatham, Berkeley Heights, New Providence and other little towns in the area. But I spent most of my time in high school, where I usually played the role of the token Jew.

In fact, I've often found myself in situations where I am the token Jew: Chatham High School, Kenyon College and the small, predominantly White and Christian (though nominally secular) boys' school where I teach. It's usually not such a big deal. Jews are pretty mainstream. (Exhibit A: Almost no one seemed to be talking about Bernie Sanders' Judaism during his run for the Democratic nomination. I actually had to look online to confirm that he is in fact Jewish. For comparison's sake, Mitt Romney's Mormonism was a frequent topic of conversation. As was Joe Lieberman's Judaism, when he ran as Al Gore's running mate in 2000.) I have almost never been the subject of overt anti-Semitism, save for a random e-mail that I received in 2001 from some random, anonymous bigot. (From Florida, I deduced. Shocking.) But my token Jew status has occasionally made for some awkward and, in retrospect, amusing situations.

Here are a couple that I remember well from my time in high school:

Shortly after my family moved to Chatham from the more diverse neighboring town of Maplewood, a blond-haired, blue-eyed girl from my third grade class asked me, out of the blue,

“What religion are you? Protestant or Catholic?”

The question confused me, because she seemed so certain that there were only two options, but I eventually stammered that I was Jewish.

The wheels turned inside her eight-year-old head. “If you’re Jewish, do you believe in Jesus?”

I hadn’t really considered this question before but responded that no, I didn’t think I did.

And this third grade theologian responded, “It’s not nice to not believe in Jesus.”

And then there was this:

During sophomore year, before one of my high school wrestling matches, the team captain gathered us together for a group prayer. The boys, most of them Roman Catholics of Italian descent, knelt down in a circle, bowed their heads and began crossing themselves as the captain lead them in a quick but earnest Hail Mary. Everyone knew the words. Not wanting to ruin the moment with my religious scruples, but also not wanting to mindlessly join the group out of a misplaced desire not to rock the boat, I simply stood on the outskirts of the circle, head half bowed in reverence. The incident passed without comment, but by the time the captain made the same announcement before a match the following week, he had apparently gathered that I wouldn’t be joining the team in prayer.

            “Everyone, we’re gonna bring it in for a quick team prayer,” he announced, then turning an eye to me in the corner, “Barron, you do whatcha gotta do.”

           

I think I responded with a solemn nod, but inside I couldn’t help but chuckle. His dispensation would have given me license to put on a tallis and teffilin and march the torah around the locker room, if that was what I “had to do.” But at least he was trying – and so were most of the Gentiles in town. It wasn’t their fault that for many of them, I represented a first brush with a religion other than their own.

You Don't Have to Love the Classics - but That Doesn't Make them "Bad"

When I was a senior in high school, I went out on a date with a girl I didn't know very well. The subject of English class came up. At the time, I was taking A.P. Literature, and I was into it in a big way. My teacher was brilliant and intellectual, and reading Joyce and Shakespeare and Emily Bronte made me feel adult and sophisticated. The course was, to me, an important early stop on a road that would ultimately lead me to a Master's Degree in literature, and a career of attempting to incite similar passion in my own students. But this girl was apparently not taking A.P. Lit, and didn't share my enthusiasm for great books. When I brought up "The Glass Menagerie," which I had just read (and loved), she scrunched up her face and said - I still remember the exact words, because they hit me like a punch to the gut - "That's the worst book I've ever read!"

That was our last date. Was I judgmental for not wanting to date a girl who called a play a "book"? Possibly- but we all pass judgments on dates. (I mean, that's the point of dating, isn't it?) And we all have our deal-breakers, and that was mine. Of greater concern was her dismissal of one of the great American dramas as the worst of the (I'll estimate fewer than ten) books she had ever read.

I'm of the opinion that if a book achieves a certain amount of esteem, I no longer get to call it "bad." (I'm not just talking about popularity here - I still feel plenty comfortable asserting that The Da Vinci Code is a bad book.) It takes a special kind of arrogance to pass such a harsh judgment on a text that is comfortably in the canon. True, the idea of the canon  is itself somewhat subjective, but if a book is in the canon, it is objectively not "bad." That doesn't mean you have to like every book that's in the canon, but in my opinion, there's a right way and a wrong way to dislike a great book.

Ms. Morrison, I feel genuinely guilty that I don't enjoy your books more than I do. But you are widely regarded as one of the greatest writers of our time, so you clearly don't need my support.

In ten years of teaching, I frequently hear claims that echo my date's enlightened opinion - "Hamlet is sooo bad!" etc. - and they never cease to sound like nails on a chalkboard to me. I don't expect high school students to enjoy all of the classics. God knows I didn't. (More on that in a minute.) But there is a difference between "That book is terrible," and "I hated that book" and a more tactful, nuanced response. Something like: "While I didn't actively enjoy that book, I acknowledge that many other people did. I can understand the value in it, even though it wasn't my cup of tea."

Yeah, that last one sounds good. If a student says that to me - about any book at all - I'll be fine with it.

Why is it that we don't hear people express this third opinion more often? Even when I talk about books with adults, the discussion so often devolves into It was good/It was bad or I love it/I hated it.

I was recently asked to compile of list of my ten favorite books of all time, and I found it pretty difficult. Midway through the exercise, I realized that I had a much longer list of "Books I Grudgingly Appreciate," "Books I Feel Bad About Not Liking," and "Books I Respect Despite Not Actively Enjoying," Off the top of my head, here it is.

The Round House by Louise Erdrich (which I mercifully finished yesterday, and which inspired this topic).
Vanity Fair by William Makepeace Thackaray
East of Eden by John Steinbeck
This Side of Paradise by F. Scott Fitzgerald
Everything I've ever read by Toni Morrison
Everything I've ever read by Philip Roth
Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close by Jonathan Safran Foer
Absalom, Absalom! by William Faulkner
A Prayer for Owen Meany by Jon Irving
Everything I've ever read by David Eggers
For Whom the Bell Tolls by Ernest Hemingway
Dante's Inferno
Paradise Lost by John Milton
One Hundred Years of Solitude by Gabriel Garcia Marquez

I feel a strong sense of regret when I encounter books like these, which everyone seems to like except for me. I feel dimwitted and slow - even immoral. It's like standing around with a group of people who are all laughing at a joke I don't get.

I guess I've come to view reading in much the same way I view dating. There are plenty of nice, smart, beautiful, interesting women out there - but it doesn't mean I was necessarily compatible with all of them. Likewise, a book can be brilliant and profound and highly regarded - but that doesn't necessarily mean I'm going to love it. What I'm trying to say, Toni Morrison, is, I think we should see other people.

First Day of School

Throwback to Day One of the 12-13 school year. Sideburns are out of control.

Tomorrow is the first day of school. It's my eleventh as a teacher, to go with roughly seventeen as a student (counting kindergarten, elementary, middle, high school and college). As a friend pointed out to me recently, with a combination of amazement and derision, I've never experienced a year without a summer break. Such is the life of a career student and teacher. I was thinking this morning that I would try to write about an interesting first day of school from years past, but I quickly determined that this was impossible. Nothing interesting tends to happen on the first day of school. In fact, I find that I remember only a handful of specific events from any of those first days.

For me, the first day of school as a student was mostly about saying hi to old friends, seeing who had a new haircut or had otherwise changed their appearance in a radical way, trying to get a feel for which teachers I would like and which ones I wouldn't, and of course, finding out if I had classes with any girls I had a crush on.

The first day of school as a teacher is even less interesting. It mostly consists of me talking at an awkwardly silent room. (Even generally talkative classes tend to be pretty quiet on the first day. If they aren't, I know I am probably in for a long year.) I am at my most boring on Day One, and having been a student myself, I know that most students have too much on their mind to really focus on what I'm saying anyway. But the way I see it, it's pointless to teach content on the first day because they won't remember that either. So I'm going through my syllabus, dammit. Because I took the time to write it and there is no chance that high school kids will read it on their own.

Here are a few scattered recollections from first days of school past:

• On the first day of seventh grade, at least six kids showed up wearing the same Green Day "Dookie" shirt. (But not me! I was proudly wearing my Weezer "Blue Album" t-shirt.) They weren't even friends either, so I doubt they coordinated it. By November, it was impossible to find a seventh grader who hadn't disavowed the album completely. Seventh graders were fickle like that.

• As a first-year teacher, I wanted to make an immediate impression on my kids and I guess I felt that going through my syllabus, while informative, just wouldn't do the trick. So I started off the first period of my first class by reciting all of "A Boy Named Sue" from memory. I guess it did the trick, but I'm still not exactly positive why I did that. And it's definitely not something I'll ever do again - especially on the first day.

• I used to give this little questionnaire to my students on the first day, which asked them to provide some basic biographical information and a fun fact about themselves. The fun facts were almost never interesting. I have no doubt that many of the kids did in fact have a fun fact or two to share, but they generally went for the safest, blandest statement they could muster. Like, "I like soccer" or "My favorite color is blue." One time though, a student wrote down, "I am one of only two Asian students in this class." And then, another one wrote, "I am the other Asian." So that was helpful.

• I once asked a student what her name was, and she told me that it was "Shadee." I've since learned that Shadee is a Persian name meaning "happiness," but at the time I had never heard it before and I couldn't understand what she was saying. I thought the girl (who incidentally turned out to be totally lovely and sweet) was saying "Shorty" - or more accurately, "Shawty." As in "Dayummmm Shawty!" Basically, I thought she was having a laugh at my expense. So I think I said something sarcastic like, "Ok, whatever, Shawty." And then I looked down at my roster, and felt like a jerk.

• On my first day at B.L. I tried to engage my class in some sort of name game icebreaker. This was pretty standard procedure in public school when I taught classes of thirty or so kids. But this didn't work quite as well for a class of ten boys, most of whom had known each other since kindergarten. "We already know each other's names," one of them told me, "Actually, you're the only one we don't know."

Keeping Score

When I was nine years old, my dad took me to my first baseball game - at Fenway Park, to see the Sox play the Tigers. In an effort to teach me the game and to keep me engaged, he bought me a score card and taught me how to keep score. Actually, he taught me a primitive method of score-keeping, appropriate to a boy who still wasn't sure what a shortstop was. His version was simply one horizontal line for a single, two for a double, three for a triple, etc. He didn't realize that he was creating a monster. In the twenty-five years since, I almost never go to baseball games without keeping score.

That's a lot of baseball too: I'm going to estimate that I go to about twelve major league games per year on average. In some years it's many more: I've already been to fifteen so far in 2016. (And I'll be at Camden Yards tonight, and again on Friday.) That number probably spiked in around 2010, when I had no wife to answer to, and Nationals Park was a mere twenty-minute Metro ride away. Then again, it was a little tougher to get to games during my childhood, when doing so required me to convince an adult to provide me with a ticket and transportation.

Conservatively, I'm going to estimate that I've been to somewhere between 250 and 275 major league games, at twenty-six different stadiums. And probably another twenty or so minor league games.

I've had my scorecard with me for almost all of them, and at times, it has proven pretty inconvenient to carry around a spiral notebook that you'd like to keep dry, free of mustard stains and in otherwise pristine - or at least legible - condition. Two weeks ago, I took it with me to the park and, when it started to downpour, ended up spending more than two hours with it tucked under my shirt. Another time, after a Nationals Game, I brought it with me to a bar in Adams Morgan, where I learned that most girls aren't all that impressed with baseball score book - even when it contains the full box score from Stephen Strasburg's debut. Once, at a Pawtucket Red Sox game, a guy asked me if I was a professional scout, to which I responded, "No, just a professional nerd."

I have a fanatical devotion to accuracy in my scoring. Rationally, I concede that it makes no sense: in the age of the internet, anyone can easily look up a box score from any game and find a much more detailed, even scientific account of what happened. Still, I find myself panicking sometimes when I miss a play. "Wait, did Davis just strike out looking or swinging?? Did anyone see that?" Although, I'm not above looking up the answers online.

I've taught Maya to keep score too. Turns out, it's kind of something I require in a spouse. She's actually great at it. Sure, she sometimes forgets the difference between a forward and a backward K, but that's splitting hairs.

Trying to understand my commitment to scoring, a friend asked me last week if I used to play baseball. "Yes," I told him, "I was pretty bad at it. But I think I'm pretty good at scoring. So I've kept up with that."

Paying it Forward

Last night at the Camden Yards, I bought two beers and was bringing them up to my seat. I handed one of them to a friend, but as I was about to sit down, I got distracted by something behind me and spilled a few drops - about an ounce, really - on the head of the boy in from of me. He was probably about eleven years old, and was sitting next to his dad. Both of them were keeping score. The boy just kind of rubbed his head in confusion, but the dad glared at me. It was an honest mistake, and I apologized, but still I was embarrassed.

As I sat there for the next half inning or so, I had a little flashback of going to Shea Stadium with my dad when I was eleven or twelve, and hearing him grumble about the obnoxious drunk guys sitting behind us. And I thought about the drunk bros whose presence I had to endure at an outdoor concert about a month ago. (The back of my t-shirt was fairly soaked with Bud Light by the end of the ordeal.) I wanted to explain to the man in front of me that I wasn't even drunk, that I was an upstanding citizen, a high school teacher and a generally good guy. I wanted to explain that I was especially non-threatening and decent  in comparison to your run-of-the-mill bleacher rum. But at that moment, to that guy, I was just the idiot who spilled beer on his son.

An inning later, the two of them moved seats to a spot a couple rows behind us - which officially made me the guy who prompts families to change seats at a baseball game. I couldn't deal with that. So between innings, I approached the two of them, apologized again and asked if either of them needed a hot dog or an ice cream. The dad played it off: "No thanks. Don't worry about it." So I asked the kid, if he liked ice cream and predictably, he nodded his head yes. So I went down into the concourse and picked up an overpriced dish of vanilla soft serve with orange and black sprinkles.

I'd never really done anything like that before and it made me feel good. But honestly - and I really wish this wasn't the case - I was a little sorry that a few more people didn't witness me doing what I thought was a really nice thing. And that kind of defeats the purpose: you're supposed to do something like that because it's the right thing to do, not because you want the accolades.

I really wish I could have been like the guy I met a few years ago at Primanti Brothers restaurant in Pittsburgh: I told him it was my first time eating the famous sandwich, he gave me a recommendation and we chatted for a while. Only after he left and I went to pay my bill did I learn that he had picked up my tab. No accolades necessary for that guy:apparently, the satisfaction of doing a nice thing for someone else was enough. And he didn't even have to pour beer on me first.

But I doubt I would have done something like that if I hadn't been motivated by my own guilt. I want to think that's not the case, but it probably is. And I probably wouldn't have done it if the recipient wasn't there to thank me. Still though, I'm glad the kid enjoyed his ice cream. And I'm glad that when that dad and son got home, and mom asked why her son smelled like stale beer, dad could have been able to say, "Some idiot spilled beer on his head. But then he made up for it."

First Seven Jobs

Lately, people have been posting their first seven jobs on Facebook. Reading the lists has made me feel a little regretful that I didn't have cooler jobs. I've been a classroom teacher, in some form or other, since fall of 2004, so it's not like I've experienced a great deal of variety. I've also noticed that I seem to be one of the few people who has never had a real physical, blue collar job. I've never painted houses or worked construction or done landscaping. (Actually, the first time I mowed the lawn was just a couple years ago, after I bought my house.) So I kind of feel like I missed out in that regard too. Still, I have had some interesting little gigs here and there. My chronology may be a little off, but here's my list:

1 - Camp Counselor

For probably too many summers, I worked as a camp counselor. I spent time at two different camps: three summers at a local day camp and I think five summers at a sleep away camp in the Poconos. Despite all this experience, I was never a big rah-rah summer camp guy. This was especially apparent at the sleep-away camp, where I always felt like the only guy who wasn't drinking the Kool-Aid. I have the fondest memories of my first and second summer at that day camp: I worked there with my best friends, Michael and Shawn, and our experiences there probably warrant their own post some other time.

2 - Intern at Medscape.com

After two years of playing dodge ball with kids, it was decided that I should find a job more likely to prepare me for the work force. A friend of my parents offered me an internship at Medscape.com, a kind of online database of medical news, not unlike WebMD. (Full disclosure: I'm still not entirely sure what the company does or who visits the website.) I worked in the Sales department and they didn't really have much for me to do, so for about a month, I would occasionally file things, while attempting to look busy for the rest of the time. The office was in Manhattan, which was probably the job's biggest perk. I felt very sophisticated taking NJ Transit into the city every day. After about a month, my parents' friend (my boss) called to tell me that he was sorry but the company was losing money and he could no longer afford to pay me. No one who has ever been laid off was ever as happy as I was. By the next week, I was back at day camp.

3 - Floor Model at Abercrombie & Fitch

Admittedly, this is a little misleading. I wasn't one of those guys who stood in the entrance flexing and looking bored. But I don't exactly remember what my responsibilities were, aside from wearing A&F clothing (only from the current season) and occasionally folding shirts. In fact, I think the managers gave us as little training as possible so we would appear too cool to answer customers' questions, when really we just didn't have any answers. So essentially, I was just a living, breathing mannequin, I guess. I worked here for only about three weeks, and I think I spent everything I earned on A&F stuff. It was actually even more boring than the website internship - but hey, it gave me some much-needed street cred with my students.



4 - Music Librarian

Most kids at Kenyon didn't even know the music library existed: it was a dingy, outdated office in the attic. But the handful of music majors went up there on a semi-regular basis, and because I was one of them, I was given first priority to work there. I worked maybe six hours a week and was paid maybe $5 an hour, which was about enough for beer money. There was a desktop computer in the office, which you weren't supposed to use while you were on duty, for some reason (lest one of your two or three customers think you unprofessional?)

5 - Substitute Teacher

In order to be a substitute teacher in Chatham, New Jersey, you must have two things: 1.) Two years of college experience, and 2.) A certificate proclaiming you don't have tuberculosis. By winter break of my junior year, I had both of these things and so, during my time off from school, I filled in as needed. The life of a substitute teacher is a strange one: I was at various times a kindergarten music teacher, an aid in a special ed class, and a gym coach. Weirdest of all, I once filled in for my sister's science teacher, and thus, wound up with her in my class. (I balked when she asked me if she could leave early to go to her car, until she reminded me that she was my ride home...)

6 - Middle School Music Teacher

In the fall after my college graduation, I received word that the conductor of the middle school string orchestra in Basking Ridge was about to go on maternity leave and that they were desperate for a replacement. I only played cello - but that was apparently one more string instrument than anyone else who could be hired on short notice. So I applied, and they gave it to me. I studied music in college but had never conducted an orchestra, so I was mostly faking my way through. The kids were nice though, and the big spring concert was quite an experience. I don't think I fully appreciated the lack of grading at the time.

7 - High School English Teacher

And the rest is history.

Song Lyrics that Bother Me

Well, I'm just about out of things to say about my receptionist job. It's been an enlightening five weeks, and I'm sure I'll miss the relative peace and quiet of the desk, although it will be nice to get up and stretch my legs once in a while without feeling like someone will be locked out of the building because I'm not there to let them in.

Let's change the subject. Since the list format seems to be working well, here's a list of some of song lyrics that bother me.

• "We found love in a hopeless place./We found love in a hopeless place." - Rihanna and Calvin Harris, We Found Love

Where, exactly, was this hopeless place? A Greyhound Station? The Dollar Store? North Korea?

• "It's five o'clock somewhere." - Jimmy Buffett, Alan Jackson, It's Five O'Clock Somewhere

I know I'm splitting hairs here, but this is just factually inaccurate. If it's the beginning of the hour, then yes, I'm sure it's five o'clock somewhere, but if it's say, 2:37, then it's 5:00 nowhere. It's 5:37 somewhere, but that's not the same thing. The lyrics should be: "It's five o'clock or later somewhere," which I grant you, doesn't roll off the tongue quite as easily.

• "If I lay here/If I just lay here/Would you lie with me and just forget the world?" - Snow Patrol, Chasing Cars

There are many reasons to dislike this corny song, but chief among them is its shitty grammar. As every English teacher knows, it should be "If I lie here" or "If I lay my head here" or something. And honestly, this is one case where the grammatically correct line (the first one, anyway) would take nothing away from the song. Honestly, it seems like these guys are just being willfully ungrammatical.

• "Been around the world/Don't speak their language./But your booty don't need explaining." - Jason Derulo, Talk Dirty

I don't think I need to explain why this is a silly line. For some reason, the words "booty" and "explaining" in the same line just remind me of this scene from Ace Ventura.

• "Lightning crashes, a new mother cries./Her placenta falls to the floor." - Live, Lightning Crashes

I actually still love this song, but this is just not an accurate depiction of childbirth. In what world does the placenta just fall to the floor? Also, why would you include the word "placenta" in a rock song? When I was fourteen, this line led to an awkward conversation that I inadvertently initiated by asking my mom what a placenta was. Thanks a lot, Live.

UPDATE: My wife informs me that during childbirth, a placenta will often fall to the floor, unless there is a basin there to catch it. So it's not inaccurate, but it's still kind of a gross line.

Obviously, this is not a comprehensive list. I could easily have included Rebecca Black or Nikki Minaj or something, but that just seems like low-hanging fruit.

More Highlights

I almost forgot - one of my main responsibilities at the front desk is to take care of a tiny fish, entrusted to me by one of our science teachers. (Because leaving your pet with the receptionist at your place of employment for six weeks is just a no-brainer.) The fish (whose name is either "Cody" or just "Guppy" - I'm not sure which) seems to be doing fine, although I feel guilty that he is alone in his tiny tank. However, he seems enthusiastic (to the extent that any fish can seem enthusiastic, I guess) about eating the three little flakes of smelly fish food that I've been instructed to crumble up and toss into his tank every morning.

Yesterday, a woman called asking to be connected with "either someone in the I.T. department or in dining services." I spent the next hour or so trying to come up with a scenario in which speaking to someone from I.T. would be just as helpful as speaking to someone in dining services, but I just couldn't think of one. I need to know the backstory here.

Every few days or so, we get a catalog in the mail addressed to "Head Cheerleading Coach." Apparently, someone either doesn't realize or doesn't care that this position is vacant here, as I imagine it is at most all-boys' schools. One of the perks of my job is designating an Honorary Head Cheerleading Coach to be the recipient of the catalog.

FYI - I've finished Making a Murderer, and will be progressing to Season 2 of Bloodline this afternoon.

Some highlights from the past two days:

Me: Good afternoon, Boys' Latin.

Caller: Yes, is Mr. Stephon available?

Me: Mr. Stephon?

Caller: Stephon? DaBin? DaBonne?

Me: Are you looking for Steve Dubin?

Caller: Yes please.

Me: Good afternoon, Boys' Latin.

Caller: This Royal Farms?

Me: I'm sorry?

Caller: Is Royal Farms there?

Me: Royal Farms?

Caller: Sorry. [dial tone]

Me: Good Morning, Boys' Latin
Caller: Good morning to you. Am I speaking with Ann-Marie?
Me: Uh no. But I can transfer you if you want.
Caller: Thank you.

Dude. I have about the same vocal register as Johnny Cash. Do I really sound like an Ann-Marie??

Me: Good morning, Boys' Latin.

Caller: Hi this is Josh! Can you hear me ok?

Me: Yes.

Caller: I'm calling with good news! You and your entire household have been pre-selected to receive a Disney vacation!

Me: Awesome! Does my "household" include all of the students and faculty? Or is it just the upper school?

[dial tone]

Me: Good afternoon, Boys' Latin.
Caller: Hi, can I speak to Stephen?
Me: Stephen... Dubin?
Caller: [slightly annoyed] Yeah, Stephen.

Me: Good morning, Boys' Latin.

Caller: ATTENTION! THIS IS AN IMPORTANT ANNOUNCEMENT! PLEASE DO NOT HANG UP!

Me: [hangs up]

Notes from the Receptionist's Desk

I've taught high school English for ten years now, and during that time, I've accumulated a wealth of funny anecdotes about my students. For a while, some colleagues and I maintained a shared Google document simply called The Database, in which we collected "highlights" of student writing. I still have that document somewhere, and it's definitely worth at least one post of its own.

This is my first (and possibly only) summer working at my school's front desk. It's an extremely simple job, consisting of three basic elements:

1 - Answering the phone and transferring callers to the extension they request
2 - Unlocking the front door when people ring the bell
3 - Sorting the mail

My favorite part about answering the phone is that I'm not really expected to provide any information - all I need to do is pawn off the call on someone who knows more than I do (which is to say, anyone else in the building). I've used the rest of my time at the front desk for: 1 - writing, 2 - reading, and 3 - binge-watching Making a Murderer on Netflix.

Because I don't have nearly as much daily human contact at the front desk as I generally have during the school year, I haven't collected nearly as many amusing stories. However, I've been fascinated by the handful of unusual calls that trickle in every day.

CALLERS WHO AREN'T AWARE THAT MANY PEOPLE SHARE THE SAME NAME

Me: Good morning, Boys' Latin.
Caller: Hi, is Cathy there?
Me: Depends on which of the six Cathys you are looking for...

OVER-EXPLAINERS

Me; Good morning, Boys' Latin.
Caller: Hi, my son is going to be a ninth grader in the fall. He is 5'5, 125 lbs. He plays lacrosse and he's thinking about cross country, but he isn't really sure. I think cross country tryouts already started, so I don't know if it's too late to try out for the team, but he's still interested and he was hoping to speak to the coach. Can you tell me if cross country practices are still going on?
Me: Uh, I'm not sure, but I can transfer you to athletics if you'd like.
Caller: Sure, that would be great!

CALLERS WHO DON'T UNDERSTAND HOW EXTENSIONS WORK

Me: Good morning, Boys' Latin.
Caller: Steve!
Me: um... are you looking for Steve? I can transfer you over.
Caller: Oh, sure. Thanks.

Or my favorite...

Me: Good morning, Boys' Latin.
Caller: Hi! It's your sister!
Me: [thinking, why would Julia be calling me here before noon on a Monday.] um... this is Alex at the front desk.
Caller: Oh. Can you transfer me over to Jimmy? This is his sister!

CALLERS WHO JUST DIDN'T KNOW WHO ELSE TO CALL

Caller: Hi, I'm looking for a reputable florist.

Caller: Can you help me out? I'm trying to rent out your football field for my eight-year-old's birthday party.

Caller: Do you know where I can rent a van?

OBVIOUS SCAMS

Me: Good morning, Boys' Latin.
Automated Message: HELLO THIS IS YOUR SECOND WARNING FROM THE I.R.S.
Me: [hangs up]

And, of course, this absolute gem, which I can only assume was totally inept attempt at a scam...

Me: Good morning, Boys' Latin.
Caller: Hi, I'm looking to speak to the owner please.
Me: ... the owner?
Caller: Yes, the owner of the boys - (ABRUPT DIAL TONE)

OTHER OBSERVATIONS

I take pride in changing my greeting from "Good morning, Boys' Latin" to "Good afternoon, Boys' Latin" at exactly noon every day. It's called professional integrity.

Yesterday, B.L. received an automated call from the Donald Trump campaign. I present this without comment.

At around hour six of my shift yesterday, I clipped my fingernails. It probably wasn't the most professional thing I could have done.

You've Got a Frenemy

So I know I just said that I'm instituting a limit of 300 words on all blog entries, but there is one loophole: from time to time, I write little essays that I send around to various publications. Usually, they don't get picked up. (In fact, I'm sort of still waiting for my first.) If I can't find a taker for something I've written, but I still want to share it, I think this is a good place to do it.

Last year, I submitted a short piece for an essay contest. The theme was "enemies." My piece was rejected almost immediately, which I get is part of the deal when you submit things. (A buddy of mine who writes poetry told me yesterday that his goal is to receive fifty rejection letters before the end of the year. He is up to thirty-one.) Anyway, I think it's not bad, but I also can't find a home for it. So, here you go!

You’ve Got a Frenemy

Every so often, the Oxford English Dictionary decides to update its entries, which prompts a run of amusing news briefs about the words that have made the cut. The new words are usually what most of us think of as trite neologisms –  “twerk,” “selfie” and “muffin top” are all recent additions – and we tend to scoff or roll our eyes at the unlikeliness of their being added to a formal written record of the English language. Without the benefit of at least a decade’s worth of perspective, it’s hard to tell which of these words will end up surviving their generation, and which are doomed to one day sound hopelessly dated. The jury is still out on “frenemy,” which was added in 2010, despite having made its first recorded appearance in 1954 (in a Walter Winchell column about U.S.-Russian relations, no less). There’s still plenty of time for it to go the way of “betamax,” which the OED saw fit to add to its 1975 edition, but which has now been so thoroughly expunged from the language that Microsoft Word underlines it with a red squiggle.

            So I’m aware that it’s premature to anoint “frenemy” as a timeless term – and yet, has there been a more important addition to the language in the last decade? The word undoubtedly fills a need. To properly assess its value, just think of what it replaced when it entered the vernacular: “rival,” “adversary” and most obviously, “enemy.” All three serve their purpose, sure, but compared to “frenemy,” they seem a little bit simplistic. The relationship between frenemies is a complex one: to the untrained eye, it looks the same as a friendship. It should be a friendship, and in some cases, the two participants may have even convinced themselves, and each other, that it is one. But a frenemy-ship (the OED’s next entry?) is rife with underlying tension that crosses the boundary of normal friendly competition into something darker. Of any rough synonym, “rival” probably comes the closest, but still falls woefully short of capturing the conflict between inner thoughts and outer semblances that all frenemies have experienced.

            Surely, “Frenemy” describes a more specific type of relationship, than its parent word, “Enemy,” and as a result, we might expect its use to be fairly narrow, but I’m not so sure. Frenemy-ships are universal and vastly predate the term itself. One of my favorite novels, John Knowles’  A Separate Peace, which is as poignant to me now as it was when I first read it in high school, rings true because it sensitively and realistically illustrates the feelings of its narrator, Gene, towards his ostensible friend (and actual frenemy) Finny. So powerful are these feelings that they ultimately bring Gene to impulsively injure Finny – by shaking him out of a tree as the two of them prepare to jump into the river below. In the past, when I prepared students in my ninth grade English classes to read this novel, I asked them whether they had ever experienced an intense, yet unspoken rivalry with a friend, and I often saw a glint of recognition on some faces as I scanned the room. A girl once confided to the class that she sometimes purposely over-salted her sister’s food in an effort to take her down a peg, by causing her to gain an extra pound or two.

A complicated relationship with a frenemy is a consummate part of the fourteen-year-old experience, but unlike acne, it’s likely to linger into adulthood as well. At any age, quickly identifying a frenemy tends to be far easier than identifying a true enemy.  Every fall, when my ninth graders have finished first drafts of their essays, I encourage them to read their work aloud. “Read it to a family member or a pet or a friend,” I suggest. And here I pause to give the impression that I’m grasping for words, even though I know exactly what I want to say: “Or an enemy.” That usually gets a chuckle – maybe because it’s inherently funny to even think of using an essay draft as a weapon. But I also wonder if perhaps the mere notion of having an enemy is in itself fairly ludicrous. The word’s connotations are highly melodramatic: we reserve it to describe a person whose only purpose on earth is to oppose us – to create obstacles that we must surmount. Honestly, in this day and age, what kind of narcissist speaks about his or her “enemies” with a straight face? Superheroes have enemies. So do supervillains, west coast rappers and, probably, Donald Trump. The list is really short: even the president, when referring to a country with an adversarial relationship to the U.S., shies away from the E word.

I remember a brawl during the 1998 baseball season between outfielder Gary Sheffield, then with the Dodgers, and Pirates catcher Jason Kendall. (I think it was precipitated by a play at the plate, but the circumstances aren’t really important.) An awkward situation was created just a week later when both players were forced to share a dugout as teammates on the National League All-Star team. Rather than making amends, or at least keeping himself at a comfortable distance from Kendall, Sheffield told the press, “He’s my enemy. I wouldn’t walk down to the other end of the clubhouse to shake his hand.” It seemed to me a cartoonishly aggressive line: one that could have been convincingly attributed to a sneering movie villain like Clubber Lang, Mr. T’s memorable character from Rocky III. It made for good theater, though, because the protagonist vs. enemy, good guy vs. bad conflict is a time-honored story construction that never seems to get old. There is something comforting about Little Red Riding Hood vs. the Big Bad Wolf, Peter Pan vs. Captain Hook, Simba vs. Scar.  We like knowing exactly who to root for, and we often find it refreshing and invigorating to encounter an antagonist so obviously evil that we can boo and hiss with absolutely no reservations.

But we also tend to tire of such reductive characterizations. We learn, upon reaching adulthood, that real people are too complex to be defined simply as heroes or villains – and most of us demand television and movies that reflect this complexity. Actually, there is a strong argument that despite the interminable parade of generic super hero flicks that grace movie screens every summer, audiences have grown more sophisticated than ever when it comes to their expectations for fictional characters. The success of recent HBO shows like The Wire and Game of Thrones can be attributed in large part to characters like Omar and Tyrion Lannister, who are so morally ambiguous that they are bound to evoke a wide array of reactions. Even a thoroughly evil character like Joffrey was able to elicit sympathy from some fans (though certainly not all) in his final hour. Two-dimensional villains generally don’t do it for us anymore. Witness the evolution of the Joker: Jack Nicholson’s malevolent lunatic from the 1992 film is no longer enough. The Dark Knight , released in 2008, delved into the same character’s backstory, attempting to satisfy our questions about what made him tick. As Chris Rock once asked, in response to the popular tendency to psychoanalyze the Columbine shooters, “Whatever happened to ‘crazy’?”

Crazy. Villain. Evil. Enemy.  We have become increasingly

uncomfortable about applying these labels too rashly. Should we pat 

ourselves on the back for being more empathetic than our parents, who 

flung them around willy-nilly? Judging from the pleasantries exchanged 

during the rush hour commute, or the invective hurled at Red Sox fans

with the gall to enter Yankee Stadium, or the political discourse on cable 

news that often develops into petty arguing, cruelty and antagonism are 

alive and well. There are plenty of people in my life whom I dislike. I call 

them frenemies, or I call them rivals, or opponents, or else, if they really 

deserve it, I call them jerks. But with words like these, who needs 

“enemies”?