Crayola! The Movie

I suppose I have been goofing of just about long enough on his site. I have been promising you a story of such ...humongous proportions, as to put all my other stories to shame.

Damn the quality, I am going for sheer size...There will be no humor...(that shouldn't be hard), and I will use every trick of writing I know, to stretch this story out till it is massive.................I mean really massive...really really massive..huge. Multiple tomes even. I will be utilizing tons of hanging participles.........you'll see..........

I'll speak and write in 1st person for sure. Then I will showcase his abilities as a writer by calling attention to his 2nd person style because he like to show off. Unless somebody blows the whistle on it and the 3rd person style rears it's ugly head.

Yes I will pad pad pad and pad to make this the biggest one ever. However, you are all going going to have to step back a ways so I have room enough to whip it out.......

Once upon a, long long ago in a galaxy far far away, it was the best of times. (Whaddya think so far? Pretty catchy opener huh?)

Back in the days of my youth, I was a student at a Minneapolis Public Jr/Sr High School. For the purpose of the story, it is incumbent on me to describe a few things about myself to you, as it will be pertinent later.

I was a creative and brainy geek, and a complete non-trouble maker in school. I had just one thing on my mind all during those years.....no, not that..well ok that too but mostly, that came later..All I thought about was the arts. Music, Theater, Writing...It was what I wanted to do..... that and I read like 3 books a week... Ok put that kid in your mind

Then, think back and add that guy to the kid you knew in Jr and Sr high school that was in the band..AND the choir....and on the debate team, add to him, a 5 foot 4 inch frame and a extremely verbal approach to combating bullies. Toss in the fact that I was that "shitty little munchkin" that by scoring 8 or 9 better that everyone, used to screw up the bell curve of practically every test I ever took, thereby ensuring that I got the only A. I'm sure you can see why I was, shall we say, a bit marginalized by my fellow students and did not really enjoy school very much.

I actually think I could have, but I spent way to much of my school career running for my life. I was regularly stuffed into locked gym lockers for fun and games, or because some knuckle dragging football neanderthal thought I was personally responsible for his Cro-Magnon like test scores.

Or, there was the entire winter of my 8th grade, where I hid from a Len Dean in the school library. Why??? It seems I helped his girlfriend ace a history final and she said she thought I was smart and nice...... thereby throwing the "going postal on the geek" hormone switch on Len, who literally stalked me for 2 months with a nine iron. (He was the co-captain of the golf team)....Now I figured I was safe in the library for two reasons. First, I am pretty sure he couldn't read and so I don't think he even knew where the library was. And second, he had the attention span of a two year old mainlining Tele Tubbies, so I figured I just had to wait till Kim (his girlfriend) got tired of him and left him for some "quarterback" and Len would forget about "mashing" me.....Oh yes, I learned to be a creative thinker in school. My life depended on it.

Yup!! School!!!! The memories the memories...

Wow, I have managed to write a ton and I haven't even started my story yet...
If I keep this up, I will need a bigger monitor to hold all the words...

On with the main event.

Anyway, you should be now have enough background for me to start my story. You also have enough background to feel sorry for me. This is just what I was aiming for. Now when you start my story you will already be on my side. This is what is know in the writing world as.....sucking up to the reader so you will buy my bs.

In ninth grade I ended up getting stuck with Lorraine Tealander as my English teacher..(All names have remain the same, as it is pertinent...plus she deserves the recognition)

I did not want her for a number of reasons.

She was probably the oldest active teacher on record. I am not sure, but my own careful estimates placed her somewhere around 536 years old give or take a few. Now being old enough to say you celebrated Columbus day WITH Columbus gives you fair bragging rights and a shot of being, at least an interesting History teacher if not history yourself, but otherwise this is just too old to be teaching 9th graders.

I seriously think she was a willing role model for the Wicked Witch of the West. She was condescending and utterly out of touch with the kids and the curriculum. And she was mean...really..just plain mean..to everyone, but mostly to her students. And the kids HATED her. Heck, I hated her, and I was the poster boy for "the need of tolerance for the differences in others".

She should have retired long before this, but she had tenure, and I believe a deep seated need to destroy young adults self confidence...what a role model!!!

Ms. Tealander, (never married... betcha never would have guessed that) had been hung with a rather mean nickname for most of the years of her teaching career. She kept a hot plate and a teapot always simmering in her office and so she earned the nickname of Teabag or Teahag. No one knew if it was because she drank the tea or because of her resemblance to the bag itself after it had been left out, for oh, say, about 40 days. That was the impetus for the nick name. And she looked the part, believe me. Anyway, I resigned myself to a boring year in english and hoped she wasn't going to be too bad. Ha! We clashed on the first day. I am talking "Mountain Dew, mountain ram head butting, clash of the titans clash.

First day.. she has the entire class come to the board to do penmanship.......ARRRRRRRRRRRGGGGHHHHHHHHHH!!

Something I failed to mention? My handwriting is bad. Ozzy Osbourne with Cerebral Palsy bad.... no...not even that good.... think Ozzy Osbourne with Cerebral Palsy AND Tourettes Syndrome on Acid bad.....No Kidding.....so after about ten minutes at the board she starts sitting down the class until I am the only one standing up there writing with my stubby piece of chalk. over and over and over..Penmanship reflects your commitment to excellencePenmanship reflects your commitment to excellencePenmanship reflects your commitment to excellence. Hell! she had let guys sit down who were writing ..Penmenship reflects your comitmint to exselence!!..Grrrrrrr..then she says....(and NOT in a funny haha way) "Mr Boniface you write like a retard. Maybe I should get you a crayon to write with" (This is true. she actually said that to me in front of the class...) Oh this was going to be a bad... But I am a willow I say to myself, I can bend. I figured she would ease off after the trimester got going............ uhh no..... it didn't...it got worse... The very first day, we were given a paper to write. She insisted all papers were to be written by hand, in ink....Bummer! But, I did as asked, wrote slowly and neatly (for me), and then I turned in my first writing assignment and waited for it to be graded.

Now, in my life, I can count the number of english papers that I wrote, that did not get an A+, on one hand after an industrial accident. I waited and waited and she never gave it back to me. So after class, I knocked on her door and waited..(she always made you wait). I asked, about my paper? She dismissivly pointed to the waste basket. I looked down and there it was. She said "I am giving you an incomplete for that trash. You will have to do better or I'll throw the garbage where it belongs...I am seriously concerned that you might be retarded with penmanship that bad." I was so pissed! I reached down for it and picked it out of the trash.... What the hell? I thought....I grabbed it and she said it didn't matter.. It was an incomplete anyway.

And so began my battle with Teahag!

For the next few weeks I wrote and wrote, turned in a number of papers all in ink and they came back with D's and F's!!!! D's and F"s? I had never gotten one in my life, in any class. I tried negotiating with her. "I understand you want me to work on penmanship and I will continue to do so,
but let me do it in pencil so I can erase my errors"..."NO!"....

"Let me type it and then write it out in ink. I'll do it twice" ... "NO!"......
I was at the end of my rope.
Then it happened... at the halfway mark of the trimester..I got a notice that said I was failing her class!!!!! I freaked !!

It took me a week to tell my mom. She was cool about it asked what was up and I told her. She went down to "have a little talk" with Ms Tealander and my counselor. She came back about an hour later really steamed, but she said it was resolved. "Try to get through the rest of the class if you can. And get someone different next tri."

I go in the next day and the old bat calls me into her office and says she isn't just going to roll over and give me an A no matter what anyone thinks.

And the abuse continues...Arrrgggh

So the Trimester is finally coming to an end and the final for this class is to write an original short story, a minimum of 20 pages, any subject. The final will be worth 30% of the final grade.

I have an idea..
So I go to the drug store and I buy 50 Big Boy tablets. You know, the ones with the lines and stuff from early grade school. And then I buy a bunch of boxes of Crayons....and a sharpener.... I then spent more time writing a short story then I have ever spent in my life.

I concocted this fabulous little allegorical tale filled with characters named Durjeeding Earl Of Bergamot, Doolong, Lipsing...who are all trying to capture and kill the evil, ugly, ancient Queen Infusia. Who was trying to suck the life out of the world......I never had so much fun writing a paper in my life. After it was finished, I spent literally 3 full days writing the damn thing out in purple crayon. I would go 10 or 12 words than sharpen the crayon to a fine point and go again. Of course, because I had all the dotted lines to help, I wrote it in as close to perfect penmanship as I could get it. Because the pages were short, if I screwed one up, it was no big loss to start that page over.

It ran close to 125 pages. It was like a small phone book. It was so sweet, I walked in with it in bag. It was so big, I didn't want her to see it till I turned it in.
she asked for the papers to come forward and i pull mine out and put it on the pile.....she looks down and just about has a stroke when she saw the title.

"T Land"

She just about coughed up blood she was so pissed. she immediately threw it in the garbage, but I was ready for that and walked over to retrieve it. She actually tried to stop me from getting it .. then she ordered me to the Principals office.

The Principal I should tell you, had his double doctorate in English literature, and European History. I sat in that office for an hour before she came down. She demanded that I be expelled for my insolence. Dr. Schnieder asked if she had read the paper..she said she did not and would not. period.

I had all the rest of my papers for the trimester with me. (You could say I had planned ahead) I explained what the trimester had been like for me, and gave him all my papers. He wanted to read the crayon one, so he did, with Ms. Tealander just fuming in the chair next to me. He kept laughing and looking up to see Ms. Tealander hrumphing. When he finished he asked her to read it but she wouldn't. When Dr. Schnieder asked her what she was going to give me for a final grade, she said she was going to fail me. He said that would not do and gave me a B for my final. ( the only B I ever got in english)

He told me years later when he shook my hand during graduation ceremonies, that he thought it was one of the best papers he had ever read and was certainly the most memorable.....

Unfortunately, he kept my manuscript. He said it was the price I had to pay for him stepping in and saving my ass. I would love to have it, and maybe some day I'll find him and ask if he still has it and if would he consider giving it back. (Last I heard he had left administration and was back teaching E Lit at an Ivy League school.

But it's ok, my family often tells the story of me sitting at the dining room table for 3 days writing my short story in purple crayon and that is good enough for me. And now I have told all of you.

Posted by Jack at March 14, 2003 06:22 AM