Class Assignment

And now for today’s assignment - Making something bad out of something good. No wait that is too easy - make something good out of something bad. Now that is a challenge.

“To take something perceived ‘bad’ and to reframe it into something good. That was the assignment the teacher gave us. Why ? I don’t know. I think he sits up nights thinking of ways to torture us poor students. I think that he is a monster and should be fired and then we could get a good teacher and that would be a good thing. The End.”

The speaker was Angie Carlyle seventeen year old student in my creative writing class at Aunt MacArthur’s Halfway house for troubled teens of the southern suburbs who are rich enough to hire a good lawyer and thus get sentenced to hours upon hours of counseling and community service. My class counts as both community service (in the sense that if these kids are off the streets, the community is served) and counselling (in the sense that I give them advice to make some part of their life better). It is thus very popular with the growing population of upper middle class juvenile delinquents. I have a waiting list.

I give Angie an ‘A’ for doing the assignment. She did make something good out of something bad. I also write in my case notes that Angie persists in her rebelliousness and needs further counselling. I recommend another six week session in my class with the possibility of further sessions. I get paid by the student. I get paid to listen to teenage angst and attitude, most of which I find to be completely unimaginative. My goal is to make better whiners and more engaging arguers. If they become better people in the process so be it, but I do not have my hopes up.

The next student, Calvin Hobbinton reads his essay.
“I think that its a bummer how we don’t get to smoke weed. Lots of dudes are doing it and just because some old tight wad weeny wacking piece of shit judge doesn’t like the way I look I gotta do this crappy assignment. Plus I don’t get to hang with my Bros. And to lame it all out, I gotta come up with a happy ending. So I guess that I’ll have a flashback about grooving with my babe doing a number and wait happily to hear my scores. How about it, Mr. teacher-judge ?”

I think about telling Calvin it would be a happier ending if we were all buzzed but decide that this might send the wrong message. So I tell him to make a happier ending. He looks at me blankly. I get that reaction alot. I suggest that he say why this class is better than being at home with his parents. His blank look continues. I ask him if the judge who sentenced him to seven consecutive live terms of community service is in this class ?
“Nnno” he answers slowly. I can’t figure out if he is confused, cautious or is trying to access a part of his brain that has been damaged by drugs. I decided that it must be all three.
“Then is it a good thing that he is not here ?”
“She” corrects Calvin, “tightass bitch” he says while grinding his teeth.
“Then is it a good thing that SHE is not here ?” There is now more light in the room than before and the reason is that a light bulb has become illuminated over Calvin’s head.
“So the happy ending is that she is not here !” Calvin’s head is bobbing up and down in a staccato fashion. He is happy and suddenly the universe makes much more sense than it did before. I am a happy too. I consider Calvin to be one of my brighter stars. Some day, I think, he’ll work in Hollywood. Well, okay not maybe work, but get paid in Hollywood. Somebody will write down his ramblings and hit it big. Hmmm, maybe Calvin should also stay in my class for a few more sessions.
The next two minutes are spent trying to get Calvin to sit down. He is so happy that he is telling everyone in the class that SHE IS NOT HERE, CAN YOU BELIEVE IT, THIS IS SO COOL.

The next to read is Marla Ab Lan Gatta. Reading is a big step for her, at least to other people, living in the flesh people and not icons on the internet. Marla is not allowed to be within 100 feet of any machine that can give her access to the internet (I miss my iPhone). Marla is currently going through laptop withdrawal. She has folded her spiral notebook in half and reads from the top half.
“Those communist, fascist pigs in Washington are going to get what is coming to them. Come election day, the people will take back this country and make things right. And the rat bastard head of all that is evil will be defeated and we will take our battle to other countries and free them from oppression and then the universe will be right and all those who oppressed us will be thrown in jail and then things will be okay. The End.”
She shuts her notebook top down with emphasis and waits for the throngs of fellow followers to cheer and raise her on their shoulders.
Calvin, like the rest of the class, is in a world of their own. It is left to me to react.
“Good speech, Marla. ... Um could you tell me what the bad thing is ? “
She looks at me like I was retarded beyond belief. “The communist fascist pigs being in power” The last phrase is said like this : ‘BEing in PowERRRR. as in ‘Oh my God are you that dense. Didn’t you know that ?’ I have to admit that I was caught up in the emotional frenzy of her speech but then I remembered that Marla probably regards me as one of the bad people in power. I decide that I had better get on her good side because you never know with revolutionaries. Nobody thought Mao or Fidel would gain power. I give her an ‘A’ and write in my notes that she is ready for another class that I teach: “Finding your Voice.” Aunt MacArthur’s will be featuring that class in the Fall.

The speeches go on and on. Amy Greenberg talked about how it was good that she wasn’t pregnant (anymore), ) Olivia Whitestone told of her adventures as a runaway and how it was good to be back home (after being away three hours) and how the good it was that the courts took pity on her despite the fact she cost taxpayers one hundred thousand dollars by leaving a fake ransom note. Mark Slate handed in his composition about how he hates everyone in class and wants to buy some guns and get rid of them all and how it is a good thing that this is his last class and he will never see them again. I gave them all ‘A” s and I wrote that all need more class time. (Actually I did not write that - I stamped it. I had a rubber stamp custom made at Michael’s.)

Now the last student stands before the class. She is the oldest of them at twenty-three. She wears a drab Muslim-like dress and head wrap despite the fact she is not a follower of Islam. (It is one of those court appointed things, this being the only way she is allowed to be in a class with underage male students.) Her name is kept from me - she is only known as Jane Doe.
She reads her essay which is by far the best written, most intelligently presented one I have heard today. (Of course, I could say the same about most television commercials and all cereal boxes but truthfully hers was better than that).
It is about how she has lived a life of fear and how she never was able to enjoy being a woman not even with her husband who repressed her night and day. But one day she met a man who saw her for what she was, a man who allowed to her blossom. A man who showed her that she mattered and that she had a voice. And all this happened because the judge deemed her temporarily insane. She had to have been insane to want her loving husband dead and to want to collect his million dollar life insurance policy but now he is dead and she has all this money which she cannot get a hold of until she graduates from her twelve years of community service unless someone will sponsor her and grant her a certificate of sanity. But that is beside the point, because now she just wants to show her appreciation to the person who has turned her life around. She does not have much but what little she has is his for the taking. All she wants is a chance to give. And give and give. Multiple givings in one night, I mean, session.

I was touched by her essay in places I can’t begin to say (in public at least). I gave her an A+, the plus being that I recommended her for special individual sessions in Creative Expression (that I am teaching in the Fall with selected students that show promise). I also stamped her for more class sessions and I wrote in my secret notes ‘Maybe I can get something good out of this bad assignment."
The End

What can you do with this assignment ?
Frank