These days, parents shy away from reading the original fairy tales, as they're much too Grimm (groan). Horrible puns aside, many of us do tend to shelter our children. We control their consumption of media. We advocate for them at school. We're involved, and we feel good about that. After all, the world is a far more menacing than the one we grew up in.
Sometimes, though, I have to question these assumptions. Was the world really that safe in my day? And is our desire to protect our children from most harmful influences really that helpful? Looking back, there were some strange things that somehow just . . . were. No one tried to change them, or analyze them, or control them.
Let me give you a few examples:
1) Our Performance of "Maxwell's Silver Hammer" (elementary school)
We had the voices of angels, and Mrs. Green was a fine music teacher indeed. One day she introduced us to "Maxwell's Silver Hammer" by the Beatles.
For those unfamiliar with the story within the song, our dear protagonist Maxwell invites Joan, an intellectual girl with a knack for science, to the movies. She accepts. When she opens the door, undoubtedly all dolled up, she becomes a murder victim. At this point in the song, our elementary school voices rang loud and true:
"Bang bang Maxwell's silver hammer
Came down upon her head!
Bang bang Maxwell's silver hammer
Made sure that she was dead."
Maxwell's next victim is a school teacher--one who has the audacity to insist he behave and who punishes him by insisting he write lines. Once again we sang the chorus with gusto. Then we told the tale of Maxwell's final victim, the judge who attempts to put an end to his murderous ways.
It all seemed just fine to me . . . except for that niggling sense that perhaps this song was a slightly unsuitable selection for a school concert. We were actually singing about murder, and our parents were sitting there listening! This was dangerous stuff--and strangely enthralling. I hadn't even hit puberty and yet was walking on the wild side.
So how is it that these days, even the word "Christmas" is deemed too offensive to use in some schools?
2) Those Unedited School Plays (elementary school)
Now, my parents didn't drink: my brothers and I thought it scandalous when we discovered our father sipping a cold beer on a scalding summer day. I have no recollection of witnessing anyone in a state of inebriation. So how I so effortlessly and convincingly played the drunk in our school plays baffles me. What could possibly have inspired me? Even more baffling is the fact that I was freely permitted to do so; in fact, it became the routine I was known for.
We were allowed, in music and drama class, to create our own plays, on any topic that inspired us. I recall no limits being set upon us whatsoever. We'd then perform our creations at school assemblies. I had four best friends, and we'd come up with those long, rambling, nonsensical plays that only children can invent. Inevitably, I'd play the drunk. My greatest moment came with a drunken fall off the stage. It was pure art! My mother was appalled, and tried to get past Nicole Paxton's mother (a devote Mormon), who was questioning what I was witnessing at home.
It all seemed fabulous to me at the time: I got to fall off the stage! After pretending to drink too many beers, which never happened, especially at home. It was thrilling!
However, I now ponder why there was no editing of content or form whatsoever. I have only fond memories of Mrs. Green . . . but . . . hmmmmmm.
3) Those Other Oddities (elementary school)
Other things strike me as odd now. There was a grade two teacher in the school who was utterly terrifying. I remember sitting at a desk in Social Studies as she talked--or yelled, rather--about Maslow's Pyramid of Human Needs.
"What are the basic things we need?" she shouted. Every student was struck dumb with fear. I sat clinging to my desk, praying she wouldn't notice me.
"Um. Food?" someone finally ventured. We all held our breath. No one else could speak, which only further enraged our teacher.
"So, you're running around naked with no roof over your head whatsoever? And you can't figure out what you need?!?"
Looking back, I wonder why it never occurred to me to mention this teacher to my parents. The problem would eventually solve itself when this already unhappy woman became a victim of an unspeakable crime. I don't think she taught after that. As a child, I read the papers outlining the graphic details of the grisly murders of her family members and thought, "Wow. I knew her." And that was the end of that.
One of the best teachers ever (a truly gifted and passionate man) had the peculiar habit of sticking textbooks and rulers and even his hands down the front of his pants while he taught. Objects would stay there for long stretches of time. This behaviour, too, was just a given, and we actually looked forward to seeing what might end up in that most peculiar of storage places. Younger students had something to look forward to: our teacher's habit was a rite of passage, just like Miss Buckton's St. Bernards. It was just the way it was: we didn't know any different.
And somehow, it made life more interesting, more colourful, and our education a tad richer. The eccentrics in our life are not quickly forgotten: they're like signposts in the journey through life.
4) The Smart Science Teacher (junior high)
Now, you have to give Mr. Finnegan the credit he deserves. He drew a reasonable salary (I know, because I asked him how much he made), and yet did the least amount of work he could manage to get away with. We spent hours--hours--illustrating title pages for each science unit. It was busy work, utterly meaningless, and we would all inevitably receive the same grade we'd received on every other title page. (I believe that my little brother still resents Mr. Finnegan for this waste of so many hours of his fleeting youth.)
Mr. Finnegan's greatest achievement was the awarding of bonus marks. It was really just a subtle mockery of the keeners in the class. Bake him cupcakes? Bonus marks! Wash the classroom sinks? Bonus marks! Tania Stafinski, my competitor, actually took his lab coat home to wash it. When she used too much bleach, she had to replace it. Mr. Finnegan just smiled and awarded her those bonus marks that would make no difference to her career whatsoever. Or maybe it was those marks that set her on the path to a brilliant career in science. Who knows?
While today's parent might complain that the creation of title pages isn't the same as learning actual science, I did learn some valuable lessons. One, it's easy to be duped by the glitter of those elusive bonus marks. At the end of the day, however, nobody cares what mark I got in Science 9. Two, teachers can be as lazy as students, and still receive adequate financial remuneration. Finally, I can never recover the time I lost to colouring intricate title pages. This is a lesson that I will carry close to my heart for all of my days.
5) High School Oddities
I once carried a dagger (that I got on a missions trip to Africa) to school once to ward off bullies. Did I feel justified? Certainly. Did anyone notice? Luckily not. Nor did the gym teacher observe my bully repeatedly throwing basketballs at my head. Or trying to take me out during the roller skating unit.
Did we both survive? Yup.
No one noticed my friend Julie and I escaping art class either. We were doing virtuous things--selling my clay horse head to a shop in the nearby mall, and returning close to the end of class. I also made prank phone calls during class, using the class phone no less, and no one noticed. Those were truly the good old days.
And not a soul (as far as I know) made a complaint about Mr. Werely, the volatile physics teacher who took out the classroom thermostat with a ruler and blamed it on "vandals" (my older brother witnessed this monumental event). When I went on vacation for a week with my family, the teacher called me "that idiot whose parents are making sure she'll fail her provincial exam." I received a mark of 87%, hardly a fail. And while today's parents would be shocked by the referral to their son or daughter as "an idiot," I wasn't insulted: I appreciated Mr. Werely's blunt honesty and wanted to prove him wrong. And I left his class loving physics--arguably one of my weakest subjects next to math.
During my illustrious education, I enjoyed many memorable experiences. I tied my sixth grade Student Teacher's shoelaces together during carpet time. I painted a toilet in the bathroom and sprinted out of the school to escape an irate janitor. My friends and I molded fake fecal matter out of clay in art (to the horror of other students using the restroom). Cindy Amthor and I used spit to shine up those desks in grade 8, after being given a detention for trying to glue someone to a desk (he had made rude comments about my developing body). Shirley Wong and I hammered the tools into their incorrect spaces in Shop. We all melted countless pens in Chemistry. What else are Bunsen burners for?
We were kids, and we did stupid things. Similarly, the adults around us did their own thing too, perplexing as some of their actions were. They did things that would raise anyone's eyebrows these days. They said things that were downright offensive. And somehow, it all came out in the wash. Through some miracle I grew up into a rather conservative adult who is now trying to prevent my children from doing what I did.
And isn't that what's it's all about? Well . . . who knows?
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