Mr. Conger’s Class of the Year Award

Anyone who senses the ironic disparity in the life of a writer who tips his kind of people about politics, the legal citizens’ American language, media, aviation and poetry while playing pay day roulette as a substitute teacher, would do well for the world by considering how this blogger might find the kind of emploment I should have so that I won’t have to continue the seemingly inexorable slow trek to oblivion in which I am now earnestly engaged. OR, if you’re with the electronic media, Do you think it’s nuts that a guy who writes as well as I do should have to earn sub-poverty wages as a substitute teacher? If you do, get me to an employer, OR get an employer to me!

I love substitute teaching; I just need to make a living doing it, and since that’s not going to happen, I need to find a full-time employer who will engage the abilities I demonstrate here at Honey & Quinine.

An aphorism copied last Monday from a poster in a Lanphier High School math class room. “Wisdom is knowing what to do next.” — author unknown.

This year I’ve written four poems while substitute teaching, most recently Friday at a middle grade magnet school on Springfield’s near east side. I will post them soon at my Poems of Job page, linked from the list on the right.

About 2:05 Friday afternoon, as I neared the end of a productive day subbing during the morning at the magnet school mentioned above and in the afternoon at a near southwest middle school, a nifty notion almost swept me off my feet. Mrs. B.P.’s algebra class in that hour was the best class I had encountered over the past 2006/2007 school year, and maybe the best in the six years I’ve sub taught. I was there for Mrs. P. so she could attend a city-wide awards luncheon in which special recognition would be given to teachers nominated for the District 186 (Springfield, Illinois public schools) 2006/2007 Teacher of the Year Award..

At about 2:05, I was so grateful for the natural quiet and focus of some of the best students I had ever encountered that I knew I was going to give them special recognition: just me, a substitute teacher, to a great bunch of students. Many of them recognized me from my previous visits to the school. But my “history” with that room ran deeper.

On Friday at 11 a.m. I had walked into a room I thought I had left for the last time in 1962: my math class taubht by Mr. Cline.It was an incredible rush to be in the same room again. I remembered where I sat in his class: — far left row, third from the front.– and other things from that class during the school year of 61/62. Judi Blount a girl who could light a boy’s heart on fire with the flash of her eyes. How one day during class she turned around, grabbed my pencil from the pencil groove in the foreward part of my desk, apparently erased something on her paper and put it right back where she got it without so much as saying “Hello Job. May I borrow your pencil?” or “Thanks, Job.” or “Thanks.” Judi, if you’re reading this, thanks for the memory. . .Mr. Cline taught us about base two numbers (ones and zeros) and how they made computers work. We learned basic math using base two numbers. There was no clock in his room. In its place was a hand-lettered sign that read. “Time will pass. Will YOU?” And he was a terrific teacher. I wish I had tried harder in his class.

So how would I ackknowledge the better-than-exemplary 27 students I saw? I would draw an illustration of a trophy on the green board at the front of the room. But I couldn’t do it too soon. I wanted to give them time to savor their recognition, but not time to get over it before the bell rang, ending the school day. I had been silently reading the collected poems of Yevgeny Yevtushenko as the students worked, but I could hardly concentrate on his superb writing as I composed a mental picture of what I would write starting about 2:15.

Several students asked me if I’d share the Vachel Lindsay poem The Pet Turtle, which most of the Springfield middle and high schools know me for already. It’s fun. They delight in it, and I delight that they delight in it. So I had told them at the start, that if they behaved well and they did their assignment, we would talk poetry in the final part of class.

The fun began as I sketched a trophy. At the start it looked like a face with big ears, the start of the trophy handles. Someone shouted “A FACE!” and another “GEORGE W” and I replied “NO on both counts!” When they recognized it as a trophy, I could hear the smiles and brightening eyes. And by the time I completed “Best Substitute Teacher’s Class of 2006/2007″ on the body of the trophy and below, “Presented by Mr. Conger to Mrs. P_ _ _ _’s Sixth Hour Math Class, May 25, 2007, there was something akin to JOY in that ROOM. A student called to another teacher who was conversing with a staff member just outside our open door. “MISS _____. Please come here. We need a witness!”

She came inside, and I explained what was going on. She wrote to the side. “Witnessed this day at 2:20 p.m.. Miss ____.” The students wrote “SAVE” on the blackboard so Mrs. P. would see it when she returns Tuesday. I wish I could see her face when she pulls up the projection screen and sees what was left brhind Friday aftternoon!

Then it was time for Vachel Lindsay and poetry. I explained it was essential that they NEVER recite poetry the way they will hear most grownups read it from a piece of paper. Then I showed them what I meant. We had fun with Vachel’s The Pet Turtle. On the third go round with it, 20 of the class were chanting it with me. Told them to MEMORIZE poems they liked JUST FOR THE FUN OF IT! I said they would amaze their friends and confuse their parents; sometimes vice-versa. Since we had a few minutes, I taught them a little about Vachel’s The Broncho That Would Not Be Broken and recited it as it SHOULD BE RECITED. Some were visibly affected by the poem, and many of them applauded at the end. I told them they were all bronchos, young colts learning about life, that many times, people would try to “break” them, but they must not let them. One of the students said “But then we’ll die young.” I reassured them, “No you won’t. Remember this poem and do not be broken! Be civilized. Learn all you can and be contributing members of society, but the only way they can break you is for you to allow yourself to be broken.” I took a breath . . . .

The final bell rang, dismissing everyone to the long Memorial Day weekend.

I know I got into my car and started the engine, but coming home, my head was in the clouds and all was serene and right with the world.

Live long . . . . . and proper.