Dodging the Candlelight Outcome

I wouldn’t have complained if I had not awakened this morning.

Before me is a neighborhood newsletter I must write this weekend, a task I warmly embrace usually. And I’m not dodging that. Some positive things happened with me during substitute teaching three days this week, that in any other week would have made for separate blog postings, just so I could brag about them. But the affirmation from middle school students, their teachers and equally kind high school students PALES in the black reality of bouncing some checks (my own stupidity in typical form and they’ve all been set right now) and paying almost 4/5 of my rent check so I would not be typing future blog postings in the cozy glow of a candle-lit office. I josh, of course. If my office had to be candle-lit, there would be no computer (I guess I could use the library but then I couldn’t heat water for bathing and I’d be eating nothing but peanut butter and jelly. . . . .). I am near catatonia dealing with all of this. Yesterday afternoon, coming off a fine day substitute teaching at a major central city high school, I paid my CWLP bill, stopped by County Market for a loaf of the cheapest white bread I could find, more peanut butter & strawberry preserves, a bag of Fritos chilli cheese corn chips, Catalina dressing and a 12 pack of Old Milwaukee.

Checked my e, responded to some positive correspondence from my book editor. He says the pictures and  text look fine. The proof is in productiion. I also heard from the publisher’s publicity department. Once I’ve made corrections to the proof, the PR department wants major input from me re places to sell the book, how much time I want to spend publicizing it (answer: 24 hours a day and not another minute more) and background info for their PR efforts. I think they want to make me look as good as Carl and Roberta Volkman who earlier this year published a fine book about Springfield monuments and memorials. I don’t think that’s possible (they had some decent cred BEFORE the book was pubbed; I’m going to have to pull what I can from under my sofa cushions and the corners of my kitchen counters that haven’t seen water since 2003. Anyhoo, it was very flattering, and it’s nice to know I did something right.

The correspondence was night enough to make up for my finances. Plus the extraordinarily sucky traffic in the city this week. If there was a single 20 mile an hour octogenarian or delivery truck on the street, I WAS BEHIND IT most of the time I was en route anywhere. I had to catch up with my sleep. During the final class Friday I had nodded off for about a half second. And everyone noticed. In my haze, seated in a corner of the room I noticed the regular teacher and three students looking directly at me. I jerked myself conscious and said, “I’m sorry, would you say again please?” The teacher, in the middle of the room, giving answers to a quiz said, “Would you answer the phone please?” “Absolutely!” I made a quick walk to the phone on her desk and took a note. Then apologized for “zoning out,” I then took a seat on a high, uncomfortable stool nearby and managed to (barely) stay awake for the remaining half an hour.”

So after the correpondence, not wanting to wait until 7:00 to eat, I made three sandwiches and ate them to the accompaniment of Old Milwaukee . . . . and fell asleep until almost midnight. I know this because Bill Moyers’ interview with Reverend Wright was concluding, and the clock TOLD me it was almost midnight. Wandered into the office and shut down the computer. I was neither fully awake nor particularly interested in becoming awake, so I went to bed and until 9:00 this morning passed from deep sleep to listening to the radio to sleep again. FINALLY arose when Car Talk came on and I knew I had to resume normal programming.

Earlier this week, I subbed at an east central middle school where I had earlier visited a class — at a teacher’s invitation and gross recompense of $10 — to talk about Vachel Lindsay and recite some of this fine poems. I was in  the middle of reading aloud from a terrific short story by Langston Hughes (entitled “Thank You Ma’am”) when another teacher came into the room, caught my attention and said she wanted me to come to her class . . . . . . and talk about Abe Lincoln. After apolotizing to the students for my interrupting the story, I determiend that the teacher who had invited me to hear class last week and told her about the Abraham Lincoln poem I had recited (Vachel Lindsay’s Abraham Lincoln Walks at Midnight) and from my beard, I guess she assumed I had done a LINCOLN presentation. I told her Vachel had written two poems relating to Abe which I would be happy to recite (the other is his Nancy Hanks, Mother of Abraham Lincoln), and I would be glad to talk about why Lindsay admired Lincoln. The teacher said that would be fine, and wrote her name on a slip of paper along with the time she wants me to come and her room number.

IF I get a call to substitute on the day I’m invited to her class, I will decline the sub opportunity. WHY? Why trade in what some might call patent insanity given the state of my finances? Because I believe what I share as a student of Vachel Lindsay benefits the students more than what I share as a substitute teacher, even it it nets me a small fraction of what I’d make if I substitute taught on that day instead.

At a prominent east side high school this week, as a reward to a class for good behavior, I recited Vachel’s The Little Turtle. We had some time, and they reacted so well to it that we learned it as a class, repeating it four or five times until we were reciting it as a chorus, and a darn fine chorus, I must say.  After the class dismissed, I was about to enter the teachers’ lounge when one of the young ladies from that earlier class, chatting with about five of her girl friends (all black, btw) saw me and entreated me to recite the turtle poem. Normally I don’t do tricks for students,  but there was joy in her eyes (not the usual disdain and contempt), and I responded with joy; recited the poem, to a close horizon of smiling students. They couldn’t believe the poem, that I would repond gladly as I did, and we had a great time for forty five seconds in the middle of a busy hallway during a mad dash for lunch. It was terrific!

First thing a student said to me as I was heading for my first class at a prominent north side high school Friday was “Mr. Conger, what are you teaching today?” and I said “Special Education.” He said, “We all hope you’ll sub in Latin class again. You’re our favorite substitute teacher.” I responded, “I’d sub in your Latin class every day of the week if I could. You’re a great bunch of students, and I enjoy that kind of company!”"
WHAT A RUSH! To be remembered that way!  Later in the day another student asked me the same thing.

There are days as a substitute teacher when I can’t wait to get out of school. There are other days, Friday for example, when I can’t want to go back. Bless ‘em all.

Live long . . . . . and proper.