I turned. Mr. Hallaron walked over. He'd put his hat on and was pulling a pack of cigarettes out of his pocket. His face was pallid and it seemed to me he was sweating a bit on the upper lip even though he was wearing a wrinkled in the back, faded trench coat and thick wool socks too fat around his ankles-- especially since he was wearing wing-tip shoes. No matter, he was a nice enough guy compared to the other teachers who seemed to snicker when I walked by, or drop in unannounced to check on my yearly goals for the kids happily pointing out problems before demanding certain chapters of the social studies book, the ones they wanted to save for next year and so I was left with all of the places kids had never heard of while the bedazzled-butt, jean wearing teach got Egypt and all of the glorious pre-packaged games and lesson plans and glossy-new library books.
This is the same teacher that had sent out an all-staff-email inviting people to meet for coffee at Arnie’s Café early Monday mornings in order to pray for our students. I chose not to respond to the email and I did not attend. I have nothing against practicing your own religious beliefs, but I’d had to pay an extra $110 to take the Civil Rights testing at the prison-like facility in Beaverton. The one where the huge-man test proctor demanded my photo ID and had forced me to pull up my pant legs, roll up my sleeves and hold up my hair while spinning in front of him to make sure I hadn’t written any answers on my skin, tied white-lined notes under my curls. In Oregon, it is illegal to pray in school and from what I’d learned to pass that test, a definite no-no to send God blanketing emails.
The doors slid open soundlessly, revealing the complete and utter chaos that I had been sent to fix. Mr. Hallaron was more high-stressed than most, or at least let himself get into left and right arguments spanning politics, religion, lunch duties or which markers were best and today he was going quite belligerent over using Styrofoam cups in the faculty room.
Mrs. Miner, the paraprofessional aid he was incensed with had been at the school thirty years and was now making $16 per hour, had been given a special orange vest she wore in stopping traffic in front of the school each morning and she wasn’t about to let this greasy weirdo in detective gear tell her what cups work best with her coffee—especially since she’d gotten an entire king-sized box from the local odd lot’s store, Deal’s Only for a mere $5.50. She knew the supply would last the entire year for coffee and possibly Ms. Dalton, the special Ed teacher she assisted could double-up use for this winters’ crafting project of snowmen bodies with coconut covered balls for heads. The thing is, both staff were eccentric in their own ways, but on entirely opposite ends of the spectrum, I had a relationship with both of them and so the bedazzled butts, not knowing what to do, had called me in to subdue and break up the now escalating to yells and name-calling fight before the students could hear.
This wasn’t going to be easy and it definitely wasn’t helping matters when the bedazzled twin teacher started to fire back that restaurants all over town passed out Styrofoam take-out boxes.
Mr. Halloran started to stutter when the math teacher I’d been warned was so “Christian,” he didn’t even believe in dinosaurs dove happily into a story about the many uses he’d found for the Styrofoam he’d gotten with his new big screen, how he’d melted it down, piece by piece in a mason jar filled with diesel. This was a great way in which not to have to karate chop the big pieces into smaller and fit after dark into his neighbors cans because that much Styrofoam could waste up all the space in his own garbage bin. He’d managed to melt all into that single quart jar and then he’d discovered, purely on a sudden grand idea, that by spreading the resulting jelly on weeds, it killed dandelions on contact!
“A kind of homemade napalm for starting fires, killing weeds and saving on garbage space” he exclaimed, his eyes beaming!
The science teacher, silent through all, looked down at his watch, stood and left the room shaking his head and laughing a bit under his breath, his metal re-use coffee-cup in hand, the one he carried with him everywhere, all day long.
This wasn’t going to be easy, Mr. Hallaron, the English and History of Rock and Roll teacher was now trying to shame Mrs. Miner by throwing film, art and political activists’ names at her in a jumbled manner she rolled her eyes at, each public employee finding the other entirely stupid. In no way had Mr. Halloran attempted explaining why Styrofoam wasn’t a good idea, and he'd now launched into his Kindergarten tactics, using his outdoor voice, “Nut-uh!”
“Un, ha,” Mrs. Miner shouted back, while stepping forward, her face showing she knew exactly how to win this game!
The phone began to ring and I was all too happy to pick it up!
The following video includes another interesting way in which to deal with styrofoam--feed it to meal worms?? But, then he feeds the styrofoam eating worms to lizard! Who sees a problem with doing this?
Photo Credit: Caleb Lucas/unsplash
Video Credit: The Thought Emporium/youtube