2006-03-30
welcome to hell
The "All School Assembly" includes everyone from teachers to janitors. I sit on a folding chair in an ice-cold auditorium and stare at the PowerPoint presentation about "making the grade." I look around and I don't recognize half the greasy faces fighting off sleep at 8:30am.
The makeup-caked girls next to me keep crinkling plastic Baggies stuffed with pills (or vitamins). I glance at the screen again and see a picture of students painting an alligator at Parrot Jungle. The principal says they needed a "guard with a gun" in case he got hungry. Would a gun actually puncture the reptile's skin?
Across the aisle, my art teacher thumbs through Southern Living magazine. "Art takes nature as its model," says the boldface font. She flips through a catalogue that features gargoyle statues and garden gnomes. I turn around and see my math teacher, a stubbly man with thick neck rolls, typing on a laptop. The girls with their pills and Styrofoam cups won't stop whispering.
I keep my gaze fixed on the ponytailed jocks with baseball caps and imagine snipping them with topiary sheers. Laptop Man stretches his legs on the chairs as if he's about to run a marathon.
A blast of God awful 80s music leaks out of the speakers. Somehow I recognize the lyrics. It's Gloria Estefan. "My heart goes beep, beep," she bellows.
This sucks. I can't even slip my Walkman into my ears and escape.
"You call me on the phone. It goes ring, ring," Gloria sings.
God, make it stop.
I close my eyes. When I open them, I see that someone has scribbled an email on my chair: AndyVice1990@gmail. I do a mental calculation. Our friend, Andy, is old enough to drive.
On the side of the stage looms a wall stapled with construction paper smiley faces.
"I'm feeling happy."
"I'm feeling sad."
The undeclared theme song of Miami ("Do the Conga!") crackles at airplane level decibels, compelling everyone to shout at the top of their lungs. Behind me, the math teacher talks about driving by Club Space this morning and spotting his zombie-like students spilling into the street.
The principal cackles and says, This is like a real grown up microphone." Of course, when we use this auditorium throughout the school year, the mic vanishes. So does the podium...which forces the teachers to pile notes on a vacant desk.
Somebody in the back row just growled. "This is like Jerry Springer," says the hefty guy to my right. I can't figure out the analogy. The air conditioner rattles like a door that won't stay shut. The black-clad Goth girl in front of me whips out a notepad and sketches what looks like a blueprint for her dream house, complete with measurements. Cat hairs fleck the hem of her pants. I can't help wondering if they floated off me.
From this angle I can see everybody's brand of choice jutting through these non-lumbar-supporting plastic chairs---from Calvin Klein jeans to Gap to Dockers. I notice that a lot of teachers need new shoes. Loafers are the footwear-du-jour (except for Ms. What's Her Name's slippers). The guy next to me has crammed his tootsies into work boots. The new girl wears high-heeled wedges with sparkle-dusted straps. At least she's trying.
I get a closer look at Andy's email and the middle smiley face, which says, "I feel lovely." Isn't that a song from West Side Story? The face's eyeballs are shaped like hearts. The top smiley face has sprouted thick eyebrows, as if indicating his gender.
"Listen up," says the principal.
On the screen floats a schedule broken down by semester into spreadsheet-style squares. As the principal rattles off a list of activities, an unseen "scribe" attempts to type at the rate of his speech. I watch the words morph with various spelling errors ("responsibilies"), which Microsoft Word underlines with a wiggly red line. Whenever I see it, a licorice taste floods my mouth.
The guy with the work boots blurts out a long and low-pitched, "Ooohhh," inciting a round of giggles. I can picture this guy in second grade, making the same noises and getting the same results.
The task list continues for each grade, yet I haven't learned much about our designated duties: "study groups, workshops, info sessions..." What the hell does it mean? We've lost the ability to speak English. Instead we mutter a robotic mumbo-jumbo, communicating nada.
The chair next to me is empty now, exposing a pyramid of pin-sized holes. What's the purpose? To provide a breeze for my ass? The batteries in the microphone fizzle out and the principal resorts to shouting above the "747," as he calls the air conditioner's engine.
"This is such a waste of time," someone whispers, just as the principal lets us out ten minutes early.
"Don't forget to fill out your surveys," he yells.
I leave mine blank.
f-i-n at 12:15 p.m.