In her prime
Morelli, Mark
IN HER PRINE Mark Morelli My brother described some- body as being "dumb as a mud fence/' It had been years since I'd heard that phrase and it had a fun, folksy ring to it, so I jotted it down for...
...I substituted at an inner-city school where they rebelled against me...
...She sat in her chair, hating me, hating school, hating the world...
...It'd be a shame not to open their eyes," she said with Arthurian majesty...
...She didn't exactly love teaching but loved herself for being a teacher...
...Wonderful, I thought...
...I don't want my essence to intrude upon my students' focus...
...He said, with self-effacement, "Maybe we don't get it because we are all dumb as a mud fence...
...No one here is really dumb," I said, poised to launch into my everyone-is-good-at-something pep talk...
...Knotts Hyphen Marshall knew all about effective communication (she made charts on the board demonstrating Effective Communication, with circles and arrows...
...Zinsser asks, "Why would anyone in his right mind want to be a writing teacher...
...Bea Arthurian, for she had a deep voice...
...They hated me because I cared...
...I felt like giving him a hug, but on second thought, he was doing just fine without one...
...I'm Mizz Knotts Hyphen Marshall...
...It'd be a shame to wake them...
...The world, like Gershwin's Rockies and Gibraltar, would tumble and crumble were it not for her efforts...
...She was open-mouthed stunned...
...I could tell she wanted to talk teacher-to-teacher...
...My sloe-eyed students groaned and sluggishly opened their books...
...I read it aloud to my students but no one understood...
...Another day in heaven, you mean...
...We went into our rooms to teach...
...Is that so...
...She wrote a paper about me...
...Oh, how we both wept...
...I remember a young woman named Julie, whose father died two weeks before the semester began...
...That's like calling an ambulance, then bragging that you have a date with a paramedic...
...She was one thumb up the bat on me...
...I hope if s not overpowering...
...Often we're the only ones they can confide in...
...This work can be burdensome, but oh, what a velvet yoke upon our shoulders...
...Good...
...One young man let out a laugh...
...They didn't understand that learning is linked to love...
...They are in one of the caring professions, no more sane in their allotment of time and energy than the social worker...
...Guessing I was a fellow teacher, she introduced herself...
...Say, that patchouli becomes you...
...IN HER PRINE Mark Morelli My brother described some- body as being "dumb as a mud fence/' It had been years since I'd heard that phrase and it had a fun, folksy ring to it, so I jotted it down for later use as an example of a simile in the writing class that I taught...
...No," I said, but she could've opened a metaphysical bookshop right there...
...I'm dumb...
...The noted author and writing instructor William Zinsser sees writing teachers as social workers because they're trying to reverse the habits of students whose literacy problems are deep-rooted and whose lives are entrenched in a quick-blinking imagistic society that less and less values reading and writing...
...This calls to mind a rather overly zealous writing teacher I recently encountered...
...One kid in the corner who had grown up on a farm smiled and nodded...
...She came to my office, bursting with hostility...
...She said, 'My father is dead and you're alive and that's not fair.'" Though I didn't know the man, I didn't think it was fair either...
...I suggested that they could be excused since few of them in this inner-city university had ever seen a mud fence...
...And yes"hating herself...
...Another day in the jungle, eh...
...They hated me...
...They didn't understand that adults could respect them and find worth in them...
...I took a quick peek into my classroom, then joked, "Let's keep it down...
...Because it's all for the kids, all for the kids...
...I asked, "Did you ever talk to someone who made you feel dumb as a mud fence...
...You go to college to fix being dumb...
...I said...
...No, it's cool, that's why I'm here...
...She taught an early morning class next to mine...
...We have a responsibility to these kids...
...Soon poor Julie was hugging me back...
...Nice to meet you...
...And I'm here for you to fix my dumbness...
...Her eyes locked into mine...
...So after three warnings I had her transferred to another class...
...Well, I just hugged Julie...
...The answer is that writing teachers aren't altogether in their right mind...
...The clock struck eight...
...She resisted at first, but I persisted...
...Thank you...
...But this young man"who wore his cap backwards, which he said made sense since he was dyslexic"stopped me in my tracks...
...While everyone laughed, I was thinking of his analogy (if he didn't get the simile, at least he made up for it), and I recalled another comparison...
...Like when you go to the hospital to fix a tumor or a hernia...
...Just don't ask me to turn my head and cough," he said...
...I was threatened by students who later hugged me...
...I hug my students," she said, "because in this dehumanizing world, they cannot afford to forget that they are human...
...There were some wonderful ideas in it, but she insisted upon calling me Miss, which I had a lot of trouble with...
...To have as your only confidante a guy who's looking for comma splices and spelling mistakes...
...One morning, in the hallway, I was shaking bits of chalk like dice...
...Knotts Hyphen Marshall set me straight...
...I was winded by my exchange...
...I guess that makes me the doctor," I said...
...Knotts Hyphen Marshall looked past me...
Vol. 123 • April 1996 • No. 7
