May 20, 2010

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  The Daily News
  

  1   I realized yesterday that students nowadays have NO idea of what a typewriter is.

  2   Who's feelin' old?

   

  3    Naturally, when I described all the intricacies of typewriting, they laughed. Clacky keys, dinging bells at the end of every line, blotchy mistakes, inky fingers. If you've ever had the pleasure, then you know. The entire concept of carbon copies was almost lost on them. Thank God for coastal antique stores.

   

  4    <sigh> I love my students. They just get it. They loved that the past came to them on the wings of light dust, as musty and wonderful as age itself. I felt like an antique with a voice. My eyes smiled, and so did the room.

   

  5    I had the few students who had typed on a real typewriter describe the arms going up to hit the roller, the keys getting crisscrossed, the ding at the end of every line, the lining up of the paper paper, and the musty, oily smell of writing, all of which made writers of us all.

   

  6    I asked them how many had ever even worked on a typewriter. In each class the result was this: one.

   

  7    "Charming," I smiled again. This time it came with creases.

   

  8    Typewriters. Age-blue royalty, with torn, loose ribbons.

  9     I recall being younger, and of knowing the oil-slick wonder of hearing real journalists clicking and clacking away. Ribbons torn, and endless interesting writing from real writers and journalists, some of whom I grew up with, and with whom I even sipped an occasional whiskey or three. The absolute liberation of enjoying fragments.

  10   I am lucky to have been born of an age where intelligence was revered, and writing a gift of magic and exploding stars.

  11   Misty wonders. Fragments. Evanescence. And then nothing.

   

  12   My good friend and confidant Brian Daley, for example, had parents who wrote for the San Francisco Chronicle and the San Francisco Examiner.

   

  13   Brian's Mom, Adeline, had a daily piece called simply "Coffee Break". She wrote it for years. When I was young, I sat with her at parties, and she talked frankly about writing, journalism, and Manhattans, a drink that defined the Great Generation.

   

  14   Brian's Dad, Walt, was a sports writer for the Examiner, and his main beat was the early days of the Oakland Raiders. He covered them with heart, and there were times when Brian and I would hit a Raiders' game, only to get home late because Walt was finishing up his interviews and articles on the team.

   

  15    They had fabulous parties, in which the great players of the game, both Niners and Raiders, would be at their home en masse.

   

  16    I never thought about it. I just liked them because they both were real, intelligent, and genuine.

   

  17    Amazingly wonderful. Walt reminded me of Spencer Tracy, and Adeline reminded me only of Adeline, because she was simply that remarkable, and charming.

   

  18   Ah, our young years. The entire Daley family amused me with their love and fun.

   

  19   Brian was always my best friend. He now contributes some wonderful pieces to the San Francisco Examiner's website. His focus is a piece he writes letting us know what is coming up on cable networks. I love that Brian is doing this, because he writes with a flair that clearly defines a generation that knew how.

   

  20   You want to learn anything about what is happening, you need to start enjoying what this older generation is trying to pass off to you.

   

  21   Here is a link to Brian's latest. It is about classic rocker Chubby Checker, and his famous song called The Twist:

   

   http://www.examiner.com/x-36275-SF-Cable-TV-Examiner~y2010m5d19-Remembering-The-Twist?cid=email-this-article

   

  22   Ah, Brian, you are still the veddy best there is, my goodly friend.

   

  23    Moving on, Part the First:  It is with some degree of disdain that I need to announce that I will no longer be teaching the honors kids at EV.

   

  24    Our English meeting yesterday saw that some teachers were enjoying all the benefits of teaching the "gifted". I would be one such fellow. The department agreed that we had to give everyone else a turn at doing this.

   

  25    As fate would have it, my years of teaching the more challenging classes had little impact on the department, so next year I will be back teaching the students who are in need of "support".

   

  26   As a team player, I agreed to teach a class that has "needs", as though the bright students don't.

   

  27   I volunteered, but with a bit of a forced hand.

   

  28   Happens.

   

  29   At YB, they did the same thing, and I wound up being the guy who could relate and inspire the less motivated. Unfortunately, YB wound up leaving me there, because other teachers simply couldn't deal with those sorts of classes.  I eventually stopped going to English meetings over there. 

   

  30   I embraced those kids, giving it all I could, but really, I could relate to them on a very real level.

   

  31   Fine, of course, because I always felt I was a team player.

   

  32   But the past four years teaching the best and the brightest brought a new and exciting challenge to my career as a teacher.

   

  33   I ALWAYS thought that YB blew it not allowing me to motivate and enjoy the brighter lights. I was pigeon-holed, which in my eyes kept literally thousands of students from enjoying some of the things I could bring to the table.

   

  34   One of the main reasons I left YB was that very issue. I had put in my time with the student's who had challenges. I was ready to go into my final years of teaching working with the more advanced and intellectual students. I'm not trying to say that the other students didn't "deserve" me, but that I had put in my time, and helped many struggling students find their places. I was without honors students for well over twenty years. That's fair. 

   

  35   But after years and years of that, I felt that the brighter students deserved what I had to offer.

   

  36    Yesterday's meeting ended all of that.

   

  37    Am I upset?

   

  38    To a degree. But I also know that the struggling students need a person who knows their needs, their struggles, and their hopes of achieving.

   

  39    Will it be a challenge? Undoubtedly.

   

  40     But you can't fight fate sometimes. So next year, I will again be re-aquainted with the strugglers, the outcasts, and the kids who need not only a teacher, but a mentor.

   

  41     Life throws this sort of stuff at you. Perhaps it becomes the greatness that is thrust on us all.

   

  42     I'm upset on many levels, but I'm also excited to face this challenge and to support those students with all my heart.

   

  43     I just thought I'd be able to ride my last few years without the challenges and the difficulties of that sort of reality. The other teachers couldn't wait to escape the headaches and heartache that teaching the students who are struggling and unmotivated would bring.They clamored to get away from it. I understood, but really?

   

  44   They also lost all focus of the rewards that inspiring those students could bring.

   

  45    So I'm ready for the challenge, and in many ways, excited.

   

  46    They need H. That's me. H. It's what I do. It's what I always have done.

   

  47     I enjoyed Heaven for a brief stint.

   

  48     And I don't see any challenge in education as Hell. I see it as an adjustment, and a reward. Maybe those students need a guy like me. Maybe I could bring them a little Heaven. I'm ready to bring it.

   

  50     Thanks EV. It has been a great ride, truly. I look forward to the challenges of next year.

   

  51     But really? Right when I've finally hit my stride, it's all going to go elsewhere.

   

  52     It isn't about me, though, is it.

   

  53     It's about stepping up and making those students the best they could possibly be.

   

  54    I'm down.

   

  55    Yeesh. I hope to light the light in every one of them.

   

  56    'Cuz that's who I am, I imagine.

   

  57    Peace.

  ~H~

   

   

  

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  • 10:38 am
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