October 26, 2011
-
1 Here’s a limerick:
There once was a man from Calcutta,
who had a most terrible stutta.
He said, “Pass the h-h-ham,
and the j-j-j jam
and the b-b-b-b-b-b butta.”2 I love stupid stuff.
3 I stumbled upon that limerick and one other right after my students finished The Sixth Sense.
4 If you’re not familiar with it, there is a scene where a teacher is teaching his class about a school that used to be a court house in Philadelphia.
5 The teacher talks about how historical it was, but Cole, a young boy who sees ghosts, tells the teacher that it was a place that they abused people and hanged anyone who questioned anything.
6 The teacher corrects the boy, telling him that the building was used by lawyers and lawmakers.
7 Cole’s response is classic: “They’re the people who hanged everybody.”
8 When the teacher again corrects Cole, the boy looks up and tells him that he (the teacher) is “Stuttering Stanley”. He tells the teacher that he used to stutter when he was a kid, and that all the other kids teased him, calling him “Stuttering Stanley.” When the teacher stutteringly asks where he got his information, Cole taunts the teacher, yelling “Stuttering Stanley! Stuttering Stanley! Stuttering Stanley!” prompting the teacer to break down, and yell, “Shut up you f-f-FREAK!”
9 It’s one of about thirty classic scenes from the film, some small, many monumentally burned into our psyches, enough, in fact, to make The Sixth Sense officially a classic, at least in my frabjous eyes.
Here’s the scene for those of you who have seen the film:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aow69yy4UQU
10 For those of you who haven’t, buy it immediately and watch it on Halloween night, after all the trick-or-treaters have gone to bed.
11 The Sixth Sense is a must-own classic, right alongside Citizen Kane and The Godfather.
12 Bold statement.
13 Great film. One or two imperfect lines, but other than that, a true classic. It’s time has come.
14 I have truly enjoyed this mini-unit, and we have a little more today and tomorrow.
15 Moving on, Part One: Every year when I do what I refer to as The Heidi Chronicles (with a tip of the hat to Wendy Wasserstein), strange things happen.
16 This year the debacle with the power cord, as well as a few other things electrical have happened publicly.
17 A girl in my fourth period class pointed out that my hall light began working, but only every other day, right when the unit began. She is right.
18 In my seventh period class, I found a sealed baggie containing a sound cord under my desk, and put it up next to my speaker. Within seconds, someone tripped over the existing cord, and without missing a beat I opened the bag, replaced the cord, and continued the movie. I felt like Jimi Hendrix replacing a guitar string.
19 I have mechanical Starbucks’ style sun shades in my room. I pushed the button to make them come down, but just yesterday they gathered, and then got caught. I had to stop them. The movie was again delayed. Fortunately, a student jumped up on a table and fixed them. The film played again.
20 A few other minor coincidences occurred, all of them helping me instantly.
21 Heidi likes to help with things. Always has. Or so the legend goes.
22 For the uninitiated, Heidi is a purported ghost who has helped me along over the years, according to many ex-students.
23 She haunted the YB Theatre for years. I must say, many of the DN readers could confirm stories. I began paying attention years ago, and started documenting them, as the only living scribe. I wanted to make sure that the reporting was as accurate as possible.
24 At times, I never noticed the coincidences while they happened, but after around three I would always begin to pay attention.
25 I won’t go through all the stories, which I had archived for years on my old drama workshop website. I had to let it die in the weeds though.
26 It was on a Geocities webmaker, and when I paid Yahoo for an upgrade and never received it, wrote them, and still never received it. I quit and jumped to Xanga, but lost the Chronz in the process.
27 So I now have a series of bullets that I review each year. I’m hesitant to include the EV stories, even though there are already a few.
28 For example, on my very first day reporting for duty at the school, a car cut me off right at the corner of Quimby Road (which has its own ghost, btw) and Ruby.
29 I sort of rolled my eyes, because I was anxious to get my room ready. My eyes looked around and landed on the license plate of the car in front of me. And no, longtime Heidi fans, it was not an Audi; it was a Mazda. Sorry to disappoint. Anyway, I looked at the license plate.
30 It read “High T 2″.
31 If you sound it out, it sounds like “Heidi 2″, a bit of a chuckle and salute to sequels.
32 It is far too late, or too early to chronicle all of it here. Every year I intend to put together the entire story, but every year the unit gets a bit exhausting.
33 Needs to be done though, especially for newer readers to the DN. The stories are fascinating, at least to me. I never intended to tell them over the years; that “greatness” was thrust upon me.
34 As a teacher, I certainly don’t need attention. I just report things that actually happened, and that had many witnesses over the years.
35 I never talked to reporters or writers either. I just didn’t think it appropriate. I also never wanted to come across as a moron.
36 AnywayZ…
37 I’ll keep you informed if I think of any other strange coincidences that occur between now and Halloween.
38 Every year, including this year, they happen.
39 Last night, for instance, Helene and Nicoley took Phoebe for a walk. I went into the backyard to think of fodder for today’s DN.
40 I thought of something that was a tad crass, which I generally leave out of the DN, but I tossed it about; it wasn’t THAT crass. It was a mildly crass limerick. I wondered I should include it in today’s DN.
41 Just then the sliding door clicked. In the entire history of my owning my house, it has never clicked. And it was a distinct Heidi-style click.
42 Odd clicks that always sound the same are a part of the story, as most Heidi vets know. Oh, bother. I do need to re-write the entire story. I never ends, which makes it sort of fun to write.
43 So I left one limerick out, but you did get the guy from Calcutta.
44 More to come.
45 Peace. [At this point of today's DN, I was done writing AND with all the pictures. Some strange happenings occurred immediately after. So here is an addendum.]
46 Addendum:
47 Right after I signed off with the ~H~ and the website, I went up and began grabbing pictures, which is often how I throw this nonsense together. I had all the pics that were up except the Steve Jobs picture.
48 At first I flew past the picture of Steve Jobs, then backed up quickly, and saw the orbs. I clicked on it and BOTH those pictures turned up. My finger pushed the photo search button, but I accidentally pushed one that went back to the earliest pics I ever posted on Xanga. It was two pictures of former students on stage at Christmas time.
49 I quickly pulled them and posted them.
50 One had three girls chilling on a couch at center stage in the YB Theatre. The other had a girl with stagelights back lighting her almost the same as Jobs is in his picture. I posted both, shot to the bottom of the page to save, and the number 19 was there.
51 I pulled the pictures because I didn’t want the parties in them to get scared or anything.
52 I left in the 19.
53 DN vets know that 19 is always a significant number in all of this. I don’t know how to tell newbies this one, or my classes, but I left it there. All of that happened after all the other pictures were already in place, and the DN already ready to launch. When I saw the 19 I turned off the computer and fell into a slumber.
54 More to come indeed. All that happened AFTER I wrote “More to Come.”
55 More to come. I can promise you. More to come.
56 Peace.
~H~
19
