English

Teachers

  I loved Language Arts when I was in school. Back in the seventies we called it “English” class, because here in America we still need to take a class on how to speak and write our native language every year until we die.  I think our “educators” got a clue that calling the class we all had to take every freakin’ year of our lives, “English” was a little embarrassing to the US of A, so they decided to change the title to “Language Arts” implying that we were taking a much more intellectually challenging class about the "art" of the english language instead of just trying to teach Americans where to put a comma and not to use none of them double negatives, y'all. Despite the horrible “English” curriculum offered to us here in VB in the seventies I still absolutely loved literature and creative writing.  Thanks Ms. Haring for being the coolest teacher in 1975.    You still wore your mini skirts from 1968 with Frye boots and a peace sign necklace made of hammered silver back when it really stood for peace.   You also smoked and left the Virginia Slims pack sticking out of your suede fringed bag that sat on your desk, because the beach students wouldn’t DARE touch anything on your desk even if it was sitting right out in the open.  It just wasn't "done" back then.

 I loved how you shared your life with us. You used to tell us how you and your husband had broken up and gotten back together more than Liz and Richard. We had no idea who Liz and Richard were, but they must have been cool if you referenced them, right?  You told us how you rode bikes and smoked even while you were exercising and you laughed at how counter-productive that was. You asked us what we did that previous beautiful Saturday and you really wanted an answer!  I thought you were the absolute coolest adult around.  It wasn’t the smoking, or the styles you wore.  It was the fact that you talked to us like adults, talked about what you did on your weekends and actually cared about what we did on ours. You actually read our silly sentimental attempts at creative writing and gave us suggestions and honest opinions without making us feel intimidated. We felt respected and, in turn, we respected you.  Thanks Ms. Haring.  I hope you still wear your peace sign. I still wear mine.