So my darling plinky – you have chosen to be irritating again. If my concentration was better than that of a firefly perhaps I would cut you away completely (and for those of you unaware of the ‘cut away’ slang look it up, one of the most useful pieces of military slang which I would like to bring to the civilian world) but alas I am still here. Why are you irritating? Well you finally managed to use an ‘an’ instead of a ‘-est’ word word. It is simply that you are making me use the third person perspective for a second time in two days. So long as you don’t make it a hat trick I’ll forgive you tomorrow.
Anyway let’s get on topic shall we? Tell an awkward third person... wait that isn’t it... Tell a story about an awkward school experience. Fun topic... Anybody who can’t write a novel of awkward school moments must either have a bad memory or a very good imagination. So anyway I guess I should pick a good one.
As always to find a good one I had to pit stop through a large number of memories before I find a good one that I can replay which is entertaining in something a bit longer than a Facebook status (I refuse to use Twitter even in my analogies). Anyway I figure I’ll avoid the moment I told my best friend of 4 years(well me and my other best friend called him that we were lucky we he acknowledged us as friends – whole story in that one) I liked him. Or the time in seventh grade when I had a discussion on the bus with an eighth grade girl about which was more offensive the finger or the toe (which she explained was physically manipulating your toes so that only the middle toe is standing) – the answer she was looking for (everybody who asks those questions has an answer they have already deemed the ‘right one) was the toe.
So I can think of an abundance of awkward moments throughout my schooling. This one I’m going to write about however is one of those times where the snowball rolling downhill grows out of control to comical dimensions.
It is a sixth grade lunch time. Nothing particularly unusual about this one, nothing to make it memorable. The class, for in this cafeteria students come as a class, sit as a class and leave as a class, arrived to the cafeteria. Kids divided into the two lines based on meal preference―the normal meal, veg & milk just inside the door/’fastfood’ option to the far side. The girls in question had chosen the normal line.
Well, all bar one, the other girl, who in this story will be called Olive, deemed herself too good for the normal food line. She deemed herself too good for a lot of things, including the other girls―particularly the other girls. Or at least one other girl, Peach, perhaps an easy target, the youngest in the year, a little heavy, who has (being Australian not American) grown up completely oblivious to the racism and all its complications.
Peaches had been a little bit out of it on this particular day, perhaps this particular week. The exact reason for this has been washed away with history, this event took place many, many years ago. Turning to her friend, Rose, Peach said, her eyes following Olive across the cafeteria. ‘I HATE her. I want to kill her.’ Rose didn’t make a comment simply turning to get her meal.
At the table a very seconds later with the rest of the members of her class Peach was confronted by another of her not favourite people, Lily. Unfortunately Peach, having conceded completely to her bad mood gave Lily a bit of an earful also. Not death threats, though she did reiterate the one towards Olive, simply frustrated comments.
Then walking into the classroom one of the boys, a friend of Lily’s, here we’ll call him Dennis, spoke to Peaches. ‘I know what you said about her Peach. I can’t believe you could say something like that.’ Peaches starred at him shocked, she felt threatened by his tone of voice, and his words played on her already active conscious. ‘You’re... gay’ She was shocked at herself for saying that. Never had she used the word gay that way, until that moment the only references in her life to gay had been of the good-time, gay-time variety.
That was the part of this story that got to the teacher. How does one back-pedal out of a situation like that? Peach certainly didn’t manage it. The whole story came out. Funnily all of the gay stuff got forgotten about pretty quickly. It certainly wasn’t the bit that had her fronting the school police officer. How many schools have a resident police officer in the sixth grade hall, certainly not in Aussie schools? Ahhh well... The death threats towards Olive, said with all the seriousness of a relatively well adjusted 11 year old girl unexposed to anything more violent than a Disney movie.
After a long line of ‘yes sir, no sir, three bags full sir’ while the Bye Baby Bunting police officer explained how serious threats were to Peach they got to decision time. ‘Miss Peach, this is a VERY serious matter. For the threats you have made toward Miss Olive you are going to have to go to children’s court. And tell your mother.’ He said this like the separate and far more significant point which to a 11 year old girl... is about right. ‘Or we will come to a compromise. I’m going to hand you over to the guidance councillor and she will oversee you apologising to Olive and mediating a solution to your relationship issues. This will not involve court and we won’t have to call you mother.’
Dumb question, thought Peach, anything for my mum to never know my lowest moments. ‘I’ll take mediation’ The guidance councillor came and took her to the office, calling for Olive to join them. Both girls were forced to apologise to one another. Ten minutes later Olive was returned to class leaving Peach alone with the councillor to talk about the problems she was having at the time. Apparently significant enough to save dear Peach from the during class detention room instead simply being returned to the classroom to read for the rest of the lesson.
Yep... lets just say that is the first and LAST time the word of the ‘law’ has ever been directed at me. It was also the most awkward supervised apology I have ever been party to. And one of the biggest things that ever happened to me at school that I never, NEVER told my mother.
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