If Absence Makes the Heart Grow Fonder... UPDATED

... then I'd like to start being fond of them RIGHT NOW.

That is my clever way of saying I am not going to miss this year's cherubs.  As any teacher can tell you, each year's class is both similar and different.  They're similar in that all groups of kids have the same cast of characters: Smart kids, dumb kids, quiet kids, and rambunctious kids; scholars and athletes and doofuses and sweethearts.  They're different in that the group chemistry - how they work together, how they act as a group, the impression they leave - differs, sometimes wildly, from year to year.  Take the Class of 2005, or as I like to call them, the Best Class EVAH!  They were truly fun to be around, and I liked the vast majority of them probably 90% of the time.  Looking back at my class lists, I didn't have a single class of '05ers that made me want to turn the page and move on.  The Class of 2004, on the other hand?  Not so much. I liked a lot of those kids as individuals, but as a group, they just weren't very nice.  It was kinda hard to feel warm and fuzzy about a group that deliberately screwed up their state testing to make the school district look bad.  

I've been trying to figure out why this particular cohort hasn't found favor with me and I think I have it:  This group doesn't get it.  They don't understand when they cross the line between harmless goofing around and serious misbehavior.  No matter how many times we explain, no matter what we say or do or try, they Just. Don't. Get It. They never miss an opportunity to misbehave.  When we went to the high school for their step-up tour, former students in the halls greeted us with warm hellos, then caught a load of our little charges punching each other, running around, making fun of the upperclassmen and basically behaving like submorons.  "Is this class really bad?" they whispered to us in horror.  "We weren't like THAT last year, were we?"  Hastily we reassured them that no, no, they weren't nearly as heinous; this year's vintage of 8th grader was just particularly sour.

So that was Monday.  Since then, we've had TWO different boys on our team get punched right in the junk because they noodged and they noodged and they noodged and they noodged until, WHAMMO!  The people they were pestering just snapped and went for the giblets.  Such is the group we have this year that when we teachers heard about the incidences, our reaction was less one of surprise than resignation (rapidly followed by the drafting of a wish list of future victims).  This morning, after Crotch-Shot, The Sequel transpired, we had a team come-to-Jesus meeting where we told the kids, in no uncertain terms, in plain black and white, with no nuances, that they are NOT ALLOWED PHYSICAL CONTACT OF ANY KIND for the remainder of our time together.  There will be no playing tag, no bumping the backside of one another's knees, no slaps upside the head, no pushing, tripping, poking, nudging, elbowing, or any other form of touching that involves the violation of any other human being's personal space.  That edict was followed by the dictum that, should any of those events transpire, offenders are not to respond to reprimands with denials, eye rolls, imprecations muttered under one's breath, or deliberate walking away before said reprimands are completed.  Finally, should anything untoward occur from that moment forward, the offenders will be summarily removed from any or all end-of-the-year celebratory events, with no chance of reprieve. 

The room was silent.

The eyes were downcast.

The body language was defensive.

The message - FINALLY - seemed to have hit home.

So you can imagine my consternation when, later that day, one of the prime violators of the no-tag rule stopped to ask me a burning question.

"You know how we're not supposed to touch each other?" he asked.

"Ye-ee-es," I answered warily.

"Will I get in trouble if I do this?" he queried, raising his hand as if to backhand someone.  "What if I'm just trying to make someone flinch," he continued, "and I'm not trying to hit them?"

I gave him the Cold Stare of Death.  "What do you think will happen?" I asked stonily. 

"I'll get in trouble?"

"Yeah.  You'll get in trouble."

"Oh," he said, as if he was just realizing that, if we have a no-touch rule?  Gee, then doing something that JUST MIGHT HAPPEN to approximate THE EXACT SAME BEHAVIOR that his teachers are TRYING TO ELIMINATE might not be the best choice to make at this particular point in time.

And it only took 170 days for these guys to figure it out.

I don't know who's going to be voted Most Likely to Succeed or Best All-Around four years hence, but I do know who's going to win the First Freshman To Be Stuffed In A Locker By A Senior competition next year.

P.S. My ambassador from ManLand (a.k.a. my coworker's husband) reports that, when you are a middle school boy, you have to make a very big deal about any threat, real or perceived, to the well-being of your goolies.  According to him, getting decked in the business offers a golden opportunity to prove to all and sundry that, HEY!  WE GOT TESTES IN THE HIZZOUSE, YO!  So even if your wedding tackle would be hard-pressed to fill a quarter-cup measure, any shot to the crotch area has to be answered with an Academy-award winning performance of writhing, squirming, and doubling over in pain, preferably with a soupcon of gasping for breath to round it all off.  Then you have to swagger around like John Wayne just off his horse for the remainder of the day to accommodate your tender, bruised man tonsils. 

P.P.S.  I had NO idea just how much fun I was going to have thinking up euphemisms for the male pundenda!  Really!  It's a pity I don't have boy chilluns to initiate into manhood, 'cause now I am ready for 'em!  Hey, this is a perfect opportunity for audience participation:  What's your favorite nickname for the equipment? 

P.P.P.S. If Warren ever gets around to reading this post, he's going to grump about the fact that I'm getting my XY intel from an outside source.  "I'm a man," he'll point out, in a somewhat aggrieved tone, "how come you're citing other people's husbands for this?"  I just want it known as a matter of public record that my hubs has never, not ever, not even once, ever offered me so much as one helpful insight into the psyche of the under-15 male.  He probably will console himself by thinking that he is way too mature to think that way anymore.  Which brings up a good point.  But I will leave you to make your own deductions about the relative maturity and grown-upped-ness of my current ambassador.

Comments

[Marta]

you're right about the class of 05, we are tough to beat. luckily we all still enjoy being around each other. maybe it had something to do with out class advisor. you must be a glutton for punishment for going to middle school