Wil

15

The sun rose and everything fell.
That's what this goddam writer is supposed to have had on his gravestone. The sun rose and everything fell. What kind of gothic wacko wants to have that on his gravestone? When I die, I want my grave to say: "She was never wrong." or something. But, anyway there I was, with a whole goddam fourth grade class at a graveyard, about to discuss a writer who they've never read anything by. Maybe that was a good thing. Because this guy, Jackson Steinemen, was a scary friggin writer. To be totally honest about it I've only read one of his books and I did it only because I had to in high school.
But I sure as hell was not about to tell anyone that, because I just got thirty ten-year-olds onto a school bus and to graveyard. The worst part about school busses is that you have to sit next to the most annoying little buggers like Alex and Holden because if you don’t then they'll bully kids like Zeke and Allison. I used to just sit next to Zeke or Allison to prevent them from being bullied on the bus, but they're more annoying than Alex and Holden. And, now that I think about it, I can't really blame Holden for being that mean, right? I mean his name is Holden! You honestly might as well name your kid "Disturbed". The worst thing about the bad kids is that they are really smart, and often very funny, and as the teacher, I can't laugh at anything they say. It's pretty brutal.
The bus ride went smoothly. The only issue was that the whole class started singing this song, which I had at first thought was about herpetology. It occurred to me a minute later that this song was about something else entirely.
Fortunately, the bus reached its destination just as I had made this conclusion. We arrived at the graveyard and led everybody in a line to the grave. It was a very short walk to the grave, and it was there that we met our tour guide, Melissa. I told our class to circle up, which was difficult because all these graves got in the way, in particular this one that was this huge stone coffin on top of the ground, which led me to think that if people aren't going to bury the big fancy coffin of their loved one, why don't they just keep it in their living room or on their porch where it is easier to show off? While I was imagining this three of my students thought that a good way to solve the issue of making a circle was to stand on the big fancy coffin, and just have the circle overlap it.
"Get down from there!" I yelled.
"But we're making a circle!" said all three kids, out of sync with each other.
"Don't talk back!"
"Don't talk back" is what one says when one really means "I know you're making a circle, but maybe it isn't wise to stand on a grave because you'll piss off God or at least the tour guide."
After they got off of the big fancy coffin and the kids organized themselves into some connected shape, I suggested to the tour guide that maybe we should start now.
"I don't know. That doesn't look very much like a circle," said the tour guide.
I honestly hate it when teachers do that. I've hated it since I was a kid in school, which is why I only do it when I'm pissed off at the class. Melissa was mishandling a weapon. She wasn't even thirty years old, let alone a teacher. Who authorized her to do that? The questioning of a circle is a teacher privilege only.
But it was too late and all the kids were exasperatedly trying to form a somewhat legitimate circle to impress Melissa, with her unbreakable smile and baseball cap and fancy clipboard with a pen attached to it on a string.
"That's more like it!" said Melissa after everyone settled down in their new shape, which was nothing more like a circle.
"Now," said Melissa, "can anyone tell me whose grave this is?"
"Which grave?" asked one of the kids.
"This one right here." said Melissa, without pointing to a grave so still nobody had any idea which grave we were discussing.
"Does anybody know?" asked Melissa again, "Any ideas?"
At this point I was thinking "Okay, lady, seriously just say it."
"It says it on the gravestone..." said Melissa, as if she was dropping some hint that made this game even more oodles of fun. I got news for you Melissa: Nobody had any idea which gravestone we were looking at!
"Give up?"
I seriously wanted to smack the clipboard right out of her pretty little nail polished hands.
"Okay... It's Jackson Steinemen. Jackson Steinemen is considered by many to be one of the great American writers. Does anyone know what he wrote?"
"Fifty Shades Of Grey?"
That's Holden. Now, this was not one of his most witty comments, but I would have liked very much to laugh with the class, who found this hysterical, but I had to act stern and try to shut everyone up.
"Okay! Quiet down!" I said. Melissa is looking at me with this look of complete fury in her eyes, as if it was my fault that Holden somehow knew what Fifty Shades Of Grey is or that he knew when to comically refer to it.
Once everyone shut up Melissa continued.
"He is most famous for his book The Glowing Cloud Adventure. Has anyone heard of this book? Does anyone know what it's about?"
"Radioactive farts?"
The whole class erupted again. Well, that was the second time, so I had to yell: "Holden!"
"It wasn't me!" said Holden, who looked genuinely caught off guard.
"He's right!" said Allison, "It was Zeke!"
"Zeke? " I thought, "Zeke said that? Unpopular, unconventional Zeke made a successful fart joke and a damn good one at that? Wow. This could be a turning point for Zeke. Good for Zeke."
"Okay, everyone, be quiet!" I yelled. Melissa started again.
"The Glowing Cloud Adventure is actually about ghosts. One ghost, actually. It walks around the streets of New York and wherever it goes, a glowing cloud of mist follows. It is famous for it's first line 'The sun rose and everything fell.' which you can see on his gravestone right here. It is written from the perspective of-"
"It's raining!"
I looked over to Alex.
"It's raining!" yelled Alex.
Okay, Alex is normally a troublemaker, but telling people it's raining when it's not while outside, is a pretty strange form of practical joke. Only then I realized that he was, for once, not making a joke, because it was beginning to rain. Just a bit though. So I thought we could continue.
"I think we can just keep going." said Melissa, as if I hadn't already thought of that.
Melissa continued: "It is told from the perspective of the ghost himself. Does anyone know what this kind of-"
Cloudburst. We were all drenched with in seconds. The class erupted into a cacophony of laughter, shrieks, and curses. Kids started running all over and into each other. Finally one voice raised above the chaos.
"Hey, everyone! God's peeing on us!"
The class was then united once again in laughter. Thank you, Alex. Laughter so loud that I could giggle along and go unnoticed. Scratch that, Melissa was staring at me with a shocked look as if I'd just blown up her house. As if she was recovering from my display of childishness, she said "There's a cafeteria where we're eating lunch anyway. Let's go there."
That's just what we did. We got to this cafeteria building about a block away, which is normally a cafeteria for college students, but it was 10:30, so nobody has a lunch break yet. We did a head count.
Melissa started talking again.
"Does anyone know what kind perspective that is?"
"It's not raining anymore!"
It was Alex again. And he was right. You could see outside the window that it was not raining anymore.
Melissa retorted: "It will probably start again in a minute. Now, does anyone know what kind of perspective it is when the story is told by a character?... Anyone have an idea? The answer is first person. When the story is told by someone in the story, that's called a first person narrative."
"There's a bird outside-"
"Be quiet Holden!" I said. Not that I really wanted to hear about first person narrative right then.
"Jackson Steinemen used first person narrative for every one of his books, short stories, and-"
"There's a bird outside and it won't stop pooping!" yelled Holden. Now, I'm not going to lie, when everyone ran to the window to see the pooping bird, I was just as interested as them.
Melissa started hollering her face off, telling everyone to get back in their seats at the table, but nobody could hear her. They were too busy laughing, yelling "ewww", and yelling "I can't see!" I was really beginning to enjoy this day.
Finally one of the kids who couldn't see yelled "I'm going outside so I can see!"
Next thing you know half of the kids were all dashing towards the doorway. I had to make sure everyone's okay, so I chased the kids along with Melissa. All the kids stopped at the closed door. Standing at the door was the one who had the idea of leaving, Alex. Maybe I should've told him to stop, but I was exhausted. So, instead, I just gave him a look. A look that said "Don't open that door or you will regret it." Frankly, I would much rather have given him a look that said: "Your choice. I'm pooped. I gotta say, if you opened it, it would be entertaining." Alex stared at the door handle and slowly turned the knob.