Two Items on the Same Desk Essay Example for Free

Two Items on the Same Desk EssayThe commencement exercise six weeks of school atomic number 18 always a joy . They are the spring metre of teaching. The last six weeks? Those weeks prat be, in the immortal words of Thomas Paine, The quantify that try mens souls. Those are the twenty-four hour time accomplishments when teachers consider retirement regardless(prenominal) of whether theyve been teaching for three historic period or thirty. Mr. Hemphill was nearing the 30 year mark.Today Mr. Hemphill, as students always c anyed him to his face, felt more like the old Mr. Hemphill he knew students often c all(prenominal)ed him behind his tolerate. Not quite 60, his friends, all of whom referred to him as just Bob, often commented on how boylike and fit he appeared for a man his age. To the highschool school students at Olympus High he was ancient. ninety percent of the other teachers were youngsters under 40, most under thirty.How old are you? he was often asked. fourth-y ear than you can imagine, hed reply. I used to teach Shakespeare.You still teach it we read Romeo and Juliet first semester.No, no, he would grin. I used to teach Shakespeare the MAN. Thats why he uses so many puns in his plays. Mr. Hemphill never gave a test or test without including a bonus question, always a pun of some kind.He didnt witness very punny today. He just felt tired, weary to the b unrivaled. On his now cleared, moments earlier cluttered desk, were 2 items. The first was the true source of his fatigue. Seventh (the final) period of his day Mr. Hemphill had been doing his best to lead a literary discussion with a class of 38 students. Most of them hadnt read the mere seven pages of the myth hed as subscribe for rest homework and upon which the discussion was around. Suddenly a piece of paper floated into the air from somewhere in the middle of the room, and past three or four desks. It lighted softly as a flyspeck bird at his feet. He picked it up. The paper, whi ch had floated like a bird, was as welcome to Mr. Hemphill as bird poop. Indeed, the less euphemistic form of the word poop came to mind as he saw what was on the paper.In graphic, splendidly detailed tagger art color was a picture of a penis and scrotum on a skateboard. Mr. Hemphill commented on the quality of the art and expressed his wish that the author would channel his obvious talents in a more productive manner. What he almost said was that the artist must surely have exhausted hours and hours studying and handling his subject in order to depict it so 2. accurately. He didnt say it merely because Mr. Hemphill in his core saw himself as a professional.His clothes, though not expensive, were ironed and neat, his shoes polished. The years hed spent in front of classrooms had taught him losing his temper was not professional. More importantly, it did you no good. He had taken a copy of the paper to the vice principal with the names of those he was certain were responsible. To t he class as a whole he expressed his disappointment that some of them who had such grand potential for greatness were choosing to spoil it on depravity. He meant it too and said it with great sincerity. A few looked as if they agreed with him. some(prenominal) others, and probably the ones responsible, snickered albeit surreptitiously.They think Im just an old, old guy from another planet, he thought at the time.When he looked at the item now he felt disappointment once again, and anger, most definitely, and hurt. For some resolve it definitely hurt. Of course it most probable had not been meant for him. It had a boys name on it, Nick ________, and it was likely a gang intimacy. When a gang member gives a guy a picture of a male private part it is a message. Hes calling the guy out, insulting him, asking him what hes going to do about it. Sometimes a gang guy draws a picture of the female equivalent.That is a worsened insult, and implies the recipient wont or cant do anything a bout it because hes just a P______. Dont judge these guys Mr. Hemphill told himself. You dont know what the house or apartment they go home to is like. You dont know whats been done to them, what happens on their block, in their hood every day. Now why did they pose the penis on a skateboard? he asked himself. The skateboard could be said to add an element of humor to the drawing. Humor to the deprived and stupid who felt any fellow who farted was funny. But humor reflects that there is humanity somewhere in there. perhaps divinity too? Mr. Hemphill shrugged, and sighed, and turned the distasteful drawing over.Next to it was a letter from a actor student, Sean. Hed found Mr. Hemphill earlier that day at break and came up to him to give him the letter. The letter wasnt to Mr. Hemphill. It was a letter to a college he was applying to. He was supposed to tell the college a little about himself and why he would be a great student to accept. Though the letter wasnt to Mr. Hemphill, th e first half of it was all about him.I owe my knowledge and ever-lasting developing love of the Literary Arts to Mr. Hemphill the letter said. He taught me the bureau stories have, and helped me learn the basic skills every writer needs. Because of him hopefully I will be able one day to consider myself a successful screen writer. Mr. Hemphill re-read those lines three times savoring every word. He remembered Sean as he had looked as a freshmen. Short, pudgy, big glasses. It was a clich perhaps, but at first glisten Mr. 3.Hemphill had thought that if he had a book of slang and looked up the word, nerd Seans photo would be beside the definition. He was smart and determined and wanted to learn. Sean wasnt as short or pudgy any more. He was starting to look like a handsome, confident young man. He would come into his own in college.I didnt teach him anything, not really, Mr. Hemphill reflected, I just steered him a little. What were the odds of receiving both these items on the same day? Mr. Hemphill remembered the year hed had Sean, his freshmen year. In the fall while he was absent and had a sub, some students who werent his students came to his fourth period pretending to be his students. Two of them distracted the substitute while the others stole some things off and in his desk. Somebody even snatched a big Muhammad Ali poster hed had on the wall for years. Im so fast when I turn off the light switch on the wall, I can go jump into tail end before its dark Ali said on the poster.Hemphill had used it for years to instruct students about hyperbole, and pride. The worst thing about the incident was that they took his pencil can. It wasnt worth anything, but it was something his oldest daughter had made for him when she was in kindergarten or first grade. Shed put paper around a small can and drawn hearts all over it, and it said, I love you daddy on it. Hemphill kept it on his desk with pencils in it for years. Every time he looked at it he remembered the w ay his Samantha, now a young mother, had looked the day she gave it to him. Why had they stolen that? at last the guilty students got ratted out and punished, but the stolen items were forever lost.Spring of that same year in his sixth period students got together and bought him a big brand new Muhammad Ali poster, nicer than the other one. They had gotten a card and all the students signed it and presented it to him during finals week. Those were the worst and the best things students had ever done to or for Mr. Hemphill throughout his whole career. They had happened during the same school year. These twain items on the desk happened during the same school day. Looking at the two items, the gross picture and the letter were a djvu of that previous school year. The two items in a way represented of all the days and all the years he had been a public school teacher.How many of his students fathers had pencil can mementos on their desks? How many of his students, if asked to write a n essay or a quick write about a hero, someone they admired, would turn in a blank sheet of paper? He remembered that he had asked to go to this school in this part of townspeople. Hed started out at Capital High where students came from the towns nicer neighborhoods and most of the parents had jobs. Innocent and idealistic, hed wanted to go where he could combat ignorance and be a light in the darkness. After 30 years the idealism still smoldered in his heart. When that break open went out it would be time to quit. 4.Mr. Hemphill pushed himself away from his desk. Along the side wall uncorrected papers mount up in little baskets. They would have to wait. He was too tired today to correct papers. Mr. Hemphill walked to the back window. There he looked out at the blue sky. He placed his hand over his heart, and whence flung the hand outward like a fishermen who has just cleaned a fish and then flings the raw backbone out into the open sea. It was a ritual started when his kids wer e small, a way to not carry the cares of the day home in the evening.Then he went home. He looked forward to kissing his wife and listening to his youngest daughter, a high school senior, tell him about her day. When he left the room one of the items on his desk was now in the waste basket beside the door. The other was inside his grade book tucked under his arm, gripped tightly beside his heart.