Teacher Man

by Frank McCourt

  Hands are waving, all girls. I can see they want to attack James. Wait, wait, ladies. Before you zero in on James, I'd like to know if each of you is a paragon of virtue around the house, always helpful, always thoughtful. Before we go on tell me this: how many of you, after eating last night, thanked your mother, kissed her, and complimented her on the dinner. Sheila?

  That'd be phoney. The mothers know we appreciate what they do.

  A dissenting voice. No, they don't. If James thanked his mother she'd faint.

  I played to the crowd till Daniel took the wind out of my sails.

  Daniel, what did you have for dinner last night?

  Veal medallions in a kind of white-wine sauce.

  What did you have with the veal medallions in white wine?

  Asparagus and a small tossed salad with vinaigrette.

  Any appetizer?

  No. Just the dinner. My mother thinks they ruin the appetite.

  So, your mother cooked the veal medallions?

  No, the maid.

  Oh, the maid. And what was your mother doing?

  She was with my father.

  So the maid cooked the dinner and, I suppose, served it?

  That's right.

  And you dined alone?

  Yes.

  At a vast highly polished mahogany table, I suppose?

  That's right.

  With a crystal chandelier?

  Yes.

  Really?

  Yes.

  Did you have music in the background?

  Yes.

  Mozart, I suppose? To go with the table and the chandelier.

  No. Telemann.

  And then?

  I listened to Telemann for twenty minutes. He's one of my father's favorites. When the piece ended I called my father.

  And where was he, if you don't mind my asking?

  He's in Sloan-Kettering Hospital with lung cancer and my mother is with him all the time because he's expected to die.

  Oh, Daniel, I'm sorry. You should have told me instead of letting me put you through the dinner interrogation.

  It doesn't matter. He's going to die anyway.

  It was quiet in the classroom. What could I say now to Daniel? I had played my little game: clever and amusing teacher-interrogator, and Daniel had been patient. Details of his elegant solitary dinner filled the classroom. His father was here. We waited by a bed with Daniel's mother. We'd remember forever the veal medallions, the maid, the chandelier, and Daniel alone at the polished mahogany table while his father died.

  I tell my classes that on Mondays they should bring in The New York Times so we can read Mimi Sheraton's restaurant reviews.

  They look at one another and shrug in the New York way. Raise your eyebrows. Lift your hands, palms out, elbows against your ribs. This shows patience, resignation, wonder.

  Why are you asking us to read restaurant reviews?

  You might enjoy them and, of course, broaden and deepen your vocabulary. That's what you are to tell important visitors from Japan and other places.

  Man, oh, man, next you'll be asking us to bring in obituaries.

  That's a good idea, Myron. You could learn a lot from reading obituaries. Would you prefer that to Mimi Sheraton? You could bring in some juicy obituaries.

  Mr. McCourt, let's stick to recipes and restaurant reviews.

  OK, Myron.

  We look into the structure of a Mimi Sheraton review. She gives us the ambience of the restaurant and the quality of service, or lack of it. She reports on each stage of a meal: appetizers, entrees, desserts, coffee, wine. She writes a summarizing final paragraph in which she justifies the stars she is awarding or not awarding. That is the structure. Yes, Barbara?

  I think this review is one of the meanest things I've ever read. I had this image of blood dripping from the paper in her typewriter or whatever she writes on.

  If you paid high prices in a restaurant like this, Barbara, wouldn't you like to be warned by someone like Mimi Sheraton?

  I try to focus on the review, use of language, details, but they want to know if she eats out every night of her life and how does she do it?

  They said you'd have to feel sorry for someone with a job like that where you can't just stay at home and have a hamburger or a bowl of cereal with a banana in it. She probably goes home nights and tells her husband she never wants to look at chicken or pork chops again in her life. The husband himself never has the pleasure of preparing a little collation to perk her up after a long day as she's probably had enough food already to keep her going for a week. Imagine the dilemma of the husbands and wives of all these food critics. Husband can never invite wife out to dinner just for the sake of going out to dinner where you don't have to glide things over your palate to figure out what spices were used or what was in that sauce. Who would want to eat with a woman who knows everything about food and wine? You'd be watching to see what kind of face she made at the first mouthful. No, she might have this glamorous job that pays loads of money but you'd get tired of the same old routine of having to eat the best of everything and can you imagine what it does to your insides anyway.

  Then, for the first time in my life, I used a word I'd never used before. I said, Nevertheless, and repeated it. Nevertheless, I'm going to make Mimi Sheratons out of all of you.

  I asked them to write about the school cafeteria or neighborhood restaurants. No one wrote positive reviews of the school cafeteria. Three ended their essays with the same sentence, It sucks. There were rave reviews of local pizzerias and the vendor who sold hot dogs and pretzels on First Avenue. One pizzeria proprietor told students he'd like to meet me and thank me for calling attention to his business and bringing honor to his profession. It was a hell of a thing to think of this teacher with an Irish name encouraging his students to appreciate the finer things in life. Anytime I wanted a pizza, not just a slice but a whole one, the door was wide open and I could have on that pizza anything I wanted, even if he had to send out to a delicatessen for extra toppings he might not have.

  I challenged them on the smugness and meanness of their school cafeteria reviews. All right, I said, the ambience is bleak. Mimi would agree with you. The cafeteria could be mistaken for a subway station or an army mess hall. You complain about the service. The women dishing out the food are too brusque. They don't smile enough. Aw, gee. That hurts your feelings. They simply dump the food, whatever it is, on a tray. Well, what do you expect? Put yourself into some dead-end job and we'll see if you come out smiling.

  I tell myself, Stop. No preaching. You did that years ago with your rant on the French Revolution. If they want to say it sucks, let them. Isn't this a free country?

  I ask them what they mean when they say the food sucks. You're writers. How about raising the level of your vocabulary? What would Mimi say?

  Aw, God, Mr. McCourt, does it have to be Mimi, Mimi every time we write about food?

  Well, what do you mean by it sucks?

  You know. You know.

  What?

  Like, you can't eat that stuff.

  Why not?

  Tastes like crap or it has no taste at all.

  How do you know what crap tastes like?

  You know, Mr. McCourt, you're a nice guy but you can be exasperating.

  You know, Jack, what Ben Jonson said?

  No, Mr. McCourt, I don't know what Ben Jonson said.

  He said, Language reveals the man. Speak that I may see thee.

  Oh, is that what Ben Jonson said?

  That's what Ben Jonson said.

  Pretty clever, Mr. McCourt. He should have dinner with Mimi.

  15

  On Open School Day the kids are dismissed at noon and the parents come swarming in from one to three and again in the evening from seven to nine. At the end of the day you meet teachers punching out at the time clock and they're weary from talking to hundreds of parents. There are three thousand kids in this school and that should add up to six thousand parents, but this is New Yor
k, where divorce is a major sport and kids have to sort out who's who and what's what and when will it happen. Three thousand kids could have ten thousand parents and stepparents who are certain their sons and daughters are the brightest of the bright. This is Stuyvesant High School, where, the minute students step inside, doors swing open to the best universities and colleges in the country and if you don't succeed it's your own damn fault. The moms and dads are cool, confident, cheerful, self-assured when they're not worried, concerned, despairing, uncertain, suspicious. They have high expectations and nothing less than success will satisfy them. They turn out in such numbers every teacher needs a student monitor to manage the flow. They are anxious about their child's standing in the class. Would I say Stanley is above average? Because they think he's getting lazy and hanging out with the wrong people. They hear things about Stuyvesant Square, things about drugs, you know, and that's enough to make you lose sleep. Is he doing his work? Do you notice any changes in his behavior and attitudes?

  Stanley's parents are going through a bitter divorce and no wonder Stanley is screwed up. The mother keeps the classic six-room apartment on the Upper West Side while Dad is in some hovel in the arse end of the Bronx. They've agreed to split Stanley down the middle, three and a half days every week with each of them. Stanley is good at mathematics but even he doesn't know how to divide himself like that. He's good-humored about it. He turns his dilemma into some kind of algebraic equation: If a equals 31/2 and b equals 31/2, then what is Stanley? His math teacher, Mr. Winokur, gives Stanley a grade of 100 for even thinking along such lines. In the meantime, my monitor on Open School Night is Maureen McSherry and she tells me Stanley's battling father and mother are sitting in my classroom waiting to see me and, Maureen adds, there must be half a dozen battling couples who won't sit together while I talk about their little darlings.

  Maureen has given them numbers like the ones you get in a bakery and my heart is sinking because there seems to be no end to the flow of parents coming into the room. As soon as you're finished with one, another arrives. They fill all the seats: three are perched like kids on the back windowsill, whispering, and half a dozen stand along the back wall. I wish I could tell Maureen to call a halt but you can't in a school like Stuyvesant where the parents know their rights and are never at a loss for words. Maureen whispers, Watch out. Here comes Stanley's mother, Rhonda. She'll have you for breakfast.

  Rhonda reeks of nicotine. She sits and leans toward me and tells me not to believe a word of what that son-of-a-bitch, Stanley's father, tells me. She can't even bear to say the bastard's name and feels sorry for poor Stanley that he's stuck with this prick for a father figure and how is Stanley doing anyway?

  Oh, fine. He's a pretty good writer and popular with the other kids.

  Well, that's a miracle considering what he's going through with jerko Dad running around with every bit of skirt he can pick up. I do my best the times I have Stanley but he can't concentrate three and a half days a week knowing the next three and a half he's in that hovel in the Bronx. What's happening is that he's started to stay over at other kids' houses. That's what he tells me but I happen to know he's got this girlfriend whose parents are completely permissive and I have my suspicions.

  I'm afraid I don't know anything about that. I'm just his teacher and it's impossible to get into the private lives of one hundred and seventy-five kids every semester.

  Rhonda's voice carried and the waiting parents were shifting in their seats, rolling their eyes, restless. Maureen told me I'd have to watch the clock, give each parent no more than two minutes, even Stanley's father, who would demand equal time. He said, Hi, I'm Ben. Stanley's dad. Look, I heard what she said, the therapist. I wouldn't send a dog to her. He laughed and shook his head. But let's not get into that. I got this problem with Stanley now. After all this education, after me saving for his college education for years, he wants to screw the whole thing up. You know what he wants to do? Go to some conservatory in New England and study classical guitar. Tell me, what kinda money is there in playing classical guitar? I told him...but look, I won't take up your time, Mr. McCord.

  McCourt.

  Yeah. I won't take up your time, but I told him, Over my dead body. We agreed from day one he'd be an accountant. Never any doubt about that. I mean what am I working for? I'm a CPA myself and if you have any little problems I'd be glad to help out. No, sir. No classical guitar. I tell him, Go get your accountancy degree and play your guitar in your spare time. He breaks down. He cries. He threatens to live with his mother and I wouldn't wish that on a Nazi. So, I wonder if you could have a word with him? I know he likes your class, likes playing recipes and whatever you're doing here.

  I'd like to help but I'm not a guidance counselor. I'm an English teacher.

  Oh, yeah? Well, from what Stanley tells me about this class, the last thing you do here is teach English. No offense but I don't know what cooking has to do with English. Thanks anyway and how is he doing?

  He's doing well.

  The bell rings and Maureen, who is not shy, announces that time is up but she'd be glad to take names and phone numbers of anyone who would like to come in for a fifteen-minute conference on school days. She passes around a sheet of paper, which remains blank. They want my attention here and now. Christ, they've waited half the night while these other loonies babbled on about their messed-up kids and no wonder they're a mess, the parents they have. The frustrated ones follow me down the hall asking how is Adam doing, Sergei, Juan, Naomi? What kind of school is this where you can't get the attention of a teacher for a minute and what am I paying taxes for?

  At nine, teachers punching out at the time clock are talking about going round the corner for a drink at the Gas House. We sit at a table in the back and order pitchers of beer. We're dry from talk talk talk. Jesus, what a night. I tell R'lene Dahlberg and Connie Collier and Bill Tuohy that in all my years at Stuyvesant only one parent, a mother, asked if her son was enjoying school. I said yes. He seemed to be enjoying himself. She smiled, stood up, said, Thank you, and left. One parent in all those years.

  All they care about is success and money, money, money, says Connie. They have expectations for their kids, high hopes, and we're like workers on an assembly line sticking a little part in here, another little part in there till the finished product comes out at the end all ready to perform for parent and corporation.

  A group of parents wandered into the Gas House. One came over to me. This is nice, she said. You have time to guzzle beer but you can't spare a minute for a parent who waited half an hour to see you.

  I told her I was sorry.

  She said, Yeah, and joined her group at another table. I felt so weighed down by that evening of parents I drank too much and stayed in bed next morning. Why didn't I just tell that mother to kiss my royal Irish arse?

  In my class Bob Stein never sat at a desk. It could have been his bulk but I think he found comfort perched on the deep capacious windowsill in the back of the room. As soon as he was settled he smiled and waved. Good morning, Mr. McCourt. Isn't this a great day?

  Through all the seasons of the school year he wore a white shirt open at the neck, the white collar lapped over the gray collar of his double-breasted jacket. He told the class that the jacket once belonged to Orson Welles and if he ever met Welles they'd have something to talk about. If it weren't for the jacket, he wouldn't know what to say to Orson Welles as his interests were completely different from the actor's.

  He wore short pants that were long pants cut off at the knees and, no, they did not match the jacket so there was no connection with Orson Welles.

  He wore gray socks so heavy they lumped in woolen piles over his yellow construction boots.

  He carried no bag, no books, no notebooks, no pen. He joked that it was partly my fault because of the excited way I once talked about Thoreau and how you should simplify, simplify, simplify and get rid of possessions.

  When there was a written assignment or a test in class
he asked me if by any chance he could borrow a pen and some paper.

  Bob, this is a writing class. It requires certain materials.

  He assured me everything would be all right and advised me not to worry. He told me from the windowsill the snow was appearing on my head and I should enjoy the years left to me.

  No, no, he told the class. Don't laugh.

  But they were already in hysterics and so loud I had to wait to hear him again. He said that in a year from now I'd just look back at this moment and wonder why I wasted my time and emotions on his lack of pen and paper.

  I had to play the part of stern teacher. Bob, you could fail this class if you don't participate.

  Mr. McCourt, I can't believe you're telling me this, you of all people with your miserable childhood and everything, Mr. McCourt. But it's OK. If you fail me I'll take the course again. No big hurry. What's a year or two one way or the other? For you, maybe, it's a big thing but I'm only seventeen. All the time in the world, Mr. McCourt, even if you fail me.

  He asked the class if anyone would like to help him out with pen and paper. There were ten offers but he took the one closest so that he wouldn't have to climb down from his windowsill. He said, See, Mr. McCourt? See how nice people are. Long as they carry these big bags you and I will never have to worry about supplies.

  Yes, yes, Bob, but how is that going to help you next week when we have the big test on Gilgamesh?

  What's that, Mr. McCourt?

  It's in the world-literature book, Bob.

  Oh, yeah. I remember that book. Big book. I have it at home and my dad's reading the Bible parts an' all. My dad's a rabbi, you know. He was so happy you gave us that book with all the prophets an' everything and he said you must be a great teacher an' he's coming to see you on Open School Night. I told him you were a great teacher except you have this thing about pens and paper.

  Cut it out, Bob. You haven't even looked at the book.

  He urged me again not to worry as his father, the rabbi, often talked about the book and he, Bob, would be sure to find out all about Gilgamesh and anything else that would make the teacher happy.