The Alpha Male

It would seem that Andrew Bauer is making a power play. He seems to be placing himself in a position to claim the role of Alpha male.

Oh yeah, it's on.

Let me set the stage for this potential epic struggle. I currently teach in what might be the most non-traditional, yet effective and productive English Language Arts team ever assembled. Oddly, the team of seven contains four male members. That may not sound significant to most of you, but as a male English teacher at the high school level, I have often been alone in the testosterone zone, or been lucky enough to have one compadre to which I could turn. It was not a bad thing, if you must know the truth. It definitely has made me a more well-rounded teacher, and it has allowed me to identify my shortcomings as a man and learn to repair or at least camouflage them so my wife does not have to suffer them quite so much.  This team has four male members. The senior member of the team (by senior I mean he has taught at BHS the longest, not that he is just old) knows how to build and fix stuff, makes a mean pot of hot chilli, and has a concealed carry permit. He is a man. A second member has coached football, wears a mustache and goatee, and is bald. As we all know, baldness equals boldness, as evidenced by Michael Jordan, Stone Cold Steve Austin, and Dr. Evil. Man card? Check. I have never claimed to be the most manly of men, but I too have been a long-time football coach, I drive truck, and buffalo wings are in my top three favorite food of all time to consume at any time. Yeah, I'm a man. Besides, my wife said I was one. So there. Then we have the fourth member. Andrew Bauer.  He is definitely the most well-dressed member of our little clan. He is also the tallest. Intellectually, he can hurl pithy comments and ironic allusions my way without missing a beat. He was an editor of his college newspaper, despite not being a part of the journalism major program, and I can envision him, sleeves rolled up as the clock ticked toward presstime, demanding a rewrite of the feature on page three, all the while puffing on cigar, totally disregarding the government prohibition of such practices in public buildings. The classic man's man. He is also awaiting entry into the fraternity that the rest of us have enjoyed for some time: he will become a father for the first time. Yep, we're guys. Dudes. MEN.

Now, it would seem that Andrew has decided he must make a power play and claim, for himself, the position of Alpha male. It began by his subtle undermining of what little authority Greg and myself pretended to enjoy by calling us "jerks" to his students. I know he has been making challenges to both John and Greg. Ok, I do not know this, actually, but if I yell it, then it must be true. HE HAS BEEN MAKING CHALLENGES TO JOHN AND GREG! I can speak with even more certainty about the personal challenges he has made to me. He followed up his jerk attack by printing a tweet I had made in response to his challenge and posting it on his classroom door. Obviously, if I tweeted it, it was supposed to remain private. Last week, he taped to my door an article that revealed the power of evoking the image of a baby deer in a group of men to immediately elevate that man to the position of Alpha male in that group. Well played, Andrew. Well played.

So, it would seen the battle for masculine supremacy has begun and threatens the pleasant and productive atmosphere of the upstairs south hallway. It is a shame, but what else can we do?

The only problem with this scenario rests in the makeup of the remaining members of our team. The "ladies". You see; they are also not what most would envision as the traditional image of the English teacher. Mousy, reserved, and submissive. Um, no. One owns a Harley, and rode it through the American southeast this summer. One is a huge NASCAR fan who had Ms. Jewell as her predominant example of a strong female teacher. The third, our youngest member, wields a pistol better than any of us, owns a dog that I am pretty sure ate a guy, and has actually slept with a shotgun.

Men, we're in trouble. But, since we're all married, we already knew that. Around here, "Alpha male" just means you are the first one say something stupid.

Hey, I win!

"My compliments, I think."

As I scanned my closet this morning, I spotted a long-sleeved, black dress shirt that I had not worn lately. It met the three requirements for selection as a part of my outfit: it was clean, it was not wrinkled, and it did not obviously clash with the slacks I had already pulled out. So, I wore it. I saw Miss Porter in the hall after lunch, and she said, "Well, this is different. You look nice today."

Ouch. She cut me. Cut me bad.

I am going to assume that Miss Porter's intended meaning was not what the statement sounded like. She laughed after saying it, and actually said something along the lines of "That's not what I meant." She told me that another teacher, we will call her Mrs. Neill, told her that a mouse caught on a sticky trap reminded her of Miss Porter. For some reason, Miss Porter did not see that as a compliment.

That has me thinking about how compliments are not always compliments, and insults are not always insults. For example, on that occasion that Miss Porter says, "Well, this is different. You look nice today," she is not trying to point out that my fashion choices are rarely ones I should be proud of, but rather that she has never seen me wear that shirt. Or maybe it was a little of both, and she is just too polite to say, "Dang Kohls, about time you pieced together something presentable." That is the beauty, and the rub, of the American English language.

Take the word simple. "Your life is a simple one" is not in any way derogatory. Most people would welcome a life that could be described that way. However, would the listener be willing to accept "You are, for lack of a better term, simple" as a positive assessment of her mental capabilities? If she is, in fact, simple, she might nod and smile, but that does not mean she accepts it as a compliment.

Think about the word "thoughtless". Break down the word, and one has a term meaning "without consideration, literally, without thought." No one wants to be called thoughtless; however, the statement "He rushed in without thought and helped the little girl" is obviously a compliment. It is a good thing to be thoughtless, or at least it would seem to be.

I would suppose, as with all things, it is context that rules the day. I hear young men in my class tell one another, "Dude, you look swole." That is a good thing. Swole, by the way, is a perverted and corrupted form of the verb to swell, past participle form of which is swollen, rolled around in the mouth of a 17 year old boy, and later spit out as "swole", meaning he has been made large by lifting weights. To turn to his left, however, and direct the same statement toward the petite young lass at the next table, "Girl, you look swole today," would most likely result in blushing, shocked silence, or an outburst of tears. "I knew these jeans make me look fat! I hate you!" I recommend not using that term to describe your pregnant wife either.

Heck, even calling someone the phonetic equivalent of fat is a compliment, as in "She's phat like Cindy Crawford." Now, if I could only find someone in my classes who still knows who Cindy Crawford is, that might have more meaning. At one time, Bad was a negative, but then it became a positive (remember Michael Jackson, when he was still the King of Pop? He was B-A-D bad. I am not really sure where MJ sits on the positive/negative scale right now).

So, be careful what you say, even when you are complimenting someone. It is odd that I put much thought into my outfits, but I do not need to be reminded of that deficiency very often. I am still trying to figure out exactly how reminding someone of a dead mouse on sticky strip is a good thing, but I am sure that is how she meant it. Maybe the little corpse was swole.

#Socktober

Good morning! This post is going to be a short one, as I have freshmen starting to wander in and need to make sure everything is ready to go. Despite the exemption the state of Kansas has received, we still try not to leave any of them behind.

Each Friday, my classroom hosts "Friday Filmday". We watch a short video, usually from the internet, that has something to do with life, school, whatever seems relevant at the time. Last week, I showed the Kid President's latest offering. In response, my students have accepted the Socktober challenge. I have cleaned out the right side of my classroom closet (which is truly amazing in itself), and the kids have been challenged to fill it with socks, blankets, toiletries, anything that a local shelter or organization might be able to use to aid the homeless in our area.  It warmed my heart during the day, when I explained the challenge to my first senior class, when one of my girls said, "You will need to clean out more of the closet Mr. Kohls. That is not enough space." I told them that if we fill the right side, I will continue to clean off the shelves on the left and keep filling them. Now, we just have to live up to her words and fill the closet. It's a good cause, and our kids have proven before that they can do great things for other people. At the end of the month, we will choose an area organization or group of organizations to whom I will deliver the goods.

Kind of cool, eh? If you want to take part but do not know how, drop a pair of new socks, a blanket, canned good, or anything else to could help as the weather turns colder by my classroom, Room 202, and we will add it to the closet. I hope I have to clean out much more space. That would be amazing.

Until later, have a great week! 

Biff. He's Back.

I started posting this in serial form a while back and stopped for some reason.  So, I thought now was a good time to start it up again.
Here is a link to the installments I posted earlier, in case you missed it:
"The Torrid Tales of Biff Wellington, Private Investigator, Installments 1-4"

Here is a link to the latest installment, if you want to just skip to that.
"The Torrid Tales of Biff Wellington, Private Investigator, Installment 4"

Let me know what you think. As Belushi once said, "It don't cost nothin'."

Choose, or "The Twitter War"

I opened my blog to post, but then I entered into a vicious twitter grammar conflict that pulled me from my task. Is it wrong that I feel incredibly fulfilled by correcting a misused word such as "cause", which can be a noun or a verb, but not a subordinate conjunction, or "its", which shows possession, but is not a contraction of the pronoun and the verb is? Is it even more satisfying to see former and current students favorite those tweets and join into the fray? Wrong may not be the correct word. Surely, it is somewhat disturbing though.

Twitter, Facebook, and other social media provide us as guardians of the language (self-appointed and misguided as we may be) with an opportunity. I know many teachers despise the social media postings because they are so filled with inappropriate language, bigotry, and ignorance. However, my feed and timelines are not filled with such things. Sure, they are there from time to time, but the people I interact with do not post that way as a rule. What I do see is a chance to interact with people on another level, in another way. A way that they enjoy and are willing to use without hesitation. Where else can one get 15 to 20 young adults to willing read about grammar, syntax, and other writing conventions and actually take part in the discussion, even if it is just to click a star.

We have to take any opportunity we can to interact with people in a positive way. It might be clicking the star of a post or picture, letting a person know you appreciate their words or work, at least a little bit, sharing a photo from a quirky grammar and writing page so you can covertly reinforce a lesson from class, dropping a word of encouragement on Compliment Monday or as Beautiful Buhler, or congratulating a great group of guys that they have shown a tremendous amount of heart and guts so far this season. Carl Sandburg wrote a poem named "Choose".

"A single clinched fist, lifted and ready,
Or an open, asking hand, held out and waiting.
Choose
For we meet by one or the other."

I tell my kids in class not to be the closed fist, but to be the open hand. We have to be open and willing to give things a try. We ask our kids to do that every day, and we get excited when they do it. Sometimes, they are also waiting for us to follow suit. It might be something as simple as posting on twitter or facebook. But it is something.

I don't fool myself. I know that someone, many someones, probably, is reading what I post and saying, "Kohls is such a nerd. Wow." However, he read it, didn't he? He just saw how to properly punctuate a quotation.

Got you.

Nobody's Perfect, but We Keep Trying

I just came back downstairs after talking to my daughter Emily. She is frustrated by how her drawings have been going tonight. You see; art is Emily's thing.  I know I am a little biased, but can honestly say she is talented. I envy her ability. However, she has this issue. She is a perfectionist when it comes to what she draws, sketches, or paints. It has to be as she has seen it in her head, and when the pencil will not cooperate, when the ink does not follow her mind as smoothly as she feels it should, she becomes upset with herself.  I hate when she gets that way; she is my little girl, and she always will be. I do not like seeing her upset, for any reason, but I also know that this is the only way she will grow. If it were always easy, she would not be pushing herself to grow, to become better, and to stretch. So I console her and tell her to step away from it, as I sometimes have to do with what I write. That does not help; it needs to be a certain way and she will not be happy until she figures out how to get it to that point.
Her mom is the same way about certain things, particularly those that involve tiny details that "should be like this" but just aren't. I have seen her pour for hours (literally, not figuratively) over cancelled checks and the banks statement to locate a 32 cent error. It was in our favor too.  Ok, I did not actually watch her do this for hour (I had things to do), but she did. And she was sincerely happy and relieved when she discovered the banks error. It really did not matter in the grand scheme, but it mattered to her. It had to be fixed. Details, that is her thing. So I have learned to kiss her on the forehead and let her comb through the details, for she could not be happy otherwise.
Sometimes, I laugh to myself how foolish these two beautiful ladies in my life are to become so upset, so focused on such things that they cannot rest. Then I realize that this evening, while Emily was drawing a graphite point across the page of a sketch pad, erasing, gritting her teeth, willing the pencil to do her bidding, and creasing her forehead as she erased once again, I had spent nearly two hours trying to develop an idea, no not an idea, THE RIGHT IDEA, for a four minute video for Thursday night after practice.  I still do not have anything. I had a few thoughts, a few things that might have worked, but nothing was just what I wanted. So, I scrapped them. It's frustrating me right now, but I needed to shower, so I had to step away from it for a while. That did not help. Actually, I thought it did for a minute, after an idea came to mind amidst the steam and stream of that nightly ritual, but it wasn't quite right either.
I guess, what it comes down to is this: we are all our own kind of crazy. I am still going to blame Emily's propensity for frustration on Heidi, but she probably pulled just as much of that from me as anyone. No one knows how many pages I have crumbled up, how many digital details I have deleted, simply because I was not happy with them.
Sorry Em.

Tick Tock

I broke my promise to blog at least once a week, so I am going to make up for it by posting twice this week. This is the first post, and it will be a doozy, I am sure.  I am trying to pare down a writing lesson for my freshmen so it fits in today's class period. It is not happening. Yesterday's lesson has spilled over into today, like the frothy head of root beer float, leaving its sticky residue on the tabletop that is today. So, I am going to go with it.  Sometimes, lessons cannot be bound by this man-made convention we call time. Learning goes at its own pace, and in trying to rush it, we risk splattering it all over the place.  Ew.

We do it all the time though, don't we. We have to finish this by the end of the hour, this must be completed by Tuesday, my plans say we move on next week to something new. I hate it. A second year teacher, who is developing into a very good English teacher, asked me the other day if it mattered that one of our units spilled from first nine weeks into the second nine weeks. Would that mess up the grading? I told her that as far as I am concerned, it did not matter at all. We need another week and a half to do what is right for the kids and the material. She went with it, which is a happy moment because she is a schedule maker of the highest degree. I wonder how much it actually bothers her that our first nine weeks is only eight weeks long.  (By the way, the world does truly need people with the compulsion to make schedules and annoy the rest of the world with them, people such as my wife, such as this teacher and those of the same bent in our department, for they provide just enough structure for the rest of us to make it to meetings and meet deadlines. So, thank you. Now leave me alone.)

I could go on. Perhaps I will. Later. I just looked at the clock and I have freshmen entering my room and they will need some instruction in about ten minutes. Dang clocks.

Tick Tock.