Unlike Peas in the Same Pod

Being a freshly minted college graduate in 1967 was nice, and getting a job mattered. Though my long-term vocational interests were varied (teaching had never been in that mix), I signed a contract in Springdale, Illinois to teach middle school literature. This didn’t get me closer to figuring out what I wanted to do in life but it did make me confront the complex and often complicated nature of human beings—my own and that of others.

It is with equal measures of fondness and occasional embarrassment that I recall those three years with curious and hungry middle school students. A two-week patch of time in May, during my last year in the classroom, captured this and reaffirmed the decision I’d recently made to pursue graduate studies in psychology.

The students were in the midst of reading and comparing Romeo and Juliet with West Side Story when my class was interrupted.

“Mr. Thompson, someone wants to see you. I think it’s Mr. Woodruff.” Penny, seated in the front row and closest to the open door, pointed to the hallway where the glowering figure of a fellow faculty member stood several feet outside the doorway. In point of fact, Woodruff often seemed to glower at me, and to be fair, I, in turn, often invited it.

            I looked at the faces of the twenty-two ninth grade students, who’d been listening to a recording of West Side Story. Their concerned expressions mirrored my own.

            “Excuse me for a moment,” I said to them. “Eric, would you turn off the record player? Open your books to page sixteen of Romeo and Juliet, and read the prologue then write a sentence or two about what you think this play is about. I’ll be back in a few minutes.”

            Wilson Woodruff, nicknamed “Willie Beak” by the students at Springdale Middle School because the tips of his nose and chin almost met, said nothing while he glared at me as I left the classroom and walked toward him. I knew that many students disliked Woodruff, while they openly liked me, who displayed a free spirit in the way I dressed and acted. I imagine this had something to do with the times, but whatever the reason I enjoyed and appreciated their affection.

Woodruff had been on staff my first year, then left with his wife and children the next year to teach in the Lexington, Kentucky school district where he’d been raised. He returned to Springdale because, according to rumors, “going home” hadn’t worked out. Now, in the classroom across the hall from mine he taught ninth grade biology.

His redneck views about the Vietnam War, Civil Rights, and the place of women in society clashed with my own, especially my support of the anti-war movement. I often avoided the faculty lounge as much because I wanted that time with students as I wished to evade confrontation with him and his coterie of like-minded conservative teachers.

Two weeks earlier I’d worn a black armband to school, a May Day commemoration of the dead in Vietnam. My opposition to the war included open displays of protest designed to illicit a response. But I don’t think I anticipated the reaction I got that May Day.  In the middle of my class I suddenly heard my name being called on the loudspeaker. “Mr. Thompson, come to my office immediately!”

Wendell Stinson, our principal, supported his teachers and cared about the students, but I clearly detected anger in his voice.  As I walked down the hall toward his office I wondered if I’d overstepped by wearing the armband. The moment of doubt included what I’d say in my defense and what his response would be.  The closer I came to the administrative offices the more anxious I felt, including a concern that my public protest could get me fired.  

I walked past the principal’s scowling administrative assistant and into his office. To my great surprise Mr. Stinson banged his fist on the desk and demanded I throw the black armband in the trash or leave school that moment. Though his red face and bulging neck veins caught me off guard, I knew that my position on issues was designed to be provocative, but I did not want to get fired and tried to steady my shaking knees.

I removed the armband and placed it on his desk. In the steadiest voice I could muster I told him, “I’ll leave this on your desk, but I expect it to be there after my classes are over and students have been dismissed for the day.”

He looked me in the eye and said, “It will be right here.” We both glanced down at the armband. “Do not, and I repeat, do not bring your political leanings into the classroom again. Am I clear?”

“Yes,” I replied and left his office.

When I returned at day’s end the armband was still there on his desk. That night I received a phone call from the secretary of the Springdale School Board summoning me to appear before the board the following evening, an impromptu session to discuss my actions.

The next day when I took a seat at the conference table surrounded by board members, I recall having a brazen attitude. The ten members present, well dressed and serious, didn’t greet me or smile. Their resentment was palpable. I appeared before them dressed in tie-dye shirt, bell bottom pants and sporting shoulder-length hair. The president of the board, Bellevue Pendergast, was the father of Eric, one of the best students in my class.

After reciting the details of my malfeasance, Dr. Pendergast asked me to respond.

I paused, as much for effect as to gather my rehearsed thoughts, which were both contrite and calculating. 

“I apologize,” I said, “for using my position and classroom to proselytize my views before a captive audience of students. Though they’d been free to discuss and voice opposition to my points of view I’d nonetheless taken advantage of my role as their teacher. Though I believe in freedom of expression, knowing when to “speak” and when to keep your thoughts to yourself is embedded in that freedom.”

What I didn’t say was that I needed the income from my job until I headed off to graduate school. I could have added, but decided not to, that protesting had been a foundational piece in the thinking of our Founding Fathers and the evolution of democracy.

A brief silence followed my statements. Dr. Pendergast volunteered that his son Eric thought that I was the best teacher he’d had. He didn’t call for a vote on my status, added nothing to what had been presented and adjourned the special meeting suggesting I “keep my nose clean and political opinions within appropriate guidelines.” He finished by telling me to enjoy the rest of the year, and thanked the others for coming.

I retained my job, was relieved, and felt a bit self-righteous and superior.

Out in the hallway that day two weeks later, I believe Mr. Woodruff had guessed I’d escaped the board’s wrath and discipline and took it upon himself to demonstrate his position vis-a-vis my “unpatriotic” alliances.

“Can I help you?” I asked as I looked into his bloodshot eyes.

He remained silent, sculpted in place, taking me in before giving me the finger and abruptly turning around and stomping down the hall.  

I returned to the students who seemed to have been glued to the hallway drama rather than the opening lines of Romeo and Juliet. I turned my attention back to them. “Mr. Woodruff and I disagree about many things, but we may share something in common.”

Silence replaced the commotion in the classroom and the students watched as I stepped to the chalkboard and wrote the word SELF-RIGHTEOUSNESS in upper case letters.

“Can someone tell us what this word means?”

Several students raised their hands with others to follow but Jo Anne was first. As I gestured her way she blurted out, “Willie Beak is a holier-than-thou jerk!”

I looked to make certain the door was closed. It was.

Amidst the tittering, Amos declared, “It means being smug, and thinking that you’re superior to others!”

A few more definitions were tossed out, including being intolerant and believing that you’re better than the next person.

“You may think that being holier-than-thou, smug and superior applies to Mr. Woodruff,” I said, “but it also applies to me. I’m sorry that I brought you into this.

I still feel strongly about the positions I held in those post-college years and would take them again. Now, after having been a psychotherapist for many years, I understand what those years teaching middle school taught me. For a community and democracy to thrive, its members need to allow disparate viewpoints, be open-minded and accepting of those with differing ideas and beliefs. We are, after all, and like it or not, all “Peas in the same pod.”

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