Detention: Not Exactly The Breakfast Club
I’m pretty sure I only served one or two detentions in school.
I was a “good kid.” I was a teacher’s kid, for crying out loud. There was really no option where in-school conduct was concerned – if you did something bad and your parent was a teacher, they knew all about it before your butt ever hit the front seat of the car.
When I went to high school, I thought I was free at last! Free to do what, though, I had no idea. I mean, I really was a “good kid.” My idea of rebellion was wearing the wrong color sweater with my uniform just to see what would happen.
What happens, by the way, is that you get a detention and Teacher Mom knows about it before dismissal. The Curse of the Teacher’s Kid followed me! What is this magic power of telepathy that these people have?
But that was not my most awful detention.
And by awful, I mean embarrassing. Really. I can’t even believe I’m writing this, but it is pretty funny, so pull up a chair for confessional time, folks.
My big bad detention was for PDA in the hallway. Yup – Public Display of Affection. This was an absolute no-go in my school. But there was this sort of unwritten rule way back in the glorious 80s that if you had a boyfriend or girlfriend, you swapped class rings, put them on long neck chains, wore each other’s jeans jackets, and publicly displayed your affection in the hallways between classes whenever possible.
Now, anyone who knows me knows full well that I’m really not a PDA kind of girl. So where that whole high school thing came from, I’ll never know. But there we were, The Boy and me, grabbing a smooch between classes when we are caught red-handed (er, uh red-lipped?) by one of the math teachers on his way up the stairs. The next thing I knew, I was signed up for detention with some of the school’s worst hardened criminals and frequent offenders…
OK, not really. But for me, the very good, very afraid of Teacher Mom teacher’s kid, this may as well have been a ticket to Alcatraz. Detention. How humiliating! Teacher Mom knew about it, of course, before dismissal and the opportunity for displays of affection – public or otherwise – were swiftly eliminated from my social roster for the foreseeable future.
But that isn’t the worst part.
The worst part is that the teacher in question is now a colleague. I see the man nearly every day in the very same halls where the infraction occurred. Talk about returning to the scene of the crime! I am certain that he has absolutely no recollection whatsoever of that day. But every now and then, I find myself wishing I could crawl under a rock and hide when I see him coming down the hall.
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I love this story, Lisa.
Here’s what you should do… the next time you come across this man, you should ask if he has a moment, tell him you’re feeling sad (!) and ask him for a hug!
Dare is my key word of the moment, so… I dare you!
Seriously, I love your writing style. You had me hooked from the first line.
Oh my gosh, Linda, that would probably be hysterical. I just may have to do it.
And thank you for the compliment – made my day! 😉
In my all-boy world, the Triple Coon-Dog Dare is a dare that cannot be denied. If someone throws down this gauntlet, only the most sissy of all sissies turns it down.
And on that note: I Triple Coon-Dog Dare you to ask him for a hug!
OK, this is out of control…
Ha! If you told the teacher who you are and he remembered the experience, he would probably just laugh. Even though the situation was somewhat traumatic for you, I don’t think teachers are as hard-hearted as they seemed to be to us when we were kids. They just have rules to enforce as a part of their job.
How funny that you guys work together now.
He probably would, Heather. And you are definitely right that the teachers aren’t such battle axes – working alongside my former teachers has more than proved that. We’re just (semi) regular people, too! And I can tell you the rules enforcement is the least interesting part of the job.
EEK! How awkward is that?
Completely. Mostly in my mind, of course, but that’s me.
that was a great story. My kids also had to have the father (principal) crowding their space. But on the other hand if they ever forgot their lunch money they had an open wallet at school 🙂 kelley—the road goes ever ever on
Definitely a handy connection!
I wonder if he remembers it and feels awkward too? Amusing (now) though!
Never thought of that… I doubt it. Speaking from the other side of the detention slip, I truly forget stuff like that about kids the minute it’s over.
Lisa, which character from the breakfast club did you most identify with? I know it’s a little off-topic, but I was curious. As for the teacher, I’m sure he has no recollection of it, but I would tell him about it all the same and mention that you have been afraid he would remember the incident for all of these years. ;D
Hm, good question. None, really, to be honest. If I had to pick a category for myself, I’d say musician because that was my thing – a group that is not represented in The Breakfast Club.
School hall PDAs were a rite of passage, weren’t they? If people couldn’t witness you having a boyfriend, then why have one at all? I don’t know, it made sense at the time….
I think you should remind the teacher! I bet he would laugh.
Hi, Angie. Yes, that’s exactly what it was like – a status thing, probably. And yes, he probably would laugh and be amazed that I remember it at all.
Ooof. That is awkward. But even more awkward would be if you tried to bring it up to make it less awkward, which might be awkward for him too, so technically you could be increasing the awkwardness by sharing it. This would result in you having more awkward interactions with this colleague for the rest of your wokring life, perhaps. Ah, I’d just let it go and pretend that this detention never happened.
That is a whole lot of…awkward.
Oh that is too funny! I would have crawled right under a rock and I’m sure I’d avoid the kissing hall at all costs as an adult working there! Haha! At least you weren’t the only one…people smooch in the halls all the time!
Hi, Kat. Well, here’s the really funny part about that…my husband and I actually both worked there for eleven years. If he even walked within ten feet of me, I would get weirded out and make sure we were at an unmistakable safe distance.
[…] when Kat visited and commented on the Detention post, she suggested that as an adult, it would be wise to avoid the kissing hallway. Good […]
(Clearly, I’m very behind in blog reading.)
This is hilarious!
I know the kind of embarrassment you speak of. I, too, was a good kid. I seriously don’t know what I would have done if I was sent to detention. Wait, yes I do. I would have cried. Literally. Thank god they were a bit more lenient with PDA when I went through high school 🙂
It really is, isn’t it? Well, now, anyway…