by David Safier
I asked a teacher friend how his school was handling the budget cuts.
"Oh," he said, "we just stopped teaching. We know there'll be cuts down the line, so we don't want any of our kids to be smart enough to take our jobs."
I was going to respond with a witty rejoinder, but I kept quiet. I knew he wasn't finished.
"Hey," he said, smiling, "these aren't my kids. They're not gonna take care of me in my old age. Why should I help them take my job away?"
Sometimes you gotta laugh to keep from cryin'.
[NOTE: Since items like these are sometimes misinterpreted, let me explain that he was kidding. Gallows humor. His faux heartlessness was completely out of character, which is why I was amused. Felt like old times in the faculty room.]
That would be funny if it didn’t really happen when I was in high school. Anyone else remember the “sick-outs”?