This is why I hated School-quick version

Disclaimer:
This is an invention, and any resemblance to individuals or places is unintentional, and/or does not reflect the opinions of the author.
Bonnie Scott

5/11/12

This is why I hated School

Get up, stand up: stand up for your rights!
Get up, stand up: don't give up the fight!

(“Get Up, Stand Up” —Bob Marley)

It began with that Charon’s craft, the overcrowded, decrepit bus conveying us to our prison. As prisoners of the bus, sweltering in the sticky seats, we observed in silent horror as we approached the School gates, young hands and noses pressed to the windows forming clouds of moisture on the grimy surface. A winding snake of downtrodden seniors stretched before our dismayed eyes. The welcoming committee were garbed in blindingly white long sleaved button-up shirts and long trousers—the same for males and females. Charon squeezed his passengers out into the strange welcome. The kids were in a state of resigned panic and dull confusion, until they looked into the seniors’ eyes and saw the inevitable conclusion: the ridiculous get-up was the new uniform they had been demanding. It was plain to see—especially from the pained faces of the seniors—that everyone now longed for the return of the ugly, but permissible green and brown uniform. I however, was still caught in a state of acute horror: I was all alone among my peers, being the only senior to catch the bus with the juniors. I searched the sea of horror-drawn masks for my best friend, and found only the anonymous crush of young captives. The flow of passengers was ebbing, and I could delay no longer. In a way, it was a relief to step out of the stifling air of the bus that cooked us from the inside with every inhalation. I exited the bus, at the end, and its jaws almost caught me as they closed in a skeletal grin.

On the footpath, the embarrassed seniors’ eyes were dull with dismay and some wept quietly. They stood in a faux-welcome, someone’s sick performance of “School pride”, and I knew just whose it was: the Doc’s. That’s what we called her: the head teacher. She surveyed the albino student snake with a disciplinarian’s enjoyment, hair in a severe black crop and penetrating eyes taking in her handiwork. The Doc stood there for a moment more, savouring the horrified expressions then started spouting some rubbish about how we will be so pleased to see our request for a new, more professional uniform has been obliged, and that we should start wearing it immediately. She then stalked away through the tall gates, no doubt to return to haunting the senior’s designated district, formally known as “I Block”. At the exit of Her Ominence (yes, I did just make up that word), some of the more tear-stained seniors tugged at their uniforms, muttering about how all they needed to do now was dye them orange, and the effect would be complete. The two groups of students began to meld and commiserate about their shared fate. My peers seemed to be recovering from their initial horror, donning an additional layer of resignation. This new defeat was an iron ball and chain that made them drag their feet as they filed into the School grounds as the warning bell rang. “Bring out your dead,” it said to me.

I could not follow the group this time, aware of the wrath I would incur as punishment for tardiness. Panic had again risen in my chest at the thought of facing this new situation without my ally. A moment later, mingling with the echo of the bell was the distinct sound of her van’s motor pulling into the car park. She bounded up to me in a flurry of nervous energy, and a sliver of fear slid away at the sight of her. Breathy greetings were chased hurriedly aside as I relayed to her the ghastly new situation. She gave me a curt, grim nod of solidarity and we sped into the grounds. I was exulting that the new uniforms were “horrible, just horrible. Worse than the last-“ when sirens went off, too loud and too close. Appearing among the flashes of red and blue lights was a girl from our year. She was a stocky girl, with a serious face and humourless grey eyes. She had always been a kind girl, until Doc had caught her for some minor offence, taking her under her wing and had returned one of them. She read mechanically from the printed sheet of paper in her hands.

“Classmate 44218, you are charged with crimes against the institution for your debasement of the new uniform. You, and classmate 44351 here are also in violation of the Uniform proclamation as of four minutes, thirty-two seconds ago that states all students must wear Uniform 3.0, the white upgrade,” (upon which, she handed us a set of the white atrocities each and ensured we donned them on the spot) “furthermore, you are now…two hundred and thirty-…eight seconds late for class. You will await your punishment at the final School bell.”

She turned on her heel and marched toward our classroom with the knowledge that the both of us would surely follow. My ally exchanged a fearful glance with me, wondering what cruel and bizarre punishment awaited us once all the other students had escaped for home.

“Keep up!” our authoritative classmate barked, without turning to look at us at her heels.

Along our hurried march to the classroom, some of my fear turned to anger: anger at this place that was supposed to be a place of learning, where young minds collaborated to seek and education about all possibilities of things imaginable. Where has the dream gone to die? The only things we saw here were fear, obedience, punishment, and the unquestionable power of authority. This totalitarian prison took the world’s most promising hopes for the future, young minds, and turned them into cowardly, detestable vermin, which resorted to scrapping and bullying amongst themselves to vent their frustration with the dominance of an authority they could not rebel against. That was how the authorities did it, the teaching and administration staff; they kept the cohorts separated so the student body could not unite and rise against them, in a unified whole. It made me want to shout “Look what you’ve done!” at the top of my voice. It was a miracle when anything positive like friendship formed out of this, like it had with me. If only we could unite! Maybe then our goals might be achieved.

From somewhere far off, I knew that with a little time, age would give us the power to break the curse of suppression and enable us to forge our own identities. We would become responsible for our own actions, when we left the totalitarian School-state in our memories and our nightmares. No matter how much we think we could do things better, if we could do it over again, we can be eternally grateful that we don’t have to return because it’s over now.