Other Duties as Assigned: Go Tell That Girl to Change Her Shirt
Somewhere in America there’s a girl in a turtleneck weeping. But she’s not the girl standing in front of the blue lockers in the hall outside the classroom where I’ve asked to have a private conversation with her.
Her spaghetti straps violate the dress code I’ve been reminded to enforce by a male colleague who’s afraid if he tells her to cover up, he will call attention to his noticing her bra straps. Instead he calls my attention to my own bra straps, both tucked neatly under my own unflattering and professional blouse.
At the staff meeting, the principal asked women colleagues to be aware of their male colleagues’ complicated feelings around this issue. This is hard for men, he said. All the girls need to do is cover up. That’s not difficult, is it?
Coverage. Coverage of the halls, coverage of curriculum, coverage of her bra straps. And what’s her crime, so young, so narrow, trying to learn her way into her body and algebra at the same time.
I look bad in a crew neck too. Boxy, middle-aged. That’s expected, even encouraged. Otherwise the principal might say, Cover up that cleavage. Aren’t you too old for that shirt?
* * * * * *
On Tuesday Before Third Period They Are All Beautiful
Especially the ones who do not think they are beautiful. The girl hunched in the heavy coat. The boy with acne hidden under bangs which hide his eyes. Even the mean one. Even the one who came to fifth period stoned. Even the one who’s too tired to sit up today. Every semester in a writing exercise practicing extended similes, they will write school is like jail and believe no one has said it before. At sixteen, they discover sadness, but like seedlings, they can’t help but turn toward light. Unlike me, who years ago turned away so hard I turned on myself instead. These days, my sadness, simplified with age, just wants out of these tights and skirt, wants a nap, wants something more than sore feet, tired eyes, ink-stained fingers. Years ago, in 11th grade English, I propped a book on my desk and rage-read while eavesdropping in the background, so when Mrs. Warning called on me to call out my inattention, I could answer defiant. Years ago, I was the girl hunched in a coat, covering a body I hated more than geometry. This afternoon, that same girl is here, skipping lunch, reading in the corner of my classroom as she peels her chipped nail polish and waits for another bell to ring. I want to give that girl my eyes, let her see herself outside her skin. If only she could borrow them long enough to see the ring of light still clinging to her from the world before.
* * * * * *
Labyrinth
Because the Social Studies teacher notices you haven’t been yourself, he writes a pass to counseling. Sophomore you: greasy hair, slept-in clothes you. The counselor’s office, windowless, is lit with a table lamp, the fluorescent lights left off. Suburban Chicago institutional ambience.
She asks you things. Her head nods. Her David Bowie Labyrinth hair flops in perfect agreement. You answer a little, in that nail-picking-and-avoiding-eye-contact kind of way. In that teenage-caught-and-maybe-wanting-to-be-caught kind of way. So she asks again. You answer less or more, pulling at the black gauzy scarves you keep tied around your wrists to keep anyone from asking. When she suggests, Maybe you should go to the mall and do a little shopping. That always makes me feel better, and sends you back to class, she is just doing her job. Or whatever she thinks her job is. You can’t blame her for not seeing what you work so hard to keep hidden.
Years later, watching a sophomore girl retreat into herself, noticing her sleeves pulled down over the heels of her hands, I choose not to write her a pass. I know her. I walk myself down to the counseling office, sit once again in the chair adjoining the desk. The same table lamp and the same box of tissues, the same institutional ambience shipped north to urban Alaska. I say, Look, I’m worried. My student needs someone who’s really going to listen. I can tell she’s between wanting and not wanting to be caught.
The counselor, with his close-cropped, George-Clooney, Oh-Brother-Where-Art-Thou hair, smiles. He has a suggestion. Without irony he says, She should go to Young Life. The Christian group. They do wholesome things there — like milk-drinking contests. He hands me a brochure for her. He is just doing his job. Or whatever he thinks his job is.
So I decide to talk to her myself.
* * * * * *
“Other Duties as Assigned: Go Tell That Girl to Change Her Shirt,” “On Tuesday Before Third Period They Are All Beautiful,” and “Labyrinth” appear in You Are No Longer in Trouble, Nicole Stellon O’Donnell’s collection of memoir-in-flash from White Pine Press.