March 24, 2011
Usually on Tuesday’s, I walk home and write a short story. That didn’t happen yesterday, because I had other plans. So I decided to write one tonight, when I get home. The weather was hellish today, rain, freezing rain and more rain. I haven’t been out since, so let’s see what’s happening outside.
Goddamn, it's cold and rainy and rotten out here, glad I'm going home tonight.
Random street art alert!
Good old Spa Bell, the daughter of Ma. Okay, coming up, "Brother David Glover." But first, a word from our sponsor.
Brother David Glover
When I was growing up I really hated school. I hated the way they tried to make you conform, I hated the desks, I hated the lockers (I was always forgetting the stupid combination), I hated a lot of my teachers and I really hated the smell of the lunch room. But of all the things I targeted my teenage hatred and angst at during my school years, none surpassed the blinding hatred I still hold in my heart for one teacher: Brother David Glover.
The high school I attended was a Catholic high school named Bergan. I’m not a religious person now and wasn’t back then either (I’m not knocking it, whatever gets you through the night, it’s just not my cup of tea.) But having said that, I do believe it was a modern miracle that I finally graduated from high school. My one goal in life back then was just to be done with school and move the fuck on with my life. But when I almost got to the finish line, with graduation cap firmly in place, there was one asshole waiting to pull the rug right out from under my feet: Brother David Glover.
I was really excited to get my senior year out of the way and finally graduate and begin my post-school life. The schedule for students at Bergan ran on what was called a “mod” system and no, it wasn’t based on the Small Faces touring schedule. To this day I really don’t know or care what it was all about, but the short story is that you could make your own schedule and apart from classes you had to take there were other electives you could choose from, but you weren’t required to take them. If you took a lot of the required classes your first three years, by the time senior year came, you could have a pretty light schedule and kind of coast through the year. A reward for three years of hard work. And that’s the way I played it. One of the few classes you had to take all four years was religion. You also had to pass all four years or you couldn’t graduate. And I think by now you can guess who my religion teacher was my senior year. Yes, that’s right: Brother David Glover.
In addition to the regular teachers at Bergan, there were also “Brothers” who taught there. I never really cared enough to research as to what a “Brother” was or what duties or activities they pursued. I don’t know if they still have them today, but back then, they were kind of like junior priests. They didn’t wear a costume like a priest, but you addressed them as “Brother.” Maybe today you can call them, “Bro.” Anyway, my senior religion teacher was Brother Glover and there was something about this guy that really made my skin crawl backwards and gave me a major dose of the creeps.
“Slithery” is the best word I can come up with to describe his demeanor. He was a quiet man. The kind of man who never makes a peep until they discover the heads of the entire Maple Street Boy Scout troop in his refrigerator, neatly stacked on top of one another. He had slightly long, straw-like brown hair and a wiry moustache that was only about halfway grown in. He kind of looked like a psycho version of Gene Wilder. Sometimes I’d see him riding a bike around Peoria and he would have a black beret on his head, kind of like a Jesus-loving mix of the Wicked Witch of the West and Pepe Le Pew. That’s a vision, I’ll likely never get out of my head, and one that tortures me to this day.
From day one I didn’t like him and he sure as shit didn’t like me either. Back then I and most of my friends were smoking pot morning, noon and night. Religion class was right after lunch, I think about three days a week and I can remember sneaking outside to smoke a joint before most of the classes. On the odd days I wasn’t high on pot, I was probably zonked out on acid or mushrooms. Hey, it was 1976, what can I tell you?
Two of my best friends in high school were in that class with me, Tim Hennessey and Lee Ann Schwindenhammer and we always sat next to each other and kind of made a mockery of the whole proceedings. And, I’m not bragging about this (Tim is still a great friend and reads this blog and I think he’ll verify it), but I was the one that truly put the word, “mock” in back in mockery in that class.
I know it’s shocking news, but I was a real wise-ass and troublemaker back then. Brother Glover and I clashed immediately. I can’t recall what started our private little war, but I’m sad to say when it was all over and the battlefield had been cleared, he had won.
As I said, myself, Tim and Lee Ann all sat next to each other in the class. And we’d all clown around. One of my favorite things to do was to sneak a dollar bill out of Lee Ann’s purse and draw all over it with a magic marker, rendering it useless for anything other than framing. Sometimes I’d turn George Washington into Hitler with four menacing swastikas in the corners and the next day maybe I’d turn him into Bozo the Clown in a sea of daisies. We’d all laugh at the money-ruining proceedings and Brother Glover would watch us, but he’d never say anything. That’s one of the many things I hated about this guy. He was kind of a hippie Brother and let it be known that he wasn’t into punishments or “laying the law down,” but I knew our shenanigans really bugged the living daylights out of him and I made it my goal to make him crack that year and scream at me. Anything to break that phony pacifist veneer of his, because I knew in my gut he was living a lie. He wasn’t a true pacifist, I could see it in his eyes and I don’t like liars.
Most days he’d pass out mimeographed sheets of paper to all of us. I don’t know what was on them because as soon as he would hand the paper to me, I’d squash it into a tight little ball and throw it back in his face. Tim, Lee Ann and the other kids would nervously laugh, but he never said a word. And this went on for the entire year. He’d hand me the paper—boom, back in his face. He never acknowledged it, but I do remember a slight twitch developing in his right eye after about four months.
Another thing I liked to do, was put my hand up in the air and when he’d call my name out to see what I wanted, my response was to say, “What?”
“You had your hand up, is there something you wanted to say,” Brother Glover would ask in his Peter Lorre-like creep-a-zoid voice that sounded just like velvet that had been marinated in cat urine for a fortnight or two. If velvet could talk that is.
“No, just giving my arm a little air,” I’d calmly reply. The other kids would laugh and Brother Glover would give me a look. It’s hard to explain the look he would give me. I’ve never encountered one like it since and I hope I never do again. It wouldn’t last long, maybe 17 seconds or so, but it was one of pure, burning hatred. And it was exactly that look that proved he wasn’t a true pacifist.
That’s what I especially hated about Brother Glover, the fact that he hated my fucking guts and I know if he could’ve killed me, tortured me or done anything to make my existence a horrible and horrifying one, he’d have done it. But he couldn’t without blowing his pacifist “Brother” charade and it was clear, that this was the only type of “work” that this psycho was capable of. Without his “Brotherhood,” he’d probably be homeless, sleeping in a gutter of his own piss while clinging on to that goddamn precious beret for the rest of his stinking life.
And true, I hated him as well, but I didn’t wish him any harm, I just wanted him out of my life for good. I didn’t want to be around him, so I taunted him to let him know it. At least I was being honest. Plus I was usually stoned to the bejesus belt and so I really shouldn’t have been held accountable for my actions.
And so the year wore on. I’d go to Brother Glover’s religion class, draw on Lee Ann’s dollar bills, yuk it up with Tim and throw mimeographed wads of paper at Brother Glover’s twitching, silent face of hate. This went on until about a week before school was over. Graduation was within the reach of my greedy little mitts. It was like a carrot dangling in front of a starving bunny rabbit. Freedom was in the air and it was indeed a sweet aroma. I’ve never liked uniforms, but I was more than happy to don that cap and gown for a couple hours and finally be released from high school hell. One thing was about to stop all that from happening, though: Brother David Glover.
With only a day or two left in the school year, I found myself in the principal’s office and it’s funny, I can’t even recall the principal’s name, now. I think it might have been Brother Mark or something, it doesn’t matter. What matters is that I was told I had achieved something no other student in Bergan’s fine history had accomplished: I had flunked religion.
Those words echoed in my head and bounced around my brain like a pinball pinging around at the speed of sound.
I had flunked religion. I wasn’t going to graduate. FUCK! I felt like Billy in the movie, “Midnight Express,” when he finds out his sentence in the Turkish jail had been switched to life. Gecmis olsun. May it pass quickly.
To be honest, I don’t know why I hadn’t see this coming. I hadn’t done any homework all year, I taunted Brother Glover unmercilessly and I had used his face for target practice with my mimeograph paper balls. I felt sick but I soon learned there was a way out.
I was told to show up at school that Saturday at ten in the morning and report to the room where Brother Glover’s class was held and I’d be given a special test. If I passed it, my grade would be elevated to a D and I could graduate. It dawned on me later that they didn’t want me around there for another year either, so they devised a way out for me.
I didn’t want to take the stupid test, especially on a Saturday morning. I worked after school and on weekends at a drug store and I knew they’d be pissed that I’d be taking the morning off. Plus it would be costing me money, since I wouldn’t be getting paid. But you can’t put a price on freedom, so at 10 am sharp, I reported to Brother Glover’s classroom.
I walked to the room and stopped in the open doorway. There, alone in the room sat Brother David Glover at his desk. The morning sun was shining in through the window. I stood there for around 30 long seconds of silence. The two of us just stared at each other. Finally the silence was broken.
“Come in,” Brother Glover said in that shrill, spine-tingling voice of his.
Like a man walking his last lonely mile to the hanging post, I slowly entered the room and walked over to his battleship-gray metallic desk. No further words were to be spoken. He just held up a sheet of paper and I took it and walked to a desk in the front of the classroom. There was nowhere to run and nowhere to hide, so I just surrendered. What else could I do?
I sat down and looked at the paper. There were questions on it and it was a mimeographed piece of paper. I looked up and Brother Glover was staring at me. A faint smile was on his face. It took every ounce of control that I had in me not to wad that mimeographed piece of paper up into a ball and shove it right down his scrawny chicken-like throat. I took a deep breath and I looked back at the paper and read the first question.
“Do you believe in God?” it read.
“Yes, I believe in God,” I wrote in the answer area.
Next question.
“Do you believe that God is an all-knowing and honest God?” it read.
“Yes,” I wrote in the answer area, “I believe that God is honest and all-knowing.”
All total there was about twelve questions like this. You’d have to have been the world’s biggest idiot not to be able to pass it. I didn't necessarily believe in all my answers, I just wrote what they wanted me to write. And that was the whole point of it. They had me doing what they wanted me to do and there was fuck-all I could do about it. It was really a pathetic feeling for me, but I had to graduate and get out of that place.
I finished it in about five to ten minutes and walked up and put it on his desk. He looked it over and just nodded and smiled at me. I couldn’t stand to look at his creepy-ass face and my eyes darted to his desk. There in the right corner of his gray desktop sat that fucking black beret. My blood ran cold.
I spun around and walked as fast as I could out of there. When I got outside, I ran to my car and floored it out of the parking lot.
Sometimes in life you enter battles you can’t possibly win. This was one of them. Brother David Glover knew from day one that he held the winning hand in our year long game of poker. I was too stoned and drunk on my success of making a mockery out of his class to realize this until it was too late. He won and I lost. That’s all there is to it. I was taught in life that if you’re honestly defeated, you take it like a man and move on to the next challenge and try to do a little better. My parents taught me that and they are good people.
I never saw Brother David Glover again in my life. But if our paths ever do cross again, I hope there’s a big, honking stack of mimeographed paper nearby. He won't know what fucking hit him.
Further reading: David Glover, David Glover, David Glover and Crispin Glover.
Elizabeth Taylor died yesterday. One of my favorite movies of all time is, “Who’s Afraid of Virginia Wolff,” starring herself and her husband at the time, Richard Burton. The movie mirrored their own rocky relationship (they were married and divorced twice) and they both turn in great performances. Here’s my five favorite pieces of dialogue between George (Richard Burton) and Martha (Elizabeth Taylor.)
Martha: I swear, if you existed, I'd divorce you.
George: Martha, in my mind you're buried in cement right up to the neck. No, up to the nose, it's much quieter.
Martha: You make me puke.
George: That wasn't a very nice thing to say, Martha.
Martha: [derogatorily, to George] Hey, swamp! Hey swampy!
George: Yes, Martha? Can I get you something?
Martha: Ah, well, sure. You can, um, light my cigarette, if you're of a mind to.
George: No. There are limits. I mean, a man can put up with only so much without he descends a rung or two on the old evolutionary ladder, which is up your line. Now, I will hold your hand when it's dark and you're afraid of the boogeyman and I will tote your gin bottles out after midnight so no one can see but I will not light your cigarette. And that, as they say, is that.
Martha: Jesus.
Martha: Well, you're going bald.
George: So are you.
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