The Principal of the Thing

By Michael Dayne

If you’ve been looking for a little adventure chances are you’ve been looking in all the wrong places. Not so far from home, just down the street, that’s where the action is; there at the high school where you went to school and across the way at places like Slippery Moss where I worked over the years as a high school teacher, coach, assistant principal, principal and the district’s acting superintendent. That’s where the student “who never was” walked the halls, where that bridge disappeared overnight, and those two bombs were delivered to my office on my last day in the district. Teenagers everywhere you looked. Now it just doesn’t get more exciting or scarier than that. Just beware. There may be a prank or two along the way. Teenagers aren’t the only ones that can be a little unpredictable at times. Here in The Principal of the Thing, in the small town of Slippery Moss, are just a few of their stories.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Lulu.com
• Release date: Apr 15, 2015
• ISBN: 9781329068964

Book preview

The Principal of the Thing

THE PRINCIPAL OF THE THING

Michael Dayne

Copyright © 2015 by Michael Dayne

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, scanned or distributed in any electronic form without permission.

The cover photo is from the Photographs in the Carol M. Highsmith Archive, Library of Congress, Prints and Photographs Division, Washington, D.C., 20540. There are no known restrictions on its publication. The back cover photo and tree signs are courtesy of Pixabay.com. They are in the public domain.

Graphic design work and answers to all print questions large and small are thanks to my daughter Kelly Wigginton.

Special thanks to my wife, A.J., for all of her encouragement, proofreading and editing ultimatums. Without her help, this book would not have been possible.

This is a memoir; a work of creative nonfiction. I am told that means that I have recalled events to the best of my memory. I have also been told it is a memory that is pretty much shot. I don’t know about that. After all, it doesn’t seem like you could remember it, if it didn’t happen, right?

And while the stories that follow are true, actual names and identifying details have been changed to protect the privacy of the individuals involved. Consequently, any resemblance to any persons living or who may have slipped into the afterworld are purely coincidental and a really big error on your part.

Questions about people or events as they occurred may always be clarified with long time friend and colleague Fred Schwartz who was there every step of the way. And Schwartz never lies; he just exaggerates something terrible.

ISBN: 978-1-329-06896-4

Revised March 17, 2015, Second Printing

DEDICATION

For GG who gave me a chance; for Schwartz who was always ready to take one.

PREFACE

Some years ago, radio and television personality Art Linkletter, interviewing children as a regular feature on his popular show, House Party, concluded what we have long known. It became the title of his first book, Kids Say The Darndest Things. The book, a collection of priceless wit and witticisms, was straight from the mouths of the little people themselves.

Well, those three to eight year olds have the market cornered on cute, that’s for certain. The only thing more certain is what awaits just around the corner. And that is something pretty scary. It is something called the teenage years.

Those years are just a design quirk of the human body, as inevitable as a baby’s first tooth and Grandpa’s last one. Society protects itself as best it can. Sadly, it’s just not enough.

Here in this country we put the bulk of those teenagers in something we call high schools. Sometimes it’s for an incubation period of four years, sometimes longer. Some people believe this is for the purpose of the young person earning something called a high school diploma. Actually, it is to keep them away from the rest of us. Call it a quarantine of sorts.

In an effort to minimize the teenager’s exposure to the public at large, we put as many of them as possible together in one place and leave as few adults to watch over them as possible. We call these caretakers teachers, support staff and administrators.

Thankfully, the teenage condition is a temporary one. Just as the caterpillar becomes the butterfly, most teenagers will become responsible, beautiful young adults before our very eyes. For others, the metamorphosis will take place much later in life. And still for a few, it is a transformation that never will take place. Just like J.M Barrie’s Peter Pan, these striplings have not only vowed never to grow up, but have defiantly pledged that they won’t even try.

In the meantime, whatever the state of their transmogrification, those teenage years remain a rite of passage that can be a bumpy, even painful ride at times with plenty of surprise twists and turns. For not only will teenagers say the darndest things, just like their younger counterparts, they’ll do the darndest things too.

Well, they’re not alone. Some of Peter’s older Lost Boys, teachers and administrators themselves, provide a little company of their own along the way.

This book tells just a few of their stories.

Thanks to being blessed with a mind that functions pretty much like a personal digital recorder, I have been able to bring you those events just as they occurred, despite the passage of years. What I did with my keys, glasses and what happened last night are an entirely different matter.

The events retold here take place in Slippery Moss where I worked for eighteen years as a high school teacher, coach, assistant principal, principal and acting superintendent. It was all a part of a career that spanned thirty-five years in education.

In some ways, it was a town just like the one you grew up in; a school just like the one you went to and not unlike that school just down the street. In other ways, it was more like what you might find in Neverland, second star to the right and straight on till morning.

Evinkay

I leaned forward in my chair, slid the thick manila disciplinary file folder across my desk and opened it. Attached to the left and inside cover were several multiple column lined sheets filled from top to bottom with handwritten entries.

Each entry contained the date, infraction, disciplinary action imposed and the administrator who handled the incident. Inside the folder was the office copy of each of the detailed disciplinary referrals referenced on the inside cover of the file.

I was holding War & Peace; at least the student disciplinary version of the Russian classic.

Evinkay had a rap sheet that would have put many a hardened criminal to shame. There wasn’t an infraction in Evinkay’s illustrious elementary, junior high and high school career he hadn’t collected, a rule he hadn’t violated, a punishment he hadn’t served and deserved. Granted, that record would be tempered a bit by the fact that he had the advantage of repeating several of those grades; some more than once.

I suppose that did give him an unfair opportunity to collect even more offenses, though technically, it is an avenue available to all of us. Still, Evinkay was a vet!

About five feet six inches tall, heavy set with thick black rimmed glasses and long brown hair that might have been washed a couple of times by accident, Evinkay was a big, lovable slug.

Well, maybe lovable is a bit of a stretch. He had turned getting into trouble into an art. Bad art. It actually took him no effort at all. Good thing, I guess, because nothing Evinkay did was remotely connected with effort.

A hundred kids could flash mob rob a convenience store, and Evinkay would be the only one caught. He just couldn’t help himself. Evinkay was like the character Joe Btfsplk in the old Li’l Abner comic strip who walked around with that small dark rain cloud hanging over his nearly empty head, bringing misfortune to all around him everywhere he went.

Except with Evinkay, that misfortune was pretty much all his. Well, that was all about to change. At least, that was what I thought. And that pretty much tells you what I know.

Looking back, I was a relative rookie as a high school principal at the time and had just two years under my belt as the school’s assistant principal before that. And that first year in administration was just half time.

I had taught here at Slippery Moss though, and knew the school’s problems. Shoot, I had probably caused a few of them myself. Anyway, I was all too familiar with what needed to be done, and that was a lot.

The high school, which bore the name of the town, ran around 740 kids, though it had held as many as 1,200 in the past. A contract with a neighboring district to send its high school aged students to Slippery Moss that was not renewed, coupled with the natural attrition that followed the slumping local lumber industry, accounted for the enrollment drop.

Added to that, four elementary schools and a single junior high completed the school district.

The not so sleepy town of Slippery Moss had a falling city limits population of around 2,200. It was situated just about a four day hike up a narrow mountain pathway reachable only by foot. Few make it to the isolated city without the services of a local guide or Sherpa. Well, it seemed that way at times.

It was a good half hour drive from town to anything else with much more than a gas station, post office and grocery store.

The city depended upon the county sheriff’s office for its services. These consisted of little more than a marked car drive by a couple of times a day and help in an emergency. If you weren’t certain when they were coming, just check with any crook.

Slippery Moss had given its own police department the boot some time back. Its residents were unwilling to foot the bill for the rising costs of their own ongoing local coverage.

And though we were away from the bright lights of the big city, we were close enough. There was plenty of action. It had already been a busy morning. At least up to this point, it had been fairly routine.

My assistant principal Fred Schwartz and I made it a point to be among the first ones on campus each day. It gave us a chance to take a good look around; find out if our superintendent had changed the locks on us.

Also, if gremlins had visited in the night, we wanted to know about it first. That way we could take care of any problems before the staff and students started arriving. I hate surprises. Schwartz is not keen on them either.

Part of making those before school rounds included checking areas where the kids liked to hang out. We patrolled the woods that ran very near to the school and the market down the street. We walked and drove the alleyway that ran next to the store and connected to the highway that crossed in front of the high school.

If all that sounds a little like your neighborhood school, there is a reason for that. It is a requirement somewhere that all small towns and their schools be laid out exactly the same.

We patrolled the pathway that led from the nearby apartments to the school. Next we checked both upper and lower parking lots, then hit the hallways just before the final bell for the day’s first class.

This routine was time consuming but essential. It is important to be visible as an administrator; to be out and around campus, to touch base with the kids on their turf. It was also a good way to build rapport.

You would be surprised at how much the kids would tell you about what was happening in their world. And that included the latest on potential fights, parties on the horizon and drugs. They just spoke a little freer when they were on what they regarded as their turf.

Then it was all hands on deck for the beginning of first period. And it took all hands too. That first hour or so, we were knee deep in reinstatement appointments from any suspensions that had just ended. Suspensions required the parent to accompany the student to school as a condition of their student’s reinstatement. No parent in tow, no reinstatement. No exceptions.

We all had a nice little talk about future behavior expectations at these parent/student meetings. Teachers were included in these conferences too, of course, whenever appropriate. Behavior contracts were drawn up and signed as necessary.

In hindsight, we probably should have done a little more with the fine print. People really will sign anything. We’ve all done it. And that especially applies to parents desperate to get their son or daughter back in school.

Though a suspension reinstatement meeting wasn’t why I was planning to see Evinkay this morning.

It was also a time for resolving any major disciplinary infractions that might have come in at the end of the previous day. In these cases a hold was placed on the student.

The student was not permitted to enter any class without a note from an administrator; an indication that whatever the problem was, we had met with the student and he was cleared to return to class. These little fugitives from justice were cooling their jets in the front office until we were ready for them.

Evinkay, I am happy to report, wasn’t on the hold list this day either.

That first hour was also when we chased any attendance problems from the previous day. You remember those confusing teenage times, I know you do. Now it probably wasn’t you, but remember that friend of yours who used to leave third period and would forget to go to fourth period and go to lunch early instead?

Or rather than report to fifth period for that big test, he would manage to forget about the class altogether, take an extra long lunch, then show up for sixth period? Or just go fishing? Or to Starbucks? Or cruising? Or to your other friend’s house where no one was home because both parents worked?

I thought you might remember.

Though that wasn’t Evinkay’s problem this morning either.

In fact, this particular mid-winter morning Evinkay wasn’t in trouble at all. I closed Evinkay’s folder and slid it to the side of my desk. He was starting to come around. It was time for a little added encouragement. Time for a little positive reinforcement. It would be a real first for Evinkay.

School had been rocky for the kid, that was for sure. We had searched the little outlaw so many times we were beginning to use his name for the procedure. I was surprised the term hadn’t already shown up in Webster’s latest revised dictionary next to his picture.

Not surprisingly, Evinkay was on our Dirty Dozen list. Heck, Evinkay could have been our Dirty Dozen list all by himself.

We had compiled and divided up a comprehensive list of the at risk kids in our school based on attendance, academics and discipline. The idea of this program was to closely monitor these students’ progress.

Progress reports indicating tardies, attendance, grades and behavior were circulated to each of their teachers weekly and returned to us for review. When necessary, they were circulated more often than that. They were a pain in the neck for staff, but they were helping.

Then it was up to us to follow up, intervene, mentor, encourage and link the student to appropriate resources. We were committed to help these troubled students find success in school, help them get ready to be productive, contributing members of society after their school days were over.

Ahhh, the road to the straight and narrow ran right beside them, if we could just get them to see it. Some were already part way out of that ditch of self-destruction and turning around, thanks to us. They just needed a hand up, a little nudge off that curb of temptation and back on the road to good citizenship.

Many would probably move on to careers in the ministerial field after their time with us. If not, there was always politics where many of them are no doubt this very day.

I had drawn Evinkay. Now that sounds a little like I had won something and that there had been an actual drawing with the names of our most at risk students in a hat or something like that. I didn’t and it wasn’t.

Looking back though, I think we really missed the boat. Think about it. We could have sold the rights to this annual dividing up selection process to one of those cable reality television stations and run it just like they do with the NFL draft. For the right price, it could even be the Chick-fil-A, Poulan Weed Eater, or Go-Daddy Dirty Dozen Selection Draft. Maybe all three.

These kids had even had their own pre-draft combine of sorts already. That was chronicled in their checkered past juvenile court and school disciplinary records. Imagine the camera moving in for a close-up first on Evinkay, then the other leading candidates for the Dirty Dozen’s top pick.

Below their photos their infractions would crawl along the screen with their vital statistics. Several scroll by. Then this: Evinkay… A five foot, six inch, two hundred pound junior, chronologically…Born in Burnt Creek…Convictions for loitering, vagrancy, vandalism, weapons possession, assault and minor in possession of alcohol…Multiple disciplinary infractions for leaving class without permission, tardies, truancy, smoking on campus, possession of drugs and insubordination…Credits, eight.

The camera then zooms in on the administrator who had won the right to the first pick because of their poor showing with their last years’ at risk selections, lost in thought over who to select. The announcer solemnly intones, The principal is now on the clock...

Then, With the first pick in the 2015 (add the sponsor’s name here) Dirty Dozen draft, the principal of Slippery Moss High selects...Evinkay.

Amid the applause, Evinkay makes his way to the podium, dons a cap and hastily pulls on a t-shirt with his new mentor’s name on it. He is flanked by the district’s superintendent on one side, lucky selector on the other. The school’s logo hangs in the background.

Asked how it felt to be selected as the number one pick in this year’s Dirty Dozen draft, Evinkay, teary eyed, would say, It was like a dream come true, I can’t even put it into words.

Now if he had bothered to pay attention in school, he would have had the words.

The camera pans to the front room of Evinkay’s home where family and friends are gathered, anxiously awaiting the selection announcement. Then, high fiving, patting one another on the back, they hug each other tearfully at the good news; he got me.

You are scoffing at the idea, I can tell. Well, you shouldn’t. Think about it for a second. If people will buy Tots and Tiaras, Alaska Women Looking for Love and The Biggest Loser, they’ll buy anything. And schools need the money. They should feel free to use this idea as their own.

Anyway, Evinkay and I were bonding. I could feel it. And whenever Evinkay accidentally committed some crime that would have gotten him ten to twenty in the pokey as an adult, I know I too felt the distinct twinge of failure.

Lately though, things had been proceeding nicely, I thought. Now I wouldn’t want you to think we had seen a dramatic change in behavior or anything like that. That would seem like I was looking for credit I really didn’t deserve.

Still, Evinkay hadn’t been in trouble for weeks. He was getting himself to class, and he was on time, mostly. He hadn’t told any of his teachers to take a hike much, and there was word he was even thinking of turning in an assignment. Baby steps. Soon he would be walking unaided, then running.

It was time to call him into the office and pump him up. Let him know we noticed. We cared. Anyway, it was always nice to call someone in for something positive after all the negatives we dealt with.

Surely touchy feely advocates somewhere were crying out, Damn, you guys are good! Grants would probably follow. Neurophysiologist Jerzy Konorski and psychologist B.F. Skinner were no doubt smiling down from somewhere up above. Their instrumental conditioning and respondent behavior research, once supported by cats, rats and pigeons, would be theories no longer. All thanks to our efforts.

Most likely, with all the other Evinkays on our Dirty Dozen list finding success, we would probably be spending most of our time traveling. There would be no choice, really. We would be presenting our program to others, desperate for the nuts and bolts of how to launch similar programs for the at risk kids in their own schools.

The book we would by then be duty bound to write would not be enough. A movie deal would probably follow, Finding Evinkay. Sean Connery would play me. If unavailable, maybe we could get Don Knotts. Of course, we would have to dig him up to do it.

Second period was under way.

I checked with our attendance secretary to see if the subject of our future film deal was in school. He was. At least he hadn’t been marked absent by his first period teacher. Now that didn’t necessarily mean he was really there, but the odds were in my favor.

I filled out a destination pass and sent it to his teacher directing her to release our future congressman about five minutes before the end of the period. That way the interruption would be minimal. Evinkay was to report to the front office, not pass go, not collect two hundred dollars, not make a run for the state line.

If we were really concerned the student might forget where he was going, or might take a little detour for some reason or another, we collected our little miscreant personally.

I had about fifteen minutes before he would be arriving.

I was actually looking forward to seeing him and giving him the good news of how proud we all were of his behavior of late and of the progress he was making. Tell someone that enough and soon they will believe it themselves and behave accordingly. Robert Merton’s Self-fulfilling Prophecy, Karl Popper’s Oedipus effect, William James’ Will to Believe; amateurs all.

According to the aide who delivered the pass, Evinkay wasn’t in his second period class after all. He had been. At least his teacher thought he had been. Had something happened to the little fellow? Foul play maybe? Wouldn’t you know it, just when Evinkay was turning his life around, too.

Sometimes life just doesn’t seem fair, does it? Shoot, Evinkay could play Texas hold ‘em every day for the rest of his life and still be dealt a two and a seven off suit every single time—the worst hand in the game. Now it appeared someone may actually have snatched him right out of class.

It was a little too soon to have his picture put on a milk carton, issue an amber alert, put up missing person posters or anything like that. I decided to take a good look around first. If I came up empty, I would round up a posse. Then we would see if we could pick up his studentnapper’s tracks and hunt ‘em down.

I wasn’t too worried though. Just like in O’ Henry’s Ransom of Red Chief, once they realized who they had snatched they would pay whatever it took for us to take him back. I was anticipating a really big payday.

Anyway, there was always the possibility his teacher might have given him a hall pass for some reason or another and forgotten. Or maybe he had an accident, struck his head, had amnesia and was wandering around somewhere needing help.

Yes, that was probably it. That happened to me once as a kid. Coming home well after I was supposed to on this particular occasion, the scene played out like this.

Mom: Where have you been young man?!!! Do you have any idea what time it is? You were supposed to be home hours ago!

Me: A bunch of us were playing basketball and I got knocked into the basket standard and cracked my head right on the pole. When I came to, I tried to find my way home, tried to remember my name. Then these people came by and brought me here. Said this is where I live. Are you my mother?

Mom: You poor dear! Lie down while I get you some hot chocolate and a cookie.

See, it could happen.

If Evinkay was actually still here on campus somewhere, there were a couple of obvious places to check that were both close by and likely suspects; the cafeteria, locker-room and the library. Surprisingly, all doors to the cafeteria were locked, and it was empty.

I say surprisingly because although these entrances were supposed to be secured at all times during the day, except immediately before and after school and lunch, cafeteria staff made a habit of leaving various doors ajar or outright propped open. I think they did this just to make their administrators crazy.

Additionally, the vending machines inside the cafeteria were supposed to be turned off during those times. Cafeteria staff had keys that could be used to do just exactly that. The machines we had were so sophisticated though, apparently they were actually able to turn themselves back on whenever they felt like it.

You see our foods program, like most school programs, perpetually ran in the red, a source of continued embarrassment for the cafeteria staff, not to mention a drain on scarce resources. P.P. Pinkerton, the district’s business manager, was responsible for the program’s hiring, supervision and firing. Though the latter, as I am sure you know, is easier said than done.

Some estimates put the dismissal cost at $250,000 and five years by the time the typical firing process plays out. That includes costs from the initial investigation and union grievances to court challenges and re-hearings.

Anyway, profit from these machines was the only real moneymaker they had. So, cafeteria staff did everything they could to make sure there was always a way in to the vending machines. Kids knew it, our teachers and support staff knew it. And there were always a few of each ready and willing to take advantage of the situation.

To add to the foods program profit margin woes, I had permanently eliminated the all staff, all student ten minute everyone return back to class late break in the morning. Schwartz and I also had made it a point to personally lock the cafeteria area off at the first bell for first period and again at the warning bell for the first class after lunch. I think the ladies who worked the area were holding a grudge.

With the cafeteria clear, that left the locker-room and library as the most likely places to check to see if Evinkay was, in fact, still in the building. Like the cafeteria, the locker-room was supposed to be secured during class, but that battle was also still raging.

Once students had dressed down and had headed outside or up to the gymnasium for P.E., it was up to the teacher to make certain the area was locked. It wasn’t unusual for the instructor to forget, or despite district policy to the contrary, send some student back to the locker-room with their school keys to retrieve one thing or another that someone had left behind. Then that person would forget to lock up.

All it took was an open door and anyone arriving late to school, leaving early, or out of class on a hall pass with mischief on their mind and they would certainly find it.

Once found, those lockers were sitting ducks. It wasn’t even necessary to break open a lock. Those old single dial combination locks just needed a sharp rap between the shackle and outer case, and they popped open anyway.

No, it was much simpler than that. Here everyone was long gone, and you were guaranteed to be able to go through others’ belongings uninterrupted.

And you were certain to find several lockers that kids who, despite knowing better, had left unlocked. There was also no shortage of students who had set their locks having dialed the first two numbers in advance, so that with one spin of the dial the combination lock would pop open. Remember setting your lock like that?

Some things never change.

There were also vending machines for a little added mischief here. If the business manager had his way, they’d be in the hallways and classrooms too. Probably on the school buses. Probably at their stops.

There was also a couch just outside the hopefully locked inner coaches’ office. Was.

I used to make these rounds through the school at odd times during the day whenever I could, just to keep an eye on things. Schwartz did the same. Every once in a while you would find someone who thought they were doing something new. Though that is probably not how I would describe what the young couple were doing in the dugout we surprised one day.

On this particular occasion, I slipped my master key in the lock of a side door that led from outside the building into the boys’ locker-room and stepped into the dark corridor. The outer entrance was locked, and the lights were actually out; a good sign already. I made my way past the weight room, which was also surprisingly locked, and navigated my way towards the inner office.

About two steps from the couch, there in the darkness, I could just faintly make out the unmistakable form of the dead body. Its arms and legs were spread out in an unnatural final repose. The long handle of what must have been used to bash the head in had been left lying there on the floor, right where it had been dropped.

Unbelievable. A murder right here in our locker-room. Evinkay. The suspects would be a homicide detective’s nightmare; too numerous to count. It could have been anyone on staff. Then again, the person lying there could have been our day custodian sound asleep.

Hank! I said, just a little too loudly.

What... The not so murdered dead body that was, in fact our custodian, bolted upright. First, there was just confusion. Then, thinking swiftly, Oh! Thank God, he cried, his hands clutching his chest. My heart...dizzy...faint...help...

I was afraid of that, I lied, thinking just as quickly. Don’t try to move. An ambulance and fire truck with EMT’s are on their way.

No! Ah, no...no. I think I’ll be all right. Just need another minute or two. Maybe a little air, he added bravely. Now in all fairness, I had no doubt Hank actually had a near death experience. I also had no doubt that it had come when I caught him sleeping there in the dark. And he really did need a little air. He didn’t want to be anywhere around when those EMT’s showed up.

I was able to arrange to have the couch hauled away the next morning. I was never able to get anyone to come for Hank. By the way, I should tell you there was still one couch left at the school. That was in my office. I had inherited it from my predecessor. Given Hank’s heart condition, I couldn’t very well get rid of it, now could I?

I was saved a trip to the library. My assistant principal had beaten me to the punch. Schwartz had scooped up Evinkay and had personally delivered him