The Scarlet Letter | La Lettre Ecarlate

Circa 10th Grade in the 90’s

My face stung and my skin curdled from blush to burn, except Black people don’t blush, nor do Brown.  Well they kinda do.  It comes out as a burnished, red clay undertone.  Watch closely the micro gestures on their face.  But my face burned  99.9 degrees with embarrassment fever and I felt as red as the scarlet letter on my paper which still burned red after decades.  It was a long and CAPITAL… and was screaming in English, French, and Spanish. It was a universal D, alone in the right hand region of my three-hole-punched blue lined notebook paper.   But there was more.

My 10th grade paper the original document

Dr. Sachs, my 10th grade French teacher, complete with her bifocal half-rim reading glasses with croakies (neck cord), and short, dated, feathered hair (google 1970s dated hair), scrawled in script, crimson, blood ink:

“Cannot read this unclear and done without care.”

Her scathing love note pierced my thin teenager skin deeper than the D of a full court press…and it rhymed.  It felt unfair, to feel silence in the air.  The paper dropped like vapor settling on the desk at her behest.   She passed through my row, papers in tow.  She flipped it over; the turnover was like a basketball fumble.  I bumbled.  She humbled me with a big fat D.  She knew the paper flip would sit like a pit, a ball in a catcher's mitt, stinging from the unfurled hurl from the pitcher’s world; her plate dished my fate.

Dr. Sachs slapped me with a simple gesture as she walked through my row, passing my desk and laying down a turned-over paper and red ink.  I glanced at it and then I crumpled it up immediately and my inside voice muttered:  “I don’t care.”  The default phrase pops up, raises its defensive head when you really do care, and you hurt, and you know somewhere,  somehow, some words of what the adult world is saying is true.  But I don’t care.  There!  I said it again.  I balled up the red curse in my hand and with each rotation and  squeeze I sculpted that harsh paper-cut giving blue denim binder notebook paper into a smooth, giant spitball, without the spit.  I was ready to shoot that “ball” into her metal garbage can, in her classroom as I exited with the shot clock ticking down to the period change bell.  I would time it right - spot up, shoot, exit room 203. 

Something clicked inside of me and I released my Jordan grip on my ball.  I gently uncrumpled the paper and carefully smoothed it out.  Was this a double rebellion?  Rebelling against the Rebel stance?  Perhaps a Biblical value my Dad said sounded in my head:  “Whatever you are doing, work at it whole-souled as for Jehovah, and not for men.”  Several cross currents of feelings coursed through my mind.   I carefully smoothed out the paper and looked closely and to add insult to injury-I don’t know how I missed it: the last word Dr. Sachs had the nerve and gall to write was a screaming Big Red Underlined Redo.  

I redid the do that I did.  I couldn’t find the redo in my journal so to Dr. Sachs and the all the French Teachers in the world, actually to all the teachers across planet earth, thank you for you and all that you do as Teachers, Chaos Coordinators, Counselors, Disciplinarians, Inspirers, Accountability Coaches, Defenders of language, Wielders of the Red Pen.  Please do not ever, ever, ever underestimate your influence and your jedi pow-wahs (powers) on beloved children -  the power of the red pen, white chalk, a smiley face, an air hug, an emoticon, a corny joke, praise, a compliment, a glance, a tone.  You stand on a box, even sit on a throne. The children are the crown and let them be shown.

Redo

Chris Miller

203

French Homework 

Chère Dupont,

Je suis allé au cinéma.  Il y avait un film très intéressant.  J’ai aimé le film parce qu'il était plein d'humour.  Un acteur qui est très amusant est Monsieur Guillame.  La thème du film était “Lean on Me.” C’était très intéressant.  Quand je suis allé au cinéma, les places ont été prises.  Voici les billets.

Je promets d’essayer d’écrire proprement à partir de maintenant si vous promettez de ne plus jamais écrire un D rouge sur mon papier.