Tyrannosaurus Strikes Again

This time I will regale you with but one tale to illustrate the ways in which this job never ceases to disgust me.

Last week I was stopping by the office at the end of the day when I ran in to Tom looking rather flustered. I mean, his whole neck and his ears were totally red. I asked him what was wrong, and got that he was really upset with Ms. Land (the idiot secretary...the one who didn't book my kids' bus and almost made me cancel my field trip and then had the gall to tell me I was "bugging the shit out of her" when I had tried to remind her daily to call and book it). When I got him and Tony to recount the story a few minutes later, this is what I found out.

It was ninth period and there were a bunch of kids in the hall. Tony stepped out to yell and clear them out (I always wonder why that hall has problems with kids since it's the hall where the office is, but there it is...), and he had to argue with two kids who clearly were not supposed to be there. His correct argument was that they were clearly not freshmen as he didn't know them and they looked much too old, and even if they were, they weren't in uniform so they clearly either weren't our students or, if they were, they weren't supposed to be at school. He got the typical response - threats of bodily harm and car vandalism - and, having no other way to identify the miscreants, took one of their hats and headed to the office. He informed the office staff, including one Ms. Tyra(nnosaurus) Land, that the kid banging on the door insisting he get his hat back needed to be arrested for verbal assault.

At this time, Tom happened upon the scene and realized that said juvenile was one of his seniors - in fact, the very same senior who picked him up and threw him earlier this year. Well, Tom pulled him in to the parent room to talk to him and calm him down. Fifteen minutes later, Tyrannosaurus knocked on the door (for what reason beyong nosiness is beyond me, as there is nothing other than a table and chairs in the room) and, when they did not answer, let herself in with her master key. She turned to the kid and asked which teacher he was fussing with, and when the kid told her Tony, she said "You god damn white men." When Tom was able to pick his jaw up off the floor he told her how inappropriate her comment was on all different levels. She eventually left, at which point the kid said, "Did she SERIOUSLY just say that to you?" This is the kid who 15 minutes early threatened Tony that he was going to "fuck you in your face." Interesting.

But the story doesn't end there. Tom also told this story to me and Amanda outside the principal's office where we were overheard by a few others on staff. I got a phone call from the principal on my cell phone while I was at the gym and she left a message asking for me to call her back so she could get clarity on something. When I did call her back, she asked if I had been involved in the incident, and when I said no, she asked me to at least tell her what I'd heard because she couldn't get in touch with Tom (I covered for him and said "I think he's at the gym" and she said "or at the bar having a drink because he's so pissed...either way, I don't blame him." Love that woman.). After I told her, she did something that totally surprised me. She got really serious and said "I hope you all know that the rest of the staff doesn't feel that way." I said, "Of course! Ms. Land is just..." She filled in the blank with "Extra. She's extra. We'll leave it at that." I thought it was a really weird exchange, though, and totally out of character. But when I came in to work the next day and talked to Tom, he told me the rest of the story. The way my principal heard about the whole incident was from Mr. Manning, our Blum mentor, who over heard us and told her that a bunch of the white teachers were about to quit because of something Ms. Land had said. So she called to mend the fences or wahtever the right metaphor would be. Of all the race related issues I thought I'd have to deal with in this job, blatant racism on the part of the office staff is not one of them.

The outcome of this whole incident will be a meeting between Ms. Land, the principal, Tom, and a representative from North Avenue. She will probably get defensive and bitchy again and walk away from the meeting thinking Tom is an ass and that she knows everything, just like every conversation with her seems to go. I thought that surely a racist, ignorant, insulting, self-important bitch who can't even pass the typing test would be hard to employ, but instead she is a 15 year employee of the Baltimore City Public School System. Now someone tell me how I'm supposed to look my kids in the eye and tell them the only way to be successful and employable is to go to college and learn life skills...