General Petraeus, 9th Graders and Sir Isaac Newton

Pick any Monday morning in a high school........it's too darn early for life to start.  The weekend is always brought to school.  Always!  ALWAYS!

********************

7:00 a.m....The front desk secretary brought me three students.  She handed me a cup of black coffee and the write-ups, raised one eye-brow and said, "This is a wild one.  Call me if you need a refill."  She looked at the students and said, "Sit down.  Dr. Weaver will be helping you now."

The three 9th graders sat in straight chairs right in front of my desk.  The boy was "boohooing" like there was no tomorrow.  Both of the girls on either side of him looked as mad as wet hens.  No, they were madder.  They were ANGRY and that boy kept up a noise that could be mistaken a howler monkey caught in a trap.

As an assistant principal, I saw students who, shall we say, have made bad choices.  I rarely saw students for something good and I could tell from the volume alone, this was going to be a doozy.  

The three had been causing a loud ruckus in a hall before an early morning class and the teachers had wanted me to get to the bottom of it.  The teachers wanted it stopped.  Now.

I handed each student a clipboard with lined paper on it.  "No talking to each other.  Write your side of the story for me to read before we start discussing this,"  the standard  message came out of my mouth.  "Write the truth as you see it and then we'll compare your stories."  

Furiously the girls began writing and writing and writing.  AND writing.  The boy was still gulping and crying.  I handed him a box of tissues and he wrote one sentence and handed me the clipboard with his statement.  

"She said my ding-dong was small."

I read that sentence at least three times.  I looked up and the boy was still sobbing.  

The synopsis of girl number one was that she was the boy's girlfriend.  AND he was showing his tallywacker to other people.  AND she didn't think he should show his wiener to anyone else.  He was her boyfriend.  AND he had done this weekend.  AND she didn't think that was very right.  

Girl number two had looked at his private parts and declared them "SMALL".  She wrote that all she was doing was telling the truth.  And he shouldn't have been showing it to everyone after the movies Saturday night if he didn't want people to talk.  She was telling everyone before school because it was so tiny and it looked like a miniature Johnson.  She'd never seen such a teeny weeny peeny.  

(I can't make this stuff up.)

The students were interfering with the orderly running of a public school.  I sweetly called the secretary and asked her to get me a refill on my coffee.  "Yes, Ma'am."   At this point I said a quick prayer in my head for wisdom and not to laugh right out loud.

***************************

The punishment was simple.  I had each of them call their mother and tell their own story.  All three of the moms came and got their children.  All three of the mothers were aghast.  All three of the children got more punishment from their parents that they could ever get from me.  All three of the families hide from me whenever they see me.

****************************

I'm going to tell General Patreus what I told those children.  If you show your privates to someone, they will talk.  If you are in a relationship, you don't need to show your privates to anyone else.  If you do show your privates to outside parties, you  have made a choice and you need to live with the consequences.  It's physics.  Just like Sir Issac Newton stated, "For every action, there's an equal and opposite  action."

****************************

It's all about the academics, isn't it?