This Is Going On Your Permanent Record
Christina Hamlett
December 19, 2006
How often those seven scary little words can strike terror in the hearts of students everywhere. Years later, I can still summon remembrance of that pulse-pounding dread…the steely-eyed glint of every teacher who ever caught me in some silly infraction…the interminable walk down the long corridor from the classroom to the assistant principal’s office.
At the same time, I have to snicker in retrospect at just how impressionable those teachers must have thought we were.
Did Lindsay Oliver, for instance, ever get denied government employment because he once put a row of KandyKorn inside his upper lip and told Tommy Mengert he was a vampire?
Did Imelda Feeney get left at the altar because her fiancé found out she copied two answers on the fourth-grade multiplication quiz?
Has a publishing house ever rejected one of my novels because there’s a letter on file somewhere that I only read the Cliff Notes for “The Red Badge of Courage” in junior high but still got an A for the semester ? (Okay, so maybe that one’s still out for vote…)
The point is that teachers apparently continue to use that time-worn chestnut of a threat to keep their pupils in line. Evidence, my nephew Eugene.
The first time he ever got in trouble was in second grade for grabbing a nun’s breasts. No, he wasn’t a junior pervert in the making; the entire episode was actually quite innocent. Brother Andrew had promised to teach the class how to play softball when he was felled by a wicked cold. Sister Honore—trouper that she was—stepped in to take his place.
During what can only be described as a freak moment of confusion and bad timing, Eugene frantically reached out to grab tight to something to keep from skinning his knees in a dramatic slide to third base. Since Sister Honore happened to be playing that position and—well, you can imagine the rest.
This is going on your permanent record, young man!” she immediately retorted. Eugene, of course, was in a total state of flummox, not so much from her pronouncement but at having discovered that nuns even had breasts under those voluminous penguin suits. Much to my amusement, he was still concerned a year and a half later that God’s finger was poised on the “smote” button, courtesy of Sister Honore’s ire with his unfortunate clumsiness.
I really don’t think you have to worry,” I assured him, considering that Sister Honore had not only given up teaching but also her vows the following summer when she ran off to a trailer park in Idaho with Brother Patrick.
Eugene’s next encounter with the “permanent record” phrase was when he got caught buying everyone’s soda straws for 10 cents and then turning around and selling them back for a quarter. On the one hand, I thought it showed tremendous initiative. On the other, it aptly demonstrated just how stupid the rest of his classmates could be on any given day. In the eyes of the administration, though, this had all the earmarks of another Bill Gates and had to be nipped in the bud.
It’s going on my permanent record,” he gravely informed me. “It will follow me the rest of my life.”
Like a hulking, relentless shadow of doom, it had been impressed upon him from an early age that anything he ever did from cradle to grave was being written down in a cavernous filing room somewhere, sparing nary a detail. Even worse, that copies would be made available and precede him in any relationship or career he ever chose to pursue.
I’m afraid I can’t go out with you, Eugene,” young ladies would say. “I read on page 407 about the lizard you put in Wally Peterman’s lunchsack.”
Employers would raise a dubious eyebrow at the outset of every interview. “I understand that 35 years ago you used tracing paper for a map of Brazil instead of drawing it freehand. Would you care to explain your actions?”
I’m sure the poor lad even envisions a dark day that he’ll be called before a House Subcommittee to provide testimony as to why he once told a teacher that the dog, in Irish setter with the incongruous name of Fluffy, ate his homework.
The most recent incident involved his very first job as a “Towel Boy” at Splashworld. After only a week of employment, he was singled out by management for a promotion to “Senior Towel Boy.” (Actually, there’s a lot of turnaround at Splashworld, owing to the attention span of its youngest employees.) The elation at suddenly earning 80 cents more and bossing other kids around was short-lived (about 55 minutes), owing to the merciless teasing of his peers.
They called me Teacher’s Pet because I got a promotion and they didn’t,” he explained.
So what did you do?” I asked.
With smug satisfaction, he told me that he had turned in his ID badge and his aqua T-shirt and quit without even giving his manager the requisite two weeks’ notice. “I guess I really showed those guys,” he said with a broad grin.
Not necessarily,” I answered. “’Those guys’ still have jobs for the summer and you don’t.”
I’ll go get another one,” he said with a casual shrug. “Can you help me write a resume?”
Hmm,” I murmured, weighing the request. “How are we going to explain your short tenure at Splashworld?”
Eugene scowled. “Can’t we just leave it off and pretend it didn’t happen?”
Afraid not, young man,” I sternly replied. “It’s been e-mailed already to your permanent record…”
At the same time, I have to snicker in retrospect at just how impressionable those teachers must have thought we were.
Did Lindsay Oliver, for instance, ever get denied government employment because he once put a row of KandyKorn inside his upper lip and told Tommy Mengert he was a vampire?
Did Imelda Feeney get left at the altar because her fiancé found out she copied two answers on the fourth-grade multiplication quiz?
Has a publishing house ever rejected one of my novels because there’s a letter on file somewhere that I only read the Cliff Notes for “The Red Badge of Courage” in junior high but still got an A for the semester ? (Okay, so maybe that one’s still out for vote…)
The point is that teachers apparently continue to use that time-worn chestnut of a threat to keep their pupils in line. Evidence, my nephew Eugene.
The first time he ever got in trouble was in second grade for grabbing a nun’s breasts. No, he wasn’t a junior pervert in the making; the entire episode was actually quite innocent. Brother Andrew had promised to teach the class how to play softball when he was felled by a wicked cold. Sister Honore—trouper that she was—stepped in to take his place.
During what can only be described as a freak moment of confusion and bad timing, Eugene frantically reached out to grab tight to something to keep from skinning his knees in a dramatic slide to third base. Since Sister Honore happened to be playing that position and—well, you can imagine the rest.
This is going on your permanent record, young man!” she immediately retorted. Eugene, of course, was in a total state of flummox, not so much from her pronouncement but at having discovered that nuns even had breasts under those voluminous penguin suits. Much to my amusement, he was still concerned a year and a half later that God’s finger was poised on the “smote” button, courtesy of Sister Honore’s ire with his unfortunate clumsiness.
I really don’t think you have to worry,” I assured him, considering that Sister Honore had not only given up teaching but also her vows the following summer when she ran off to a trailer park in Idaho with Brother Patrick.
Eugene’s next encounter with the “permanent record” phrase was when he got caught buying everyone’s soda straws for 10 cents and then turning around and selling them back for a quarter. On the one hand, I thought it showed tremendous initiative. On the other, it aptly demonstrated just how stupid the rest of his classmates could be on any given day. In the eyes of the administration, though, this had all the earmarks of another Bill Gates and had to be nipped in the bud.
It’s going on my permanent record,” he gravely informed me. “It will follow me the rest of my life.”
Like a hulking, relentless shadow of doom, it had been impressed upon him from an early age that anything he ever did from cradle to grave was being written down in a cavernous filing room somewhere, sparing nary a detail. Even worse, that copies would be made available and precede him in any relationship or career he ever chose to pursue.
I’m afraid I can’t go out with you, Eugene,” young ladies would say. “I read on page 407 about the lizard you put in Wally Peterman’s lunchsack.”
Employers would raise a dubious eyebrow at the outset of every interview. “I understand that 35 years ago you used tracing paper for a map of Brazil instead of drawing it freehand. Would you care to explain your actions?”
I’m sure the poor lad even envisions a dark day that he’ll be called before a House Subcommittee to provide testimony as to why he once told a teacher that the dog, in Irish setter with the incongruous name of Fluffy, ate his homework.
The most recent incident involved his very first job as a “Towel Boy” at Splashworld. After only a week of employment, he was singled out by management for a promotion to “Senior Towel Boy.” (Actually, there’s a lot of turnaround at Splashworld, owing to the attention span of its youngest employees.) The elation at suddenly earning 80 cents more and bossing other kids around was short-lived (about 55 minutes), owing to the merciless teasing of his peers.
They called me Teacher’s Pet because I got a promotion and they didn’t,” he explained.
So what did you do?” I asked.
With smug satisfaction, he told me that he had turned in his ID badge and his aqua T-shirt and quit without even giving his manager the requisite two weeks’ notice. “I guess I really showed those guys,” he said with a broad grin.
Not necessarily,” I answered. “’Those guys’ still have jobs for the summer and you don’t.”
I’ll go get another one,” he said with a casual shrug. “Can you help me write a resume?”
Hmm,” I murmured, weighing the request. “How are we going to explain your short tenure at Splashworld?”
Eugene scowled. “Can’t we just leave it off and pretend it didn’t happen?”
Afraid not, young man,” I sternly replied. “It’s been e-mailed already to your permanent record…”