Freddogg Off The Chain

The new Principal from a small Catholic school in Northern Michigan arrived at Cape just in time for a Tuesday night basketball game. The game was marred by a halftime fight involving young and very strong but at least loud black guys from different combat zones inside the school district.
The next morning the throw down would get down again in the school’s cafeteria before the start of school. The Principal who looked like the copy repairman guy waded into the battle and flew back out again. “Welcome to the Jungle, Sweet Child of Mine”, I pulled from my Guns and Roses joke book.
This guy was pretty tough but looked weak. And it became apparent throughout the extended public school community that he and his family thought they made a mistake and immediately started laying plans to get back to northern Michigan and white Catholic people.
I was doing my usual skipping of mandatory meetings but for some reason showed up for a demonstration of how to run the new copy machine which was the size of a small submarine. The Principal gave the most in depth demonstration of something I didn’t care about I ever listened to. I had no idea copying machines could do all those things. The anal sect of teachers was downright expulsive in their exuberance and said Ron was the greatest principal ever.
That May afternoon two young athletes from my undefeated track team arrived at my door at the beginning of period six. They wanted to work on high jumping but said the Phys Ed teacher needed a pass from me to say it was o.k. and a viable alternative from dodging arrows in archery class.
I signed a pass then another then for three other guys then I locked my door because I was becoming predictable pass writing chump and I had better things to do like tell stories and make kids laugh and wonder what was so funny?
Towards the end of the period the enraged principal was at my door. I could see that the beating he had been taking for months was going to be confronted at my expense.
“Can I talk to you for a minute?”
“Go, you’re on the clock!”
“What are 25 members of your track team doing practicing at 1 p.m.in the afternoon? They all said that Coach Fred said they could do it. They are wearing uniforms and now the softball and baseball teams want to practice during school as well.”
I, of course, was stuck inside a real job without the flexibility to roam around wondering about students running and jumping and loving life. I didn’t like being interrogated in a doorway with my students behind me.
“I mostly don’t know what you’re talking about, ”I said. “But instead of trying to shake me down and not giving me all the love that I need why aren’t you out there solving the riddle.”
Then he hit me with unsuspected directness.
“I don’t like you,” he said. “I know these kids all think you are cool and funny and they appear to love you but I don’t, in fact, I don’t like you at all. “
I responded, ”In the words of Elton John, ’Don’t go breaking my heart.”



The principal went back to Michigan and wasn’t heard from until he showed up in a tragic national news story.
An English teacher at Principal Ron’s school was incompetent but instead of saying, ”You’re incompetent and can’t work here anymore” the administration started building a paper trail.
Real men don’t build paper trails and don’t get trapped while blazing them either.
I would always tell my students, ”Don’t disrespect a person and then just leave them standing there because they will come back and get you. If you must ruin a person’s life then you better kill them before they kill you. The moral of the story is to never be the person who can destroy or disrupt a family or rob someone of their identity by taking away a career.
The English teacher was called to an after school meeting with the principal and superintendent. He was allowed to bring representation a sure warning that his job was in jeopardy. But he came to the meeting alone.
And then the unraveling of reams of paper, all serving to indict this veteran teacher and the hits just kept coming. The man sat there and didn’t say a word but an experienced police officer may have noticed the thousand yard stare. The man was dissociating which in psychotic behavior when it works. And then it happened.
He pulled a pistol from his pocket and shot the silent superintendent dead in the forehead. The he turned to the principal who had reacted by climbing up the drywall like a human fly. The principal was shot in the leg as the teacher threw the gun to the carpet and returned to his second floor classroom to continue grading papers.
This story was brought out again by Mitch Albom of the Detroit Free Press on the ESPN sports reporters program. Yes Mitch is the “Tuesday’s with Morrie” author.
Mitch closed the program by telling the story of the Michigan shooting. But the story centered on the Superintendent who was a “great guy” loved by everyone in the community. This Superintendent had pitched his town to the Little League World Series Championship when he was 12 years old.
Like a line drive back through the box sometimes you can’t get your glove up in time. He certainly didn’t deserve to go out like that.

Freddogg