Tuesday, April 01, 2008
April Fool's Day, 1992
I was a teacher's pet (still am, I guess.) I loved school, loved my teachers and they loved me. My parents instilled in me the importance of education, and they took my experience as a student quite seriously. Perhaps too seriously as I found out one spring day in 1992.
I asked my 6th grade teacher to write me a fake detention slip. On the space where he had to fill out my offense that warranted this discipline slip, he wrote "Lauren constantly talks out of turn and disrupts the class." On the reverse he wrote APRIL FOOL!
Putting on my best hang-dog face, I brought the detention to my dad. I waited for that moment where I could grin and yell "Gotcha!" but that moment never came. Dad began reading me the riot act and telling me how it was unacceptable that I got a detention. Privileges would be lost and an apology to the teacher was in order when I returned to class the next day. While Dad was disciplining me, tears were rolling down my face. What seemed like a fun prank was quickly becoming quite painful. Between hyperventilated gulps of air I managed to squeak out "but Daddy, it's a joke!"
Without missing a beat Dad collected himself and said sternly "Now you know what would happen if you brought a real one of those home."
I never brought home a detention, real or otherwise ever again.
