A Company Me
I don’t know if it’s illegal to take pictures in public schools, but sometimes I do. My super-small church, where even shorts, t-shirts, and flip flops are welcome, meets on Sunday mornings at a nearby elementary school. Like everything up here, the school old and outdated. Whether I go in the front door or the secret backdoor I learned about only weeks ago, my eyes find something I want and just like that I’ve broken a Ten Commandment and coveted my neighbor’s school. There’s the wooden lunch lady desk, the real wooden office chairs on wheels and the big steel teacher desks that are virtually unmovable, but my favorite thing has to be the kids’ drawings that line the hallways.
I like to find the most jacked up drawings and imagine what that kid must be like. I’m fascinated by the simplicity of their thoughts. How they use a million colors that never match, but still, somehow go together. And I love it when they write overly structured sentences with misspelled words.
Since school started, there have been about twenty self-portraits that have lined the front cases. Apparently, the assignment was to draw yourself and then write a memory you have about that school. Now most kids had the, “I remember when we had recess and…” or “I remember when we got to see Fantom of the Opra,” but the one featured above probably resulted in a parent/teacher conference.
One special memorie I remembered was when I was angry and alone Moby came to a company me.
On one hand, I feel sorry for this kid because I know how tortured he has to feel around all of his alleged peers and I know how alienating it can be when your mind exists on a completely different plane. On the other hand, I’m excited for him. His life will always be hard, but he’ll live in his pipe dreams.
