Plucky Letters to US soldiers in Iraq

Army Guys
One Hundred and Thirst Airflung
Boondocks, Iraq 09325


October, 2003


Dear Guys,

The grade school wherein I am employed 4 hours a day as a Lunch Lady is in utter chaos. We have a new principal, Mrs. H_. She seems oblivious to the simple fact that many of her students are hardened criminals intent upon wreaking all kinds of havoc and making my life a personal hell. Mrs. H_ says, “There are no bad children in this school.” (Yeah, right, lady, what about the third-grade gang members who slashed the tires on your SUV during study hall yesterday? They bad.)

Today a fight broke out in the lunchroom. Two of the BD (behavior disordered) kids were going at it on the floor while their fellow students chanted, “FIGHT, FIGHT, FIGHT!” all around. I ran over and pried Kurtis N_’s sticky little fingers out of Ca’rie B_’s kinky- and possibly lice-infested- hair. Kurtis protested, “He called my mama a HOE!” (sp? How do you spell the shortened version of whore, anyway? Is it hoe? Ho? Actually, it must be a sort of compound contraction: ‘ho’e.) Well, despite the fact that Kurtis’s mama may indeed be a ‘ho’e, I thought it was rather mean of Ca’rie to bring it up. After all, there are certain social standards that must be upheld, even among democrats.

I called for Mrs. H_ on the intercom and she did not respond. I called again. No joy. Finally, I made them both sit on the floor next to my computer desk until their teacher arrived to pick them up after lunch. Today when Ca’rie started the “yo mama’s a ‘ho’e” crap, Kurtis just got up and came over to a nice comfy spot on the floor by the serving window, where I was working today. I patted his filthy little head with relief and went about the business of convincing second-grader Courtney S_ that saying, “I don’t want no broccoli” is, indeed, the reason there is broccoli on her plate.

This “I don’t want no…” grammar blooper is one of my pet peeves. I firmly believe any child can comprehend the zero-sum game inherent in the double negative. I have developed an elegantly simple means of instructing the little double-negative users. Any luckless child who utters the phrase “I don’t want no broccoli” (or gravy, sauce, cheese, whatever) is then presented with two plates.

One plate has the offending substance upon it, the other does not. I explain that plate A is BROCCOLI (or whatever.) Plate B, naked of broccoli, is NO BROCCOLI. I then instruct the child that when she says, “I don’t want no broccoli.” She is, in fact, requesting plate A. I say it very slowly and carefully, as such:

Courtney: I don’t want no broccoli.
Me: Courtney, this plate is BROCCOLI. The other plate is NO BROCCOLI. When you say “I don’t want NO BROCCOLI (I point to plate B), doesn’t that mean you want BROCCOLI? (I then point to plate A.) She stares at me blankly through the mist of her blonde bangs. She sighs, because we have gone through this so many times. Then she says,
“I just don’t want no broccoli!”
I say, “You mean, ‘I don’t care for any broccoli today, thank you.’”
She says, “Yeah. I don’t want no broccoli.”

Well, there’s always tomorrow. I will NEVER give up! Besides, Courtney is a particularly stubborn child. I have had great success with several of the more intelligent ignorant little savages in her class.


Speaking of little savages, my 11 year old Dylan is making me crazy by forgetting to come to Chess Club. He has done this 3 times! I’m one of the Chess Club instructors every Thursday at his school. (Which is, thankfully, on the opposite side of the city from the school where I work. There are no BD kids or double-negative users at Dylan’s school, as far as I know.) Dylan is obviously an idiot, though.

I hate to say that, but how else can I interpret the fact that he has gotten on the bus every Thursday since Chess Club started, causing me to have to leave Chess Club and drive home to pick his sorry ass up at the bus stop and drag it back to school?

It’s embarrassing! All the other 80 kids in Chess Club manage not to forget to show up. Today I yelled at him and made him cry. I felt bad about it, but this outrageous Chess Club evasion has got to stop! Just between you & me, I hate Chess Club as much as Dylan does. It’s boring, and the guy running it is a crazy Chess Zealot. But, damnit, if I have to show up every week, so can Dylan!
Besides, Dylan’s one of our best chess players and the crazy Chess Zealot will kill me if I let him quit.

Much Love,
--An Army Mom