Chips off the Old Block

We had been for a family swim at the new pool adjacent to Blackfoot High School.

My son Ben and I were in the shower rinsing the chlorinated water from ourselves and our swim suits.

While we were nude, showering, something quite strange caught my eye. At first it looked like leeches. Upon closer inspection, I determined it was welts.

There were numerous black-and-blue bruises on the little boy’s buttocks and down the backs of his thighs.

He was embarrassed, and at first refused to answer the natural question – what happened here?

When we got home, I made the boy show his mother the welts – and the answer came flooding out, like the tears. We all cried, all six of us.

The abuse Ben suffered had been a reprisal. Here’s how it went:

Ben’s teacher was Mrs. Eldridge. Mrs. Eldridge’s team-teacher was Mrs. Yancey. Mrs. Yancey was married to Bishop Yancey, who was a candidate for Blackfoot City Council.

In my job as a reporter for The Blackfoot News, I had been asking some hard questions of the bishop – and other candidates. Pointed questions. Accusative questions.

Mrs. Yancey was frustrated by my vigorous journalistic pursuit of her husband, and she confided those frustrations to Mrs. Eldridge, her team teacher/friend.

Mrs. Eldridge became enraged enough to attack my son. Rage gave her courage. She took him out in the hallway, made him hold on to coat hooks above his head. She pulled down his pants and beat him soundly with a metal ruler.

He didn’t report this. He was a child, after all, and he presumed he had done something wrong. He was embarrassed. He probably had done something wrong; he picked a nosy newspaper reporter for a dad.

I of course immediately reported the incident to the principal of Groveland Elementary and to the district superintendent. They said Mrs. Eldridge would be disciplined. I hope they did something. We did keep Ben out of her reach as best we could.

Then because I wanted all of them to squirm, I myself did nothing. I know that every day they were all looking for the big story in the paper. It never came. But here’s what we did do.

The Parent-Teacher-Student Association annual carnival was coming up at the school.

In a rare exhibition of family unity, we made a plan. We had a rare if not unique family meeting.

I told the kids – three girls and one boy – that we were all going to the carnival as a family, but we would not do the cake walk and we would not do the coin toss or the three-legged race or any of the games.

Again and again, I drilled the children. We will not say one word, I told them. While we are at the carnival, we will sit in the bleachers. We will not move around. We will sit still, together, for however long it takes. We will remain silent.

The big night came, and we filed into the gymnasium. We moved about halfway up into the bleachers, opposite of most of the activity.

Sure enough, Mrs. Eldridge was there. The six of us followed our instructions. We sat side by side. We crossed our arms in front of us.

We maintained silence. We didn’t move. We simply stared at Mrs. Eldridge. It was quite impressive, if I do say so myself.

After about half an hour of this enormous non-violent psychic pressure, Mrs. Eldridge suddenly burst into tears. Sobbing loudly, she picked up her belongings and burst out into the darkness, leaving the school.

Bingo. Mission accomplished. A wrong like that which was done to Ben is never really corrected, but we did send out some mighty powerful vibrations. We won.

And we kept close to our hearts the fact that we could at any time “open up the case” and make it even worse for the Yancey-Eldridge team.

I was proud of us as a family.

A visit to the junior high

The phone call came late in the afternoon, a busy time of day at the newspaper where I worked.

It was Ted Ramsdell, principal of Blackfoot Junior High School. It wasn’t good news. “Your daughter Jaye has been caught smoking on the school grounds,” Ramsdell said. “We need you to come to the school.”

I didn’t like to leave work, but I found someone to substitute for me and went to the school.

In the principal’s office, it soon became apparent what Mr. Ramsdell wanted. He began to berate my daughter. He tried to get me to join him, to berate her as he was doing.

I definitely did not approve of my daughter smoking, but instead of beating up on her verbally as Mr. Ramsdell was doing, I came to her defense. I was her dad, after all.

In spite of the fact that we had been having a truancy problem, the principal suspended Jaye for three days to punish her for the smoking offense.

As he was excusing us, he asked, “Jaye, do you have any questions?”

“Yes I do,” she said. “I would like to know why they built this whole brand-new school, and the only window in the entire building is in the principal’s office.”

Good girl. Chip off the old block, if I do say so myself.

Another daughter, another anecdote

By and by, Mr. Ramsdell got a “promotion” and became principal at Blackfoot High School.

Eventually, he told my cheerleader-daughter Tammy that she could not drive her car to school because she was only a junior, not a senior as school district rules required.

Poor Mr. Ramsdell. Here’s a reconstruction of what Tammy told the principal:

“The car is licensed, registered and insured. The car belongs to me, I have the title. I have a valid Idaho driver’s license. I use the car to go to work after school. I don’t want to hear from you about this issue ever again.”

Good girl. Chip off the old block, if I do say so myself.

Big truck, two drivers

My daughter Monica teamed up early with a young man named Jay Burke.

He was likable enough and seemed harmless compared with what I was seeing out there.

He was a diminutive fellow, weighing perhaps 90 pounds and measuring less than five feet from his boots to his hat. Perhaps this is one reason my daughter found him favorable, as she is diminutive herself.

One morning early, Jay brought Monica to school in his giant lifted Chevrolet four-wheel-drive truck. By chance, I happened to be there, on the scene.

When I saw them, they were sandwiched together under the steering wheel. I couldn’t help it, I had to say, “Does it take two people to drive that truck?”

Unperturbed, Monica replied in one split second. “Well Dad. It is an awfully big truck.”

Good girl. Chip off the old block, if I do say so myself.

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Word of the week: Perturbation. It’s from the Latin, perturbatio. We usually see it in the word “unperturbed,” which means exhibiting a lack of agitation or alarm. My smart remark had left my daughter unperturbed.