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| i dare you. volume one. | 11.23.2003 | |
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 i remember when we were introduced to the D.A.R.E. program. we were calmly sitting in mrs. mast’s sixth grade reading class. man, remembering the sixth grade is going to make me so nostalgic. anyway, we were just starting our discussion on this story that we had read in class the day before. it was one of those stupid serial-like stories that always says “to be continued...” at the end. when i grow up, i’m going to let six grade teachers around the world know that “to be continued...” stories don’t excite eleven year-olds to read. i remember it always leaving me frustrated and indifferent. like, i just spent hours reading this f[beep]ing story... and there’s no ending. so look, if you’re gonna write a story for kids... learn to put all the stories together in a book with chapters, or don’t bother writing it at all. back to the story, i remember it starting out with a woman standing over a man in a hospital bed. she was crying. her husband had just been gunned down by the mafia or something, and she was watching him flatline. moments later, the doctor walked in and told her he’d “kicked the bucket.” he consoled her for a bit, and then they started hugging. that went on for a while. then, before you knew it, the distressed woman and the doctor had tossed her husband’s dead body down onto the floor, and they started having sex on his hospital bed. i forget the rest, but i remember at one point in the love making, the doctor leaned over and told the woman that he was her long lost brother... it was a stupid story. i didn’t think it was all that believable. of course, maybe if i knew how the story ended... anyway, before we launched into our discussion there was a loud onomatopoeia. BANG. suddenly, a police officer bounded out from inside the closet where mrs. mast keeps the overhead projector. the officer ran across the room to the desk of this quiet girl, gwendolyn pierce. stone-faced, the officer smacked his baton across her desk. gwendolyn froze in terror, raising her arms in front of her. as quick as a whip, he grabbed her wrists and cuffed her. gwendolyn screamed. one of those blood-curdling ones that vocabulary lists tell you about. the officer, while prying open her eyelids, yelled: “are you doing drugs? ARE YOU DOING DRUGS?” gwendolyn was still frozen, white as brand-new white paint. then, get this, gwendolyn starting throwing up! it was so gross. of course, once one person throws up, for whatever reason (which i’m sure boring, advanced medical science can explain), other students started throwing up. now smiling, the officer spoke. “scared y’all, didn’t i?” mrs. mast stood up from behind her desk and started laughing. then, she started clapping, “let’s all give officer quimby a big round of applause!” no one clapped. no one moved. and the partially digested tuna noodle casserole that we had for lunch was really starting to thicken the air. opening the window for some circulation, a still-chuckling mrs. mast informed us that officer quimby would be coming by once a week for the entire school year. he was going to instruct us on the scathing hells of illegal drug use. officer quimby introduced himself, and said that the program was called D.A.R.E. and although he couldn’t remember the actual acronym, he said, “let’s just assume it was something like ‘drugs are really evil.'” this ‘class’ would be substituted once a week in lieu of our reading period. according to officer quimby, doing it during the reading period was important because something like fifty percent of all drug users don’t have a proper reading education. so, by giving up our reading period in favor of these anti-drug instructions by officer quimby... god, i don't know, this is like the ironic equivalent to a triple-negative. i took his word for it then, so i’ll take his word it now. at first, everyone was a little wary... not only of quimby’s D.A.R.E. classes, but also of him as an officer and instructor. i think a lot of it had to do with our somewhat abrasive first meeting with him. however, one day all of that would change. a certain event would revolutionize our relationship with officer quimby. enough, at least, for my high school experience to feel incomplete without him. yes, officer quimby turned into a surrogate officer in each of our hearts following one snide d.a.r.e. out of (none other than) shroeder’s mouth.... to be continued... |
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| 6:31 am | xander said this. | |
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