Get your ow
n diary at DiaryLand.com! contact me older entries newest entrydelicate students - 2004-09-28

A reply to Mitten Quotes - 2004-09-12

a letter from Mitten Quotes - 2004-09-09

What is the main thing? - 2004-08-24

A return to my babbling form - 2004-08-21

>

2004-09-12 - 3:15 p.m.

I started writing a reply to Mitten Quotes , and it occurred to me that much of what I was telling him had never been relayed to all of you. So here is my letter to Mitten Quotes.

12 September 2004

My dear Mr. Quotes,

I am pleased that you have discovered the joys of paper mail. I must admit that I am confused as to the utility of such an assignment, as I understand that all mail carriers will soon be called by the President to go to Canada in order to fight our enemies there as a part of the War on Terror. Surely, as good Americans, we should find alternatives to paper mail as a way of supporting our fighting men and women in blue shorts. I am pleased to see that they did not require you to actually write the letter with a pen, but allowed you to use the computer. Surely we should be saving our pens for the mail carriers to use as weapons against the Mounties.

Many years ago, when I was young, before email, and before I became like a cool person, it was considered quite normal for a college freshman to write to his family and friends using paper and stamps. I myself used to do it quite a lot. Sadly though, those were the last heady years of the U.S. Postal service. Email exploded in popularity during my college tenure, and by the close of my formal education no one used stamps for anything legal.

Since I saw you last, I have packed up everything of importance from my hidey-hole at [high school] and moved West to an elementary school in [City, State], where I am the Queen Bee of middle school science, and the apple of my principal's eye. My principal is Mr. Man [Mr. Man being formerly a slacker teacher at my old high school]. Yes, that Mr. Man. In a turn of events which editors would call �improbable� if I were writing a book, Mr. Man became the principal, in July, of a school I decided to join in April. It was all very surreal. The phone call went a bit like this:

Phone: �Ring...Ring...Ring�

Me: �Hello�

Mr. Man: �Hello, Ms. Vocat, this is Mr. Man.�

Me (dumfounded): �Oh, hello�

Mr. M.: �Do you know which Mr. Man this is? From [high school].�

Me (still dumfounded): �Yes, but my caller ID says [Elementary School].�

Mr. M.: �Yes, I'm your new principal.�

Me (utterly gobsmacked): �How did that happen?�

Mr. M.: �I interviewed for the job, and they offered it to me.�

Me: �yes, but how did that happen?�

Mr. M: �I have no idea.�

Naturally I spent the rest of the afternoon calling and e-mailing various people and asking them how it happened, but none of them seemed to know. He is, however, a busy, involved and helpful principal, to the point that I really don't know what to do with myself.

I am sending this letter by post (the old fashioned, and less offensive, name for �snail mail�) in hopes that receiving a letter in return may earn you some extra credit in what sounds like an immensely difficult course. After this, you are welcome to write me at my very own email address. I shall be very much interested in your progress; and I hope you will keep me informed as to your fortunes and those of your hockey team. If teachers had favorites, which they don't, because it's wrong, you would certainly have been one of mine.

Yours sincerely,

Silva Vocat

[email protected]

P.S. Don't let the first name freak you out. Teachers all have them. We need them when we leave the school building.

2 people had questions, comments or compliments

hissandtell - 2004-09-12 20:08:36
Hysterical. Publish this! Love, R xxx
-------------------------------
SilvaVocat - 2004-09-12 21:48:42
Hiss, you're exactly the right kind of critic. But I don't know where I'd publish this sort of nonsense. I do give myself the giggles when I picture American postal carriers wearing their blue shorts and absurd safari hats marching into Canada, pulling pens out of their mail bags to lob at the RCMP.
-------------------------------

Rings

previous - random entry - next

Sign up here to find out what happens next:
email:
Powered by NotifyList.com


powered by SignMyGuestbook.com

about me - read my profile! read other Diar
yLand diaries! recommend my diary to a friend! Get
 your own fun + free diary at DiaryLand.com!