As he walked toward the Language Arts Department, George felt old. Not in a stiff, sore, achy sort of way—although he knew the spring had been missing from his step for some time now. He felt old as in outdated—like the dinosaur of Warner High. It was no secret that he was the oldest teacher on staff, or that the administration had been encouraging him to retire the last couple of years. But now he was nearly fifty-five, which sounded dangerously close to sixty, and budgets had been cut once again. His principal knew she could save money by hiring a less senior language arts teacher. George had resisted her in the past. But this year, he’d caved.
After a bad bout of flu last winter, George had given in, announcing that this would be his last year to teach. And now, in less than a week, he would be officially retired after more than thirty years. Not that anyone appeared to put much value on experience nowadays . . . or even care that he would soon be gone.
More and more, George had begun to feel invisible at this school, as if each year diminished his presence. Even the students looked right through him at times. Not that it was so unusual for a teacher to be ignored. As an English instructor he was accustomed to his students’ general lack of interest in academia. He tried to impress upon them the need for good writing skills—and sometimes they got it. But thanks to this electronic age, which he detested, there was a complete disregard for spelling and grammar and structure. As hard as he’d tried to make his favorite class—English literature—relevant and appealing, most of his students didn’t know the difference between Chaucer and Shakespeare. Even more, they didn’t care.
He sighed as he clicked the pass-code pad numbers beside his classroom door. He remembered a time when no doors were locked inside of campus. Now everyone had pass-codes for everything. Security cams and uniformed police abounded—so much so that he sometimes felt like he was teaching in a prison. And to be fair, some of his students might be better off in a prison. He flicked on the fluorescent lights then walked through the stale-smelling classroom. Not for the first time, he wished the high windows could open and get fresh air in here. He’d raised this issue before, pointing out how it might actually help to wake the students up. But thanks to budget challenges, no changes had been made.
As George punched the number code into his office door, he remembered what this school had been like back in the dark ages—back when he’d been a student in this very building, back when dinosaurs roamed freely. What a different world that had been. Although the building, which was new and modern back then, hadn’t changed much.
But then some things never changed. Over the years he’d observed that teens from every decade bore striking similarities. Peel back the veneer of current trends and fashions and you’d usually discover a frustrated mix of rebelliousness and insecurity. To be fair, his generation had been no different. He remembered the late seventies well. His class had its share of druggies and dropouts and slackers, yet his peers, even all these years later, felt more real to him than today’s youth. Of course, it was possible that his memory was impaired by his age, but when he looked back he saw an authenticity that he felt was missing from kids nowadays.
Maybe it was because his generation hadn’t been plugged into all these electronic gadgets and devices . . . pads and pods and phones that were attached at the hip of all his students. Even though the school had a policy of no personal electronics during class time, most of the students managed to bend the rules. It really made him feel crazy at times. What happened to connecting with your friends by looking into their faces while conversing? Or using a phone and hearing a real voice on the other end? He didn’t understand these shorthand messages they exchanged, with bad grammar and silly little pictures. And the complaints he got when he explained a letter-writing assignment to his class! You’d think he’d asked them to gouge out their eyeballs—or to destroy their mobile phones.
He’d recently looked out over a classroom only to feel that he was gazing upon a roomful of zombies. It was as if they were all dead inside—just empty shells. He knew he was old-fashioned, but he honestly believed that computer technology had stolen the very souls of this generation. Of course, this had simply confirmed what he knew—it was time to quit.
Melody Carlson is the beloved author of well over two hundred novels. She has been a finalist for or the recipient of many awards, including the Romantic Times Career Achievement Award. She lives in central Oregon.