1976. First class

It was the first class that Owen had ever taught as a qualified teacher. He had spent a few years getting a university degree and passing the required training at Teachers’ College. He had no trouble finding employment. He would teach English to High School students.

Discipline was the catch cry. Discipline! Let the students get away with murder and they’ll be murdering the teacher for the rest of the teacher’s career. Be stern – at least for the first week or two. Owen was well prepared. He was nervous, but having thoroughly prepared lessons lessens the unpredictability of the classroom. He would walk into the classroom and announce work! Work! Work! Work! Let the students know from the beginning that he meant business.

Owen strode into the room carry a class set of “King Lear”. After introducing himself, he would hand each student a copy of “King Lear” and say “Turn to page 24”.

The teacher’s desk was on a small rostrum. Owen tripped on the rostrum step, fell, and threw the pile of twenty-two books into the air. The students roared with laughter. Owen himself laughed! After all his preparation and that happened!

The students saw him laugh. Yes! He was a jolly good fellow. He enjoyed his first class. He never had any problem ever with class discipline. Teachers who can laugh rarely do.

1612. Pretty garden flowers

There was nothing wrong with Shelley really. She was simply a goody-goody. She was one of those girls who was always proper and correct and nobody liked very much.

When the teacher gave students the task to write about their favourite thing in the garden, Shelley handed in what she thought to be the most beautiful reflection (complete with coloured-in drawings) of the poppies of Flanders Fields. She even stuck in a poem. Most of the other girls had gone in for something ordinary, like pansies. The boys, except for Gavin, went for potatoes or parsnips. But Shelley! Oh! exclaimed the teacher, what a darling! Oh it’s fabulous, Shelley! You have a wonderful gift! I have a special reward for you!

It was enough to make you sick.

You could tell. Shelley had a crush on the teacher. She was all starry-eyed and thought Mr Cvetkovic was the cat’s pyjamas. Personally, I hated Mr Cvetkovic, especially when after school he’d take me out to the school’s maintenance shed and tell me it was our little secret.

877. The bathroom was cleaned

(This is my attempt to use a phrase in the passive voice! Grammar was never my strong point!)

It’s terrible. There was blood from one end of the bathroom to the other. Rosina’s body was on the floor. The rest of us had gone to the pub for the evening and left Rosina home because she had a chemistry assignment to finish as part of her university papers.

Rosina was a bit of a nerd. She never took part in any of the fun the rest of us students had. We would get most of the academic stuff out of the way by the weekend, so we could party. I admit, there were some recreational drugs, but it was pretty harmless. Rosina had threatened to report us, but she never did.

This weekend we were all at the pub except for Rosina who stayed in the shared student apartment to do her chemistry paper. The body was found when we got home.

Anyway, the bathroom was cleaned. Rosina was put in the chest freezer for a bit until people sobered up.

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530. Shared accommodation

Claudia and her three friends all shared accommodation in a rickety old house that they rented for a song. They were students. Claudia attended the Nanny School. It was a three year course. Her three friends studied various subjects at university.

Between them, they owned a rickety old car. Being young and party-prone, they easily ran out of money, but this time it was serious. They had hardly eaten for a week. Desperate times call for desperate measures. One night, they headed in the car for the hills to a sheep farm. They would capture a sheep in the dark of night and bring it home in the car. Claudia, being of farming stock, was appointed chief butcher.

They captured a sheep. But Claudia was a little loath to use the knife that night. They kept the sheep in the living room for early morning slaughter.

Claudia rose early. Overnight, the sheep had given birth to twin lambs.