Today I had the dubious privilege of going on a field trip with the 9th and 10th grades to see a stage version of Of Mice and Men, and at intermission, a kid I'd never spoken to came up to me and asked, "Can I go?" So I said, "To the bathroom? Sure." And he said, "No, to the bus." After a few moments of silent, mutual misunderstanding, he asked a follow-up question to help me out: "It's over, right?"
Now, to be fair, whoever decided that a novel filled with long conversations about loneliness and without a lot of action was a text worthy of adapting for the theatrical entertainment of high school audiences probably doesn't actually know any high schoolers, but come on. Throughout the second half of the play, all I could think was, "Was that kid for real?" Was he so out of it during the first half that he wasn't following the story? Did he not realize that in a play, there's usually a climax and, well, an ending? Did he not hear the theater manager announce that there would be a 10-minute intermission? An even more disconcerting possibility--had he not ever been to a play?
By the time I was 15, I'd been to lots of plays, but today's kids live in a very different world from the world I knew 20 years ago. Today's world is increasingly devoid of cultural savoir faire, and it's a problem. I've noticed this year in particular that people, particularly young people, are becoming much less aware of what is and what isn't acceptable in polite society. For instance, when someone performs on stage in a school assembly or at a theater, like the one we went to today, the polite response at the end of the performance is applause. I can't tell you how many kids I saw today just sitting there. That's rude. Here's another example: if someone says hello to you and asks how you're doing, the polite response is to reciprocate. No one actually cares how you're doing, but if I say, "Hi, how are you?" and you reply, "Fine, thanks" and that's it, well, that's rude.
And that brings me to my #1 pet peeve, worthy of its own slightly tangential paragraph--the use of cell phones in movie theaters or other dark public venues that cost money to enter. Every time some moron takes out his or her cell phone to check those oh-so-important messages while I'm trying to watch the movie that cost me $11.50, I get SO MAD I could kill somebody. Instead, I normally just settle for loudly telling the person to put the phone away. So far, that public admonishment has done the trick. What people don't understand is that no man or woman in a crowded public place is an island. When you flash your ridiculously bright phone in other people's faces, you're being socially insensitive. And that's rude.
Living in today's world of technology and social media certainly makes everyone a little more narcissistic, myself included. I mean, the fact that I'm writing this blog entry in hopes that people will read it and perhaps comment on it proves my point. But living in this world of "hypermagical ultraomnipotence", as E.E. Cummings would call it, shouldn't excuse us from being socially aware, from being polite to other people, or from learning the proper etiquette of going to the theater.
It also shouldn't excuse us from writing in a grammatically correct way, yet another blatant and prevalent breach of culture. The other day one of my former students posted as her status a comment belittling those who correct other people's grammar on facebook. It's a sentiment shared by many young people who should know better but don't. Education is one of the most important gifts we can be given. I strongly believe that if my parents sent me to the best schools they could send me to so that I could learn what my teachers had to teach, then the best way to honor my parents and my teachers is by taking pride in the knowledge I gained from them. I'm an educated person who was taught how to write correctly; why would I toss my education aside simply because I'm posting something on a social media site where grammar "doesn't matter"? When I see my students and former students publicly posting things that make them seem uneducated or ignorant, like any teacher, I am disappointed and disheartened. I am disappointed that these young people don't cherish the educational advantages they've enjoyed and for which their parents have paid upwards of $17,000 a year. And I'm disheartened that the lessons I worked so hard to teach haven't made the impact that my own teachers' lessons made on me.
I suppose it could be a lot worse, though. At today's play, we were seated across the aisle from a group of about 10 bona fide juvenile delinquents, fully decked out in state-issued sweatsuits and heavily "guarded" by 5 or 6 chaperones. Within 10 minutes, they had made so many loud and obscene gestures and comments directed at the actors on stage that they were kicked out of the theater. I felt sad for them in a way but also relieved that my group of kids would never have even thought to do the things those kids did. But then in the second half of the play, when--SPOILER ALERT--Lennie accidentally and tragically snaps Curley's wife's neck, and the majority of the boys in our group cheered with gusto, I was appalled. So yes, things could be a lot worse, but they could also be a lot better.
And that brings me to the point of this blog entry and that is that if I could urge the young people I know to do one thing, it would be for them to strive to be more sophisticated, to not so cavalierly cast aside what they have been taught. If we're going to have any possibility of preserving polite society, we're going to need all the help we can get from those who have not only enjoyed the privileges of a good education but who can also take a few extra seconds to ask someone how he's doing, who can put away their iPhones for 2 hours, or who can remember what to applaud (a performance) and what not to applaud (violence against women).
It might also be a good idea to remember what poet--and my former professor--CK Williams wrote in his poem "The Singing":
"Sometimes it feels even when no one is there that
someone something
is watching and listening
Someone to rectify redo remake this time again though
no one saw nor
heard no one was there."
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