In honor of the fact that it snowed again in Michigan this morning, I decided to extract an archived
blog post from two winters ago (winter, by the way, sort of ends in
Michigan, and there are some
distinguishing characteristics of other seasons). I was observing my classroom
(a.k.a. I was taking attendance and entering make-up work), and my studious
pupils were absorbed in paragraph writing when—with no forewarning whatsoever—an
eighth grader in the front seat of the second row vomited all over my floor.
Luckily, no one was sitting beside him when he splattered the runny, liquidy
mess. After hurling the revolting chowder, he never raised his head an inch. I wondered
if he was too embarrassed to look up, but what I soon realized was he was too
sick. Again, without any warning, he started retching, only this time I saw it
happen. Out of his mouth jetted a wide stream of slimy sickness. What was on
the floor quadrupled in size—at least. The hoven stream of spew was as round as
his mouth and came shooting out of his throat like it was shot from a fire hose.
The liquescent flow upchucked for a good seven seconds straight. The rancid,
putrid gag sprayed and splashed into a pool the size of a bathtub. Students, to my amazement, scattered
politely. Surprisingly, not a single one of them heaved his or her own
breakfast contents. Finally, the boy, about eight pounds lighter, stumbled awkwardly
out of the room (I wondered why he hadn’t thought of it before), banging into
one desk and bouncing off one wall before escaping through the doorway, leaving
me and his classmates with a puddle of bile large enough to drown in. Four
steps from the door, we all heard round three, the jet-spray of fluid grossness
splashing in the hallway.
The rank, foul smell accosted us all at once. Two windows
flew open, and chilling, sub-freezing, sweet February Michigan air satiated my
classroom. Everyone within fifteen feet of the stench acquired a new territory
to inhabit. I calmly phoned the main office and said something like, “There’s a
puddle of puke on my floor of enormous proportions. I need some help.” I wasn’t
exaggerating. If there wasn’t a gallon of stomach cesspool reeking in my
room…well, then there were two gallons—more
than should have sensibly fit in his stomach. There was a stagnant, fetid lake on my floor.
As we waited for merciful assistance, sweatshirts stretched over
noses and frosty arms embraced tightly to bodies. One girl asked what was
taking so long. I said, “Our custodian isn’t a teleporter. It’ll take a few
minutes to get here.” Needless to say, I focused my astonishing teacher
attributes to the problem at hand. My goal wasn’t to wish the room rid of the squalid
pond of putrescence; it was to get my shivering, nauseated students to finish
that all-important paragraph. Girls were sticking aromatic chapsticks nearly up
their noses and everyone else’s arms and faces had disappeared into loose
garments. Three boys asked for permission to step into the hall, which I
granted on one condition—that they take their work with them to complete, but
as soon as they exited to the hallway, they stepped back in. It smelled worse
out there, but at least the boy wasn’t lying dead in front of the restroom,
ridded of half his body weight.
Probably eight full minutes after my emergency phone call,
who do you think arrived in my room? No, it wasn’t the custodian. He was away
at lunch. It was the principal’s secretary with a broom and one of those
buckets of chemically treated sawdust to soak up the lagoon on my floor. I
tried to find the actual name for the stuff on the internet and the best
options I found were “barfbits…chunderchow…[and] spewsoaker.” If you want to
visualize the bucket she was carrying, picture a three-year-old’s sand pail,
and then divide it by about three. It held roughly enough spewsoaker (that’s
the name I like best), to cover approximately two-square feet of the repulsive,
malodorous loch on my floor. It was the secretary that suggested I escort my
class to the Community Room for the remainder of the hour. Students hastily
flooded out the door (pardon my pun) and gratefully reassembled in the
refrigerated meeting room. Apparently, someone had opened a window in the room
and the glacial Michigan air had managed to freeze it in its exposed position.
Students gathered at tables, unloading their materials, not
even complaining that their newest classroom temperature was fixed at an Antarctical
(I made that word up) freezessence (I made that word up too). At least they
couldn’t smell that horrific barf or see that unsanitary tarn that was infesting
my classroom. We got right to work. Students put pen and pencil to paper and
teacher paraded around the room, my breath escaping in white clouds of glorious
freedom from nasal agony. Before the bell rang to end the class, I had the assignments
in my stiff, frozen fingers, and I sent my students happily on their way.
Why do I tell this story—with only the slightest of
exaggeration? Because writing about gross things is amazingly entertaining and
fun. And choosing awesome synonyms to describe the dreadful experience was more
enjoyable yet. I did it because I had fun writing it, describing it, and
choosing appropriate words for it. I’ve learned the written word can be
engaging, compelling, charming, amusing, gripping, convincing, captivating,
enchanting, hilarious, mesmerizing, riveting, entrancing (I’m giving my
thesaurus a workout), and sickening (like this passage was). But most of all,
it can be wonderfully liberating. I can say things I’ve never said before. And
whether I exaggerate a touch or tell it like it really is, I get to be the one
to say it, knowing that my reader gets to be the one who enjoys it (or feels
queasy). I’ll never forget what happened in my classroom that Friday, but now,
neither will you.
