Ammo Grrrll wishes you a HAPPY VALENTINE’S DAY! She writes:
Here we are, dear readers, it’s Valentine’s Day and if you are here early enough, it may still not be too late to buy your Special Person a dozen red roses, or possibly, a dozen eggs.
For me, Valentine’s Day is fraught with grade school memories of trying to slalom through the steep slopes of disappointment connected with the holiday. In fourth grade, for example, it began inauspiciously with my usually patient mother being deeply and vocally upset with me at learning the evening before that I had volunteered her to make 4 dozen frosted heart-shaped sugar cookies for the next day.
Even Yeutter’s Bakery was already closed for the day but she never in a million years would have stooped so low as to send inferior commercial bakery goods instead of home-made. In the ’50s in Minnesota, it was Simply Not Done. I know Southerners in particular understand.
I had spent the rest of the evening desperately trying to figure out how to change the copy on the Valentine for the Teacher that came in the budget pack of 36 lame Valentines Mama had brought home from our drugstore. I had not yet heard the word, “self-respect,” but I knew deep in my soul that I could not abide sending THAT obsequious card to my teacher and retain any semblance of what I came to learn later was “self-respect.”
The copy was positively effusive and my teacher was a sociopath who hated all children, but loathed me in particular. Me! A tiny 9-year-old girl! Just because she caught me with a Kay Tracy mystery book inside our tall Geography Book which told a preposterous tale about the life of Pimwe the Jungle Boy. (I do not make Pimwe up for comedic value.)
Strike two occurred when Bobby T. forgot his bag lunch at Wednesday Release Time religious instruction and began to cry – a 9 year old boy! – and this hag with a slight drinking problem slurred, “Bobby, why don’t you come up here in front of the whole class so we can ALL see you crying?!” Horrified, I called out, “Don’t worry, Bobby, I will share my lunch with you.”
I spent the rest of that day sitting in the hall by the lockers. (I remember Bobby’s last name, but in case he is still alive, he is probably still dealing with the PTSD from that day. No need to out him.)
But, Miss J’s main complaint about me – I know faithful readers will find this hard to believe – was that I was known to “talk in class” to my bestie in the desk behind me or the odd little boy in front of me. That little boy was so odd that he invited many kids to his birthday party and I was the only one who came. I got a LOT of cake and ice cream. I will never forget that we played one-person charades. Yes, we took turns acting them out for his mother to guess. SHE had written the categories and titles: e.g., Movie. Top Hat. She did very well as I recall.
Anyway, several years later, Mama sent me the local paper with the news that my retired teacher had been drunk and had tried without success to outrun a train. She lost. I am aware that Judaism and Christianity are both quite clear about plotting revenge, cheering for bad things to happen to our enemies, failing to forgive, and so forth. Heck, in the Passover Seder, we even have to take 10 drops of wine from our wineglass to recall and mourn the Ten Plagues visited on the Egyptians, though they seemed fair to me.
So I will stipulate that I will have a blot on my Copybook of Life after I wrote this tribute to Miss J when my standup career took off:
Violets are blue,
Roses are red.
I’m still talking,
And you’re still dead.
Though my short-term memory is mostly gone, my LONG-TERM memory is like The Internet. Forever. What is called Irish Alzheimer’s – you only remember the grudges. I have long recovered from anything that witch did to ME. But I will never forgive what she did to Bobby T.
Also, while I was sitting in the hall, I could hear the laughter of children encouraged to make fun of him. You can learn at an early age whom to steer clear of later in life. I’m willing to bet many of them grew up to be Far Left Democrats, Commies (but I repeat myself), and potential audience members for wretched late-night talk show hosts. (See Max Cossack’s excellent post “Stephen Colbert And The Attempted Murder of Comedy” on Steve Hayward’s Political Questions.)
But to atone for righteous grudge-holding over pointless cruelty, to helpless children, I have decided to send nice Valentines to a few people. It’s the least I can do.
To The Heroic Lone Security Guard at the Department of Education:
He shall not, he shall not be moved.
He shall not, he shall not be moved,
Just like a tree that’s standing by Max Waters,
He shall not be moved.
To Faux Comedienne Kathy Griffin:
You swore no children will you birth
To help sustain the groaning Earth.
Your oath might wow us even more
If you weren’t already 64.
To Bernie Sanders, (Commie)-Vermont:
You’re a loser, a total disgrace as a Jew
But the full extent we never knew.
It must have been your piggy karma
To take THE most from Biggie Pharma.
To all other readers, commenters and lurkers alike, A Very Happy Valentine’s Day. I hope you have a sweetheart – feline, canine, or human – with whom to cuddle. Before sending holiday greetings to friends, PLEASE texters, take the few seconds required to spell out Valentine’s Day. This is neither the time nor the place for laziness! I just received quite a shocking greeting from a friend wishing me “Happy VD.”
