Grammar School: The End
David was a perfect child. Just ask his mother. “If you have a perfect child,” she once said, “then you have a problem child.” This is when the problem came into sight.
Throughout David's grammar school years, David's classmates were the same classmates in grade after grade, year after year. While there were five first-grade classes during a school term, everyone in the same class moved up to second grade class, and the same classmate from the second grade classes move up to the third grade, and so on. Some might think this system created comfort for the children by having the same classmates. But for David, those same classmates, those same bullies, those same cool kids, those same ”I'm better than you” kids, those same jock kids, those same whatever little group they fell into kids, still came with the same perspective of David, as well as all their classmates, year after year. No growth or change during the summer vacation was recognized. You were put into the same category from the start of kindergarten.
Throughout David's grammar school years, David's classmates were the same classmates in grade after grade, year after year. While there were five first-grade classes during a school term, everyone in the same class moved up to second grade class, and the same classmate from the second grade classes move up to the third grade, and so on. Some might think this system created comfort for the children by having the same classmates. But for David, those same classmates, those same bullies, those same cool kids, those same ”I'm better than you” kids, those same jock kids, those same whatever little group they fell into kids, still came with the same perspective of David, as well as all their classmates, year after year. No growth or change during the summer vacation was recognized. You were put into the same category from the start of kindergarten.
Year after year, David was put into the grouping of the “Slow Group” kids. There may be some truth to that category as David had hearing and speech difficulties. Regardless if there were any improvements, David was labeled for life. His classmates’ image would not amend. This social status created dwindling sense of worth in David. It was shown in his school’s report cards being marked with Cs and Ds, below average to average scores.
The fact that within David was a glow that was ready to ignite into a majestic beacon, yet David’s lack of confidence manifold by his classmate’s status. Tests showed that David's comprehension level was very high, above average of a child his age, but his communication skills were poor. He may not be able to tell you the name of an object, but he knew what it was for.
“We need the black thing that stops the water on you,” David would ask his parents. He was asking for the black umbrella that stood next to the front door.
The fact that within David was a glow that was ready to ignite into a majestic beacon, yet David’s lack of confidence manifold by his classmate’s status. Tests showed that David's comprehension level was very high, above average of a child his age, but his communication skills were poor. He may not be able to tell you the name of an object, but he knew what it was for.
“We need the black thing that stops the water on you,” David would ask his parents. He was asking for the black umbrella that stood next to the front door.
No tests had to tell David what he already knew. To David his low communication skills weren't pitiable; David just wouldn't talk to anyone outside his family. He chose not to talk because not only his classmates, but some of his teachers, would laugh at his mispronunciation of words. Year after year as David grew, he became quieter. If David got anything out of his early schooling, it was self doubt and lack of spirit.
His spirit was so impaired by fifth grade; he was nothing in his life. He saw that his existence was triggering pain into his family. Unlike his two brothers who were outgoing as leaders of their crowd and well liked by many, David thought he was adopted. His two brothers received handfuls of Valentine’s Day cards throughout their school, church, and neighborhood friends, while David would come home with just two cards. One card from his teacher; The other from his classmate, Marcy Paul, who annoyingly told David as she handed him his card, “I didn’t want to give you a card, but my mother made me do this. She said that I have to give a card to everyone in my class.” David’s mother took joy in seeing her sons’ numerous cards. When it came to David sharing his two cards, she wept. David’s spirit didn’t see that lack of Valentine’s Day cards made his mother cry, David’s spirit understood that he made his mother cry. That he made Valentine’s Day heartrendingly painful for his mother.
By fifth grade David shut out his emotions. He stopped feeling the sting of all that his school gave. He had no sensation of his physical body. Turning off his emotions to stop the pain within, his mind also turned off any physical pain caused either by illness or bullies. He was fully numb to the world and himself.
To the outside world, David’s parents saw David being the same quite child. His smile left his face many months ago, but he was still doing what he was told. He didn’t misbehave. For David was a perfect child. Just ask his mother. “If you have a perfect child,” she once said, “then you have a problem child.” It was his mother who received the phone call from the school.
The best way David knew how to communicate was by drawing. His spelling was more substandard than his pronunciation of words. David created a comic strip about a boy who was nothing in life; A boy who no longer felt pain. In his world there was nothingness. It is ironic that his depiction of nothingness was reminiscent of his picture of God he made in Sunday School. David saw God as an unknown image. Drawing with his crayons, he drew black all over his paper. The strip was of a boy who jumps off the roof into nothingness making everyone’s life happier and better.
During the last class of the day, David drew this comic strip. Coincided with finishing his strip as the school bell rang announcing the end of school, David folded the comic strip it in half, open his desk's top and put it in the desk’s well. As he closed the desk's top, he saw in his mind’s eye the placed comic strip in the desk's well, slowly surrounded in darkness, much like a coffin.
It was his mother who received the phone call from the school. She answered the phone that was just off the living room while David’s two brothers were chatting and David just staring out the front window.
“This afternoon we found what looks like may be a suicide note in your son’s desk this afternoon,” the school councilor told David’s mother. David knew what the call was about. Through the reflection in the front window, David saw his mother turning to look at him; Her smiling face slowly fading to tears.
Her phone conversation didn’t last long. When she hung the phone up, she ran to David, held him tight and cried into his shoulder. David’s brother asking, “What’s going on? What happened? What’s wrong?” She only responded with, “I love you, David! I love you!”
She told David’s brothers to leave the room. “What’s going on?” they kept asking as the departed the room. She asked David why he made the drawing that was inside his desk. “Were you going to hurt yourself,” she asked him?
His spirit was so impaired by fifth grade; he was nothing in his life. He saw that his existence was triggering pain into his family. Unlike his two brothers who were outgoing as leaders of their crowd and well liked by many, David thought he was adopted. His two brothers received handfuls of Valentine’s Day cards throughout their school, church, and neighborhood friends, while David would come home with just two cards. One card from his teacher; The other from his classmate, Marcy Paul, who annoyingly told David as she handed him his card, “I didn’t want to give you a card, but my mother made me do this. She said that I have to give a card to everyone in my class.” David’s mother took joy in seeing her sons’ numerous cards. When it came to David sharing his two cards, she wept. David’s spirit didn’t see that lack of Valentine’s Day cards made his mother cry, David’s spirit understood that he made his mother cry. That he made Valentine’s Day heartrendingly painful for his mother.
By fifth grade David shut out his emotions. He stopped feeling the sting of all that his school gave. He had no sensation of his physical body. Turning off his emotions to stop the pain within, his mind also turned off any physical pain caused either by illness or bullies. He was fully numb to the world and himself.
To the outside world, David’s parents saw David being the same quite child. His smile left his face many months ago, but he was still doing what he was told. He didn’t misbehave. For David was a perfect child. Just ask his mother. “If you have a perfect child,” she once said, “then you have a problem child.” It was his mother who received the phone call from the school.
The best way David knew how to communicate was by drawing. His spelling was more substandard than his pronunciation of words. David created a comic strip about a boy who was nothing in life; A boy who no longer felt pain. In his world there was nothingness. It is ironic that his depiction of nothingness was reminiscent of his picture of God he made in Sunday School. David saw God as an unknown image. Drawing with his crayons, he drew black all over his paper. The strip was of a boy who jumps off the roof into nothingness making everyone’s life happier and better.
During the last class of the day, David drew this comic strip. Coincided with finishing his strip as the school bell rang announcing the end of school, David folded the comic strip it in half, open his desk's top and put it in the desk’s well. As he closed the desk's top, he saw in his mind’s eye the placed comic strip in the desk's well, slowly surrounded in darkness, much like a coffin.
It was his mother who received the phone call from the school. She answered the phone that was just off the living room while David’s two brothers were chatting and David just staring out the front window.
“This afternoon we found what looks like may be a suicide note in your son’s desk this afternoon,” the school councilor told David’s mother. David knew what the call was about. Through the reflection in the front window, David saw his mother turning to look at him; Her smiling face slowly fading to tears.
Her phone conversation didn’t last long. When she hung the phone up, she ran to David, held him tight and cried into his shoulder. David’s brother asking, “What’s going on? What happened? What’s wrong?” She only responded with, “I love you, David! I love you!”
She told David’s brothers to leave the room. “What’s going on?” they kept asking as the departed the room. She asked David why he made the drawing that was inside his desk. “Were you going to hurt yourself,” she asked him?
David’s face was blank. Holding back his tears, his eyes moistened.
“Talk to me, David. What made you draw those pictures?”
“She doesn’t know,” he said to himself.
While his mother held him, David recalled in his mind what happen after he left his classroom. How the halls were empty after all the students ran out to enjoy the start of their weekend free from school.
He remember peeking through the glass door of his classroom and seeing his teacher sitting down at her desk after erasing the chalkboard, and going through her desk’s drawers searching for her red ink pen. He reminisce opening the unlock door that all his classmates thought was the janitor’s closet, but he knew was the staircase to the school’s roof.
He recalls the school’s roof covered with small white pebbles. At that point, David realizes he does not remember walking up the staircase to the roof. It doesn’t matter.
He does remember the free fall from the high third floor roof, the sense of feeling nothing to a sense of peace.
He remember how quite it was even though there were cars driving on the front side of the school building.
“Talk to me, David. What made you draw those pictures?”
“She doesn’t know,” he said to himself.
While his mother held him, David recalled in his mind what happen after he left his classroom. How the halls were empty after all the students ran out to enjoy the start of their weekend free from school.
He remember peeking through the glass door of his classroom and seeing his teacher sitting down at her desk after erasing the chalkboard, and going through her desk’s drawers searching for her red ink pen. He reminisce opening the unlock door that all his classmates thought was the janitor’s closet, but he knew was the staircase to the school’s roof.
He recalls the school’s roof covered with small white pebbles. At that point, David realizes he does not remember walking up the staircase to the roof. It doesn’t matter.
He does remember the free fall from the high third floor roof, the sense of feeling nothing to a sense of peace.
He remember how quite it was even though there were cars driving on the front side of the school building.
He remembers in the quietness during the free-of-it-all fall and how it seemed to play out in slow motion. The only sound he heard was the thump of his right shoulder when he hit the pavement, and then the thump of his left side, followed by the air in his lungs rushing out of his body.
He remembered that it seemed as if an hour went by until he realized he was still in the world and his nothingness turned to anger. “I can’t even kill myself right!” went through his mind over and over.
In his mother’s arms, he recalled that the only thing he accomplished was knocking the air out of himself, bruising the right side of his body, and again making his mother cry. David knew that she did not know all that happened that afternoon other than receiving a phone call from the school.
As she held David, he face was blank with wet eyes. He imaged her reaction if she knew everything; What pain it would give her. So he did what he did best: David kept quite. For he had to be the perfect child.
He remembered that it seemed as if an hour went by until he realized he was still in the world and his nothingness turned to anger. “I can’t even kill myself right!” went through his mind over and over.
In his mother’s arms, he recalled that the only thing he accomplished was knocking the air out of himself, bruising the right side of his body, and again making his mother cry. David knew that she did not know all that happened that afternoon other than receiving a phone call from the school.
As she held David, he face was blank with wet eyes. He imaged her reaction if she knew everything; What pain it would give her. So he did what he did best: David kept quite. For he had to be the perfect child.