Drat – they picked names for those new elementary schools without asking me. But if they had, I would’ve chosen these:
BeeGees Elementary. I know, I know, it’s off the beaten path, and they don’t have the same local connections as the prominent and accomplished inpiduals already on the list, but I think the authors of hits like “Jive Talkin’” and “Too Much Heaven” deserve some consideration. Or think of how much history these kids might pick up from a song like “New York Mining Disaster 1941”!
My other big idea is to call one “Where is the” Elementary School, which wouldn’t honor anybody but would be pretty funny. “Where does your child go to school?” “Where is the School.” “That’s what I’m asking.” And the joke would go on and on until the two parents collapsed from fatigue. We could turn an entire school district into an Abbott and Costello routine!
You may be puzzled by these names, and frankly, I’m puzzled too: I thought these kinds of questions were always decided by essay contests! Granted, I’ve been out of the loop lately – I’ve been preparing for my annual performance of “Messiah Soup,” Handel’s famous holiday oratorio performed on vegetables – but in my day almost everything was decided through essay contests. That’s how they weaned guys off of dueling, in fact. It was after an interminable duel in which a guy with poor vision shot at his opponent for hours, not realizing the other guy was in a different county, that the authorities realized dueling laws had to change. From then on, gentlemen would settle affairs of honor by getting out quill and parchment and producing three to five paragraphs on why the opponent was a base coward or a dastardly poltroon.
America won the Cold War in an essay contest, in fact: the Soviet writing committee accidentally wrote “should of” when they meant “should have” but they ended up missing the deadline before they finished correcting the mistake. Three weeks later, the Berlin Wall came down.
It was an efficient way to conduct business, the essay contest, and I’m sorry to see it go. But I’m glad nonetheless that we’re thinking seriously about these school names. I hope we think hard about the schools’ team names as well, if only to spare future generations the emotional torment of my school days. My high school’s team name was, believe it or not, the Trojans.
The other high school in town was home to the Mustangs. People in neighboring areas assumed the names were chosen out of male insecurity; suffice to say it was tough for any of us to get dates.
All I’m saying is, be careful when you choose these names. I’m living proof: when I was a kid I dreamed of accomplishing big things, making a mark, leaving the world better than I found it, so that maybe, one day, I might be fortunate enough to see a school named after me. But that was before I spent many, many long school nights sitting on hard bleachers, chanting “Go Trojans Go!” I’m damaged goods now; nobody’s going to name a school after me. At this point, if I can get my name off the “may not pay by check” list at the convenience mart I’ll consider myself lucky.
