GYM SPELLS

I guess I’ll tell it like it is: State employees coming through the prison’s front gates, whether they deal with inmates directly or indirectly, are subjected to harassment. The same rings true for inmates entering my classroom. We’re all just bags of meat walking through a door, or gate, or whatever—take your pick.

Yesterday, while checking attendance, an inmate whispered to me (if you can do such a thing from arms length away) that he would not be able to attend class any longer today because of a physical ailment. Keep in mind: he's a weightlifter (aren't they all?) chisled out of granite. I, in turn, asked him if he had a medical detail excusing himself from class? I know not to pry into an inmate’s private health matters, none of my business, unless I’m spit on or bit. He blurted out, "I have colitis."

Let me reinterpret this for you: The young man did not want to shit behind the half-wall in our school hallway. No privacy there. He wanted to crap back in his unit. And of course, this is based on the assumption that he really had to go at all. He claimed to have forgotten his medical detail back at his "house." (Last week he demanded a cane from healthcare for his ailing back.)

Since he put his business out there, I had to give him an opportunity to "save face." He already started warning his classmates, "Stay out of my video!"

"I’ll tell you what," I said, "if you can spell it, then you can leave."

Unfortunately, he went into a tirade about our student-teacher relationship becoming irreparably harmed due to my callous insinuation regarding the credibility of his health problem. I said, "I’m not questioning your health. I’m not a doctor, I’m a teacher. What I’m questioning is your ability to spell."

"Oh, you got jokes, huh?" he replied. He started mean-mugging me.

I paused, took my time, then continued, "For instance, if you had the flu, you’d probably spell it f-l-e-w."

Not only is physical pain a good way to learn, so is a heightened sense of arousal, i.e. through embarrassment. Remember, our prisons are full of bad spellers.