Nervous Nellie on Exam Day...and I'm the Teacher!

I meant to post this last week, but things have been pretty hectic in high school teaching land. The week and days leading up to the AP exam were pretty intense. There were a lot of senior activities that split the kids’ attention—and made it hard for them to focus on (what I think is important…) their AP Literature exam. 

Realistically, is my class the only one they have? Nope, they have 6 others…presumably 3 other core classes and 3 electives—which take varying degrees of time. 

Is my class *that* important? Nope. Family, extracurriculars, volunteering, working, music, sports, social life…I find these things imperatives to a healthy, well-rounded upbringing.

But wait, they signed up to take AP and I signed on to teach AP so that they could have a shot at getting a 3, 4, or 5 on the AP exam (and subsequently exempt a college class) and to be challenged in an academically rigorous and collegiate environment for the year. The exam is the culmination of their efforts.

All the books. (I assigned one a month since December. That was painful.) All the essays. All the Socratic Seminars. All the debates. All the Literature Circles. All the movie tie-ins. All the vocabulary quizzes. All the crazy rants I went off on about critical theory. All the technological assignments that had strict deadlines.  Tons of this was new to them. High school hasn’t been hard for a lot of the kids because they’re smart or the classes are easy. My class has been a big change for them. I’m okay with the fact that I challenged them.

 *      *      *      *

The Friday before the exam, a huge amount of the kids were on the senior trip to Disney. [I was more or less assigned to babysit a couple other classes due to  the lack of substitutes in the building. No big deal—I sent the extra kids into my classroom with a Disney movie on (well, it was Pirates of the Caribbean) and made a round-table arrangement of desks in the hallway. (Sort of the hallway—I have a little mini-entrance that I call the Vocabulary Vestibule because I hang up their comic versions of SAT words out here.)] Any of my AP students were to check in with their electives and then come back to work on AP. We worked on poetry, multiple choice, and applying literary vocabulary. It was groups of 2 to a dozen kids plus me—on a lot of coffee. (I talked re-heeaaaalllllly fast.)

We milked every practice discussion question for what it was worth and we debated the best ways to approach the essays. Kids who had felt nervous about their abilities got praise from their peers (and me) and hopefully took some of the weight of their self-doubt off of their shoulders. We argued about the reasoning for studying old, ancient, dusty poems and the relevance-slash-confusion of modern, new ones. We brainstormed the books we’ve read (mostly from this school year)—Invisible Man, 1984, The Handmaid’s Tale, Jekyll and Hyde, Frankenstein, The Bean Trees, Robinson Crusoe, The Bluest Eye, Great Gatsby, Night, Julius Caesar, A Doll’s House, The Awakening, Their Eyes Were Watching God, The Joy Luck Club…They realized that they have more stuffed in their brains than they think. 

I wished I had a small, laser-like focused AP group every dang day. It was very awesome.

Leading up, every day after school, I worked with kids on whatever they wanted help on. We had a movie afternoon and compared “Children of Men” to 1984. We watched parts of 1984 and scoffed at the movie-making techniques of only a handful of years ago. We watched parts of Wall-E and discussed how this had shades of Bradbury and Orwell. 

College Liberal-arts background: you’ve served me well. 

So, May 9^th was the exam and I went and met the kids in the library before they headed off. It was “Decade Day,” so many of them were in ridiculous outfits and costumes—notably many 1950-60’s Doris-Day looking fancy dresses and heels that, according to the kids, were inspired by The Help. I was in a hippie skirt, along with many of my Flower-Children! They weren’t to take anything with them, so I offered to hold onto cell phones—

I think a picture is worth more than a description here. 

Here’s the strange part to me—I had a large number of kids taking the exam—between 70 and 80. I’ve had plenty of kids taking high-stakes exams—Graduation tests, EOCT’s, 3^rd, 5^th, and 11^th grade Writing Test. I’ve never *felt* anything like this.

I was nervous. 

The whole morning (3+ hours!) I was pacing and just a wreck! I had the butterflies in my stomach and a dry throat—I was just so dang nervous for my babies. I can’t imagine having children and watching them perform on a stage. That must be torture. 

When they started trickling in to collect their (eh-hem) expensive electronic devices, I felt the weight lifting off of my shoulders. For better or for worse, they’d taken their exam. Most of them felt confident about the multiple choice (“You gave us way harder questions than ones that were on there, Miss G.!”), the poetry essay (“I just annotated it, TPCASTT’d it, and wrote everything I could think of!”) and the Free-response essay (“Is it okay that it seemed JUST like the essay I wrote for you about ---- book? The prompt seemed familiar!”). The prose essay was something modern and they didn’t enjoy it, but oh well. Some of them didn’t space their time well and ran out. Oh well. Some of them came in beaming and pleased with themselves…and that’s what makes me happy.

So I made it through a year of teaching AP Literature. Check one more curriculum off the list for me. The kids learned a bunch of stuff. Their writing improved vastly and I greatly desensitized them to their allergy to reading. I’d say it’s been a good year.

Mother's Day 2013

May '08, ASC: 3 generations of education graduate degrees

30 years ago on this Mother’s Day, my mom was only a few days away from giving birth to a second child, her first girl, and the first the granddaughters on both the Thomaston side and Gauthier side. It was the 80’s and they only did the ultrasounds if there were suspected problems, so she didn’t know if she was having a girl or a second son. The story of my birth includes my Grandma Jane coming to my parent’s house, at a rainy, drizzly midnight, where a feverish toddler brother was being read stories while my mom breathed through contractions. My grandmother, all 5 feet of her, admonished my mother and pointedly said to my father, “I can read to Neil for you. I CANNOT have this baby for you. Now go to the hospital.” (I was born at 2:52, and would have been born sooner had the obstetrician even been at the hospital. The nurses slowed my mother’s labor with drugs and instructed her to wait on the pushing bit. Apparently I was ready to head out into this world!)

If you’d asked me ten years ago, “What are your mother’s day plans?” for today, I’d have assumed I’d be celebrating this holiday with my family and own children. I do not have children, with the exception of the many hundreds of children who have passed through my classroom door over the course of the past five years. I often do quite a bit of counseling with my students (from the young ones up to the high schoolers) and I am grateful that I’ve been deemed worthy (by whatever powers that be) to give advice and help my kids see a different point-of-view on the world. Little ones (from teaching Elementary school classrooms) have called me “Mommy” instead of Miss G from time to time, and many hugs with heads buried in my side and arms wrapped around my waist included wistful, “I wish you were my mom”s. Many of my high school kids have fussed at me for not having a baby yet, saying that I’d be a “cool mom” and warning me that my “eggs were frying and I needed to have kids soon.” (Yikes!) 

Several of my high-schoolers have been mothers or mothers-to-be and I’ve had a special bond with those girls, encouraging and enabling them to get the education they deserve in order to be the mom to their babies that their children deserve. I’ve felt humbled when talking with teenagers (usually girls) and pointing out that their moms are scared to lose their little girls—and that this transition point of high school is a clear sign that they won’t have the same role to play with their daughters as when they were younger—and hopefully saying words to these girls that will help smooth out the oft-tangled relationships between teen girls and their moms. 

So am I glad I’m not celebrating Mother’s Day tomorrow with children who are “mine?” No, not really. I’m a little jealous of moms and that relationship that they have as a sustainer of life—it seems to me like a mystical, spiritual chance to be one with God…one that I haven’t had the opportunity to take. Am I happy for the moms out there? Of course. If not for moms out there, I’d not have had the chance to teach, converse with, sing with, make art with, and learn from their children. 

My mama came to my Beethoven concert in April

In another sense, I’ve been so fortunate, lucky, and blessed to have a wonderful mom. My mom has shown me with her dedication to anything she sets her mind to—that life is yours for the taking. She never showered me with gifts, but always experiences— Girl Scouts, church, theater, museums, concerts,  Social Studies fairs; trips around this country and Europe; piano, voice, and oboe lessons. She is thoroughly academic and musical and has always encouraged me through her words and actions that I should strive for excellence. She has been my toughest critic with singing, acting, and music…but she’s also been at every concert and performance humanly possible. One time, in grad school, I was singing with an acapella group and we were singing at a woman’s wedding. My mom crashed the wedding—in order to hear her baby (24-year-old) sing.

 My mom is a teacher—a product of the 1970’s era of Women’s Lib when she knew that she had the opportunity to go to college, but she felt that her only two career options were nurse or teacher. I worked really hard in college to NOT become a teacher, but to accidentally follow in her footsteps anyway. They’re definitely not bad footsteps to follow. She’s been a teacher who’s constantly reinvented herself: she taught Elementary school, then worked while she was pregnant to obtain a Master’s degree and Gifted certification; then after 17 years, she switched to teaching Middle School Language Arts and Science and earned her Specialist’s degree. After 13 years there, it was time for a change again, and she switched to Elementary gifted again—at schools with immigrant populations unlike the golf-course-homes one she’d left years before. 

She’s made her mark, earning Teacher of the Year for her county, helping countless kids earn Social Studies, Writing, and art awards and taken dozens of field trips around the southeast with kids. She started a monthly recognition luncheon for the best citizens in each class—and it’s caught on so that other teachers help bring in deserts to brag about the good kids. She lives her life as true to herself as she can—church-choir singer, sci-fi fan, family caregiver, rescue-dog-mommy, pianist, baker, reader, gardener, and Snoopy collector. 

Some other moms in my life are my grandmothers: my mom’s mom, Grandma Shirley Jane Pepperd Thomaston, and my dad’s mom, Grandma Marilyn Faye Cerasoli Gauthier (see, French and Italian!). I was at my Grandpa Bill’s 80^th birthday celebration this weekend when his sister-in-law (a woman I’ve not seen since I was a toddler), looked at me from a table, sighed, and said, “I see Marilyn in your face.” It made me cry because my mom’s always said that she sees my beautiful Grandma Marilyn’s eyebrows on me—in addition to other features. My grandma Marilyn was stricken with a neuromuscular disease most of my life—so I always knew her to be in her home, surrounded by her books, beads, sewing, crocheting, music, television programs, and Bible. 

There were several summers as a child when we spent a lot of time at their house west of Atlanta, and although she didn’t have the strength to do much of the cooking, she perched on a stool and gave me directions of what to do—to make Italian stuffed shells, salads, desserts, and drinks. She had recipes, but she also cooked by smell and visual presentation. Her dishes, “tablescapes,” and foods were beautiful to look at and wonderful to taste.  I would often call her as I was driving some place and she would fuss for me multi-tasking, but she would listen and sop up every story about my life that I had to tell her. She was an incredible listener, philosopher, and activist. I remember saying to my sister, that I can’t call Grandma Marilyn any more, but at least I can still talk to her—I just have to wait a while for her answer. From the time we were little, we’d give eskimo kisses and say “Bee’s Knees!” and so whenever I hear that I think of her.  I miss her so much.

 '08 Baccalaureate-- mom and grandma Jane love stuff like that.

My grandma Jane was a force to be reckoned with. She grew up traveling across the U.S. by train because her parents divorced (it was unheard of!)…her father was a photographer and her mother a contortionist. She was more or less reared by an Aunt and Grandmother on a farm in Oklahoma. She received a scholarship to Birmingham Southern College and eventually met my Grandpa Matt there. My grandma was the mother of 5 children, a dutiful wife who cooked every night, and an avid reader. But I think more than anything, she was a talker. When people who I’ve met through teaching (she taught for over 30 years in the county where I currently teach) say that I remind them of her because of how I talk and care about people—there’s no higher compliment. She looked out for the teachers, parents, and children in her school and she was a wonderful Grandma.

She traveled with me singing to South Carolina, Chicago, and all over Europe. I lived with her for a time in both high school and college and I thank the stars every day for the opportunity to know her the way that I did—not just as a grandchild who cared for her grandmother, but in a more one-on-one nurturing way. Grandma Jane didn’t know a stranger and she loved to tell entertaining stories. She had one about during World War II about rationing and that it was time for her to get her allowance of shoes and the only mary janes available in her size were RED! The ten year old Janie couldn’t have been more delighted with her luck to be the only girl at her school to have red patent leather shoes. What luck, and what a perspective on the direness of the times. 

Luchsingers concert May 08. She was able to hear the Dec. concert from her new home.

I also learned things about cooking and sewing from my Grandma Jane. To this day, I’d throw away all my vegetarian ideals for her pot roast and cornbread. She grew up with little store-bought food, but since she was on a farm, she knew how to make something to eat out of most anything. She didn’t bake terribly well because she was in much too much of a hurry to read the directions carefully (all that chemistry and stuff). It didn’t stop her from making me a birthday cake a time or two, or calling my mother and asking HER to make the beautifully frosted confections that my mom was excellent at making. Grandma Jane and I had a funny song and dance at IHOP or Cracker Barrel in which I would order whatever food she wanted, and she would get the senior breakfast that I wanted (I always liked the portion better)—in order to save on the bill. We’d wait til the waiter was watching, eye each other’s food and say loudly, “Yours looks better than mine. Shall we trade?” I wonder who was fooled. 

I got my chocolate brown eyes from my Grandma Jane (okay, my dad has brown eyes too) and I’d like to think her fighting spirit and love of seeing places of history all over the world. She and I shared many a marvelous moment traipsing across Europe—and she never got tired of people asking if I was her daughter, and she proudly explaining that I was her granddaughter. A bus driver even commented (to our amusement), “Oh yes, I knew you were related. You have the same nice legs. Sexy.” I learned a phrase from my friend Amber’s mom when she said, “I ran into your grandma and she was telling me about your trip. You know she thinks you hung the moon!” I cherish the things my grandma Jane liked to say…”How often do you get to tour the Red Light District of Amesterdam in the morning and hear your granddaughter singing a Mozart Aria at a cathedral in Germany in the evening?” She lived for soundbites!

These women and others have shown me to live my truth and to stand for what is good, right, beautiful, and musical in the world. Maybe I have one’s eyebrows, one’s legs, one’s brown eyes…but their spirits and good energy are in my heart and soul. Happy Mother’s Day to those ones who I have been so lucky to have the love of in my life.

Mother's Day Lunch 2012- Aunt Janet, Neil, Adrienne, Emily, Mom. We are generally an amiable bunch.

Prom as a 29-year-old, Part 2

 

See my previous post for a more detailed description of my mind's eye memories of prom as a chaperone. Let me know if you want to read the down-and-dirty version of Prom madness on my Teaching Tumblr. :)

My students call me Miss G. My supervisor calls me Miss G. My colleagues call me just G. The kids who are being smartasses call me G-Money or G-Baby. This is a conversation with one of said smartasses.

My date and I were waiting at some tables outside—semi-chaperoning, mainly staying out of the blaring bass and crowds. A few students trickled through to say check out the scenery outside and ended up saying hello as well. 

(To be clear, my students know I’m single. I didn’t promise them I was attending the prom—in fact I mentioned that I probably wouldn’t go unless my guy went.)

One of my smartass boys—he is polite, but sarcastic as all hell (I call him Slim)—did the very suave head nod and commented, “Looking beautiful, Miss G. As expected!” and leaned in for a hug. He whispered in my ear, “I got this, Miss G.” and winked at me. 

My date stood up to shake Slim’s outstretched hand, when he introduced himself, “Hi, I’m Tyler. Ummmmm, Mr. G?” 

*                  *                *

So, yeah, Slim, “You got this.” I’m laughing and shaking my head…because let’s see, no matter how much feminism I’ve shoved down my kids’ throats, I still don’t think I’d ever be feminist enough to have my man take my last name, er, well, last initial.

Signing off...G-baby!

Prom as a 29-year-old, part 1

I mentioned on facebook that my most creative, unique, interesting girl had asked my smartest, most polite, genuine boy to the prom and how adorable of a couple I thought they’d make. (At least for prom. I don’t want any of them ACTUALLY dating until they’re like my age, helloh!)

Well, last weekend was the prom, dun dun dun dunnnnnnnnnnn.  It was a big to-do for the kids with a lot of absenteeism in order to be properly coiffed, manicured, and made-up. There were limos and hotel rooms rented and hundreds into the thousands of dollars spent on the weekend. It was eye-opening to me to see kids who cannot/will not spend $15 on an AP study guide spend so many bones on a mere few hours of “enchantment.” Academic hrrmph.

I’m not sure how many pictures I will post—I will check my camera and update this post—but I tend to keep my students off of my social media for privacy purposes. Trust me when I say that there were beautiful gowns and fancy tuxedos. The bead work, the chiffon, the tulle, the mile-high-heels were something to behold. There was a red carpet and everything for their entrance. 

A few moments: one of my very unique (talk about marching to her own drum) and old-soul students was more or less dressed as Marilyn Monroe. She had the classic halter dress (but it was in red) with the mini-pleats of the skirt and elbow-length white gloves on. She looked breathtaking. 

My super-genius-kid-I’d-hang-out-with-in-real-life boy student (who's obsessed with Soviet Russia, so he rolled my eyes when I introduced him as a Communist) attended prom with another smart friend and their outfits were tastefully coordinated—he in a seafoam team vest and tie with her in an aqua-colored gown. They seemed to move as a group of (nerdy) friends and thoroughly enjoy each other’s company. That was sweet to see.

The deliciously awkward couples? Ah yes, the ones who’d broken up this week or in the past few days, but still had coordinated dresses, tuxes, and corsages..the tension was palpable between some of them. Another awkward thing? Hipster skinny pants with tux jackets. Weird, dudes. It looks weird.

I have a funny one and a sweet story to mention—and I hope it doesn’t violate too much of my date’s privacy to mention this one—but I’ll go with it. My date wasn’t very excited about attending the prom, for, well, obvious reasons. When one doesn’t work with the 17-19 year-old set, who wants to spend a Friday evening with them? He was a good sport and agreed to go and snap any pictures I wanted with “my kids” and listen to all the ridiculous inside stories I had to say about any of my little monsters.

So my date was a little perplexed about what to wear, but I knew he had some dress clothes hanging in his closet—and he (as the kids would say) TURNED UP! in excellent fashion. He wore a beautiful burgundy/purple shirt (it complimented my red party dress!), tailored jacket, black slacks, and suspenders—but not really suspenders—they’re called braces. I’m not so up on my fancy-pants-men’s fashion words to know that—but when the suspenders don’t clip on, but in fact, attach to the loop inside the expensive dress pants—then, they’re called braces. 

I swear there’s a reason I’m saying all that.

So we had basically just arrived at the lobby of the hotel and made our way into the ballroom when the polite, genuine boy found me. He hugged me, complimented me-- told me I looked great and put his hand out to introduce himself to my date. My student is a very charismatic kid, yet he’s also very insightful, so he knew that I wasn’t sure if I was going to prom if my date hadn’t wanted to go.  He was wearing a pretty complicated rented tux to match his date’s black on white gown—so he had the white and black shoes, the stylish black shirt with the white bow tie and vest, and the black jacket with the white silk handkerchief in the pocket. He looked sharp! (And it was probably the fanciest thing he’s ever worn in his life.) It was very mature and very grown up of him to offer the handshake and name first--my date dutifully introduced himself—it was very mature and manly of both of them.

(Granted, my date is an adult who works in a professional field, so handshakes and polite introductions are the norm, for him. The sweet part was how mature and grown-up my little baby 17-year-old in fancy clothes was being. I expected nothing less.)

 

The music was so incredibly loud in the ballroom—so you couldn’t hear anyone unless you were shouting in their ear—and it was also pretty crowded. My student was about ready to walk off and go back to dancing, but then he paused. In this sweet moment of, I can’t even think of a descriptor, naivety, my student (who is a tall, handsome kid in a very fancy tux)—opened his tux jacket, shoved his vest to the side, and pointed at his suspender (brace, eh?) and then pointed to my date’s. It was such an “aww” moment of, “You’re my teacher’s date and I really respect her and want her to be impressed by me, and look, look, man, we have the same thing on!!”

·        Maybe you had to be there. But it was sweet.

·         

·        The other moment was less poignant and more comical—by a lot.

·           

Food Anthropology: Gangman style...Shamrock Shake

So, for those of you who live out of the American collective of fast food establishments...good for you. You're saving your money, your waistline, the environment (from all the superfluous shipping and packaging), etc. etc. I attempt to live a clean-whole-natural-organic lifestyle, but only about 85% of the time. I follow 100 Days of Real Food and I feel venerated in the fight towards label reading and food company transparency.  I love me some Coca-cola. That chilly, flavorful, sparkling HFCS is amazing. When my classes have parties (as I allow/encourage) about once a month, I pile a paper plate full of whatever preservative-laden-food-garbage they brought in: Little Debbies, Hostess cakes, Cheetos, Funions, cookies that probably could make it through the apocalypse-- you get where I'm going with this. My colon and rest of my organs appreciate all the salads and fresh fruit I eat, but some days, man-oh-man, a pile of cheese puffs with that magic orange cheese glitter being washed down by some orange Fanta-- it's the best. Thanks, 'Mrrica. You're doing it RIGHT!

In doing a little internet research (cough, cough Googlesearch), I found that there is a lot of McDonald's "art" with this marketed as a "limited-time only" milkshake. I get the allure of the seasonal products-- it makes you want something because you can't have it. 

Say Shamrock Shake. Now say it in the same voice as the Gangnam Style guy. Hah! Now you've got it stuck in your head too.

Scarcity used to be part of the human condition. For most of the world it still is. Ask any Anthropologist or Historian, and they will tell you that the search for water, game, and food was the majority of why civilizations were created-- to make the scarcity less scarce. To secure food protein-- to provide for future generations. 

The strange part of that is that fast food is, in its very nature, all about immediate, NOT delayed gratification!

So, when the business model of, say, Chickfila leaves us wanting chicken nuggets and special sauce for 24 hours when you can have access to them most other days from 6 am to 10 pm, why does it work? Wendy's sweet potato fries are seasonal, Chick-fil-a peppermint, banana pudding, and peach milkshakes are only around for a bit, and Dairy Queen promotes a certain blizzard (um, how many Pumpkin pie blizzards did we eat from that one in Decatur, Marcus?) during each month. Starbucks has their seasonal drinks and desserts (and pretty poster)-- I get pretty disappointed when I want a slice of that perfectly moist pumpkin loaf and I can only have lemon cake when I'm shopping at Target or Kroger or wherever else a Starbucks has popped up for my convenience. 

Why does this work? I think because it taps into our history as hunter-gatherers. Historically, we can only eat foods that are ripe, and certain foods are only ripe during certain times of the year. We used to only eat foods that were local to us or recently killed in that area (meat-wise). However, with economic demand, the ease of the vast network of global transportation (planes, trains, boats, trucks-- everything a toddler boy wants to have miniatures of in his mom's purse), and human ingenuity-- we can have virtually any food any time. 

This of course, has a massive cost on the Earth. Farmers produce more than the demand is so that unions get paid. Foods are picked unripe, shipped, and gassed to look ripe. Laborers are exploited all over the world. Why? So we can have that immediate gratification. But then there's the human condition of being let down. We want to feel close to the farmers, the land, the people who made our food. It goes against the massive food industry-- but we have these urges to  go with seasonal.

So what did clever marketing teams do? They created that vacuum. You can only have that Pumpkin Pie blizzard around Thanksgiving. (Cuz, duh. Pilgrims wanted low-fat icecream with candy stuck in it that would survive a trip in the cupholder sans lid!) You can only have the Coconut-lime-verbena-sugar-sanded-key-lime-pie-drizzled-frappucino-magic during summer time, because it reminds us of the island vacation we took one time. (Or never took because we're so busy working.) It put a price on our memories-- and allows us to feel like we are tapping into something bigger-- a time that we once had-- and a time when we once COULDN'T have everything we wanted with immediacy.

For those of you who do occasionally (or more frequently; I'm not judging) hit up a Mickey-Dee's drive-thru (or Chick-fil-A, or Wendy's, or Dairy Queen, or TacoHell), you know that late winter and early spring is the only time to get the magically minty Shamrock Shake.

I had NO idea that every time I read the "Shamrock Shake" advertising  (and it makes me hum "Gangnam Style" in the same rhythm...arrgh)...that it has a longer history than the less than 5-year-old McCafe. It is a St. Patrick's Day drink! They invented that Grimace (whatever he is anyway) has a green cousin who demands a different milkshake...and fortunately for you, dear consumer, he gets his way. I mean, he does have a Shilleleagh and a vest with Celtic knots. It seems legit. I don't remember any commercials, but I'd venture a guess that he has a Lucky (from Lucky Charms) Irish accent. 

See, he's real Irish. You can tell from the hat and the fact that he'll do RiverDance soon.

What is this? A styrofoam cup??

I mean, gosh. Who knew this thing had been around for so long? That cup in the bottom picture is still styrofoam! They got rid of those by the mid-90's when all those Tree-huggers got to the McDonald's buyers and made us replace our Styrofoam Big Mac boxes with flimsy waxed paper. 

Crazy!

So, to end this rant...with the idea that started it...I'd been teaching sonnets to my 12th graders. The assignment was to create the 14-line sonnet (the couplets didn't have to be exact) and each line had to have 10 syllables (it didn't have to be exact Iambic pentameter). 

The theme: Something You Love.

I got a delightful variety of subjects-- of course, the romantic love poems (they are 17, so love is very awesome), and the angry, bitter love poems (they are 17, so love is very awful). There were kids who took it a little less emotionally-- and wrote about literal things they love-- some of them poignant-- their love of education and accessing knowledge, their love of video games and the entertainment they bring, their love of certain-branded shoes and the designers who created fashion empires. And then there was the Shamrock Shake. 

The girl who authored it is hilarious and deep. She writes brilliant essays and hangs out with the artsy kids. I don't know if she makes visual art...but she sure can make some verbal art!

 

[And in case you want to know JUST HOW healthy these milkshakes are...here's a link to the official nutrition page. You're welcome. (In case you don't want to read it, there's like a million bazillion calories and stuff. Duh. That's why it tastes good.) ]

So yes. The Shamrock Shake. It has a funny poem now. And I had no idea that it was part of the McDonald's history of marketing and tapping into other cultures. I knew it made me want it...when I can't have it later in the year.