Recently, I reviewed How to Save a Misfit by Ellen Cassidy, and afterward, we were in touch about getting her on the blog. One of my favorite types of posts that I used to do when I organized and promoted book blog tours was asking the author to chose a short excerpt of a story and annotate it. What were they thinking while they were writing? How did the writing affect the author’s emotions? Here is what Cassidy has shared with us today. Note that her story is in the block quotes, and footnotes are underneath. I added footnotes in this fashion for easier readability online (no scrolling all the way to the bottom).

From Cassidy: This excerpt is from a piece titled, “Saving James,” which won an award and was first published in Writer’s Digest magazine. Later, I included it in my first short story collection, No Place like Home.

The next couple of weeks Walt made it a priority to straighten the main hallway during lunch recess, and the cornucopia of shoes made him wonder what happened to penny loafers and plain old Chuck Taylor basketball sneakers. [1] Every day he’d gather the matches to ones that lit up on the bottom or had superheroes on the sides, and line them against the wall. And every day James [2] was at the metal and wood desk, his neck hanging suspended over his notebook while he scrawled away. Walt snuck glances at the boy with a mixture of anger and pity, and then churning doubt. 

You don’t know anything about kids.

He and Lorraine had no children; repeated miscarriages due to what Walt suspected was his agent orange exposure had seen to that. The closest he’d come to fatherhood was stepping in to help with his two nieces after his brother died, and raising kids was a whole different ball game today.

[1] I based this character off of Clint Eastwood’s role in “Gran Torino,” also named Walt. I have a soft spot for grumpy old widowers, one of whom was my dad, who’d recently lost my mom around this time.

[2] The character “James” comes from a little boy named Jimmy, whose tale of woe I learned one day years ago while listening to my son Danny complain about homework. “At least I don’t have pages and pages that keep me from recess, like Jimmy,” he’d said to me. I grilled him and to my horror he said Jimmy hadn’t been outside since their Halloween party. And it was February. Danny missed playing with him, so I knew he wasn’t exaggerating.

During one Friday afternoon recess, Walt tidied the hallway as usual. He opened a spare locker he kept supplied with disappearing items like tissues and hand sanitizer, straightening the Kleenex boxes. From the corner of his eye, he spotted James taking his regular seat outside the classroom. 

“Miss Tammy is out with the flu,” Mrs. Haig [3] informed James. 

The teacher’s thin hair was pulled back, with wispy bangs that fell forward across glasses too big for her face. She pulled tissue out of the denim pocket on her jumper and honked into it, her  barking voice mercifully muffled.

“Everyone’s getting sick, but our day goes on as scheduled. That means you need to stay on task. [4] No doodling and daydreaming.”  She gestured in Walt’s direction. “And don’t bother Mr. Walt. He has work to do.”

Walt turned. “He’s no bother to me,” he said, with a not-inside voice.

[3] When my now-36-year-old Sean was in first grade, he had a horrible teacher named Mrs. Hoag. She instructed 1^st graders at the same catholic elementary school I taught preschool. Which I guess in hindsight wasn’t a good mix, but then again if most parents could witness what happened during a typical school day they’d be surprised. I’d see Sean sitting in a desk outside his room frequently while I paraded kids past him to the bathroom. Each time I had to stop, of course, and ask why he was out there. He was a very bright kid and never a behavior problem, BUT. He was six in a room full of seven- year-olds. The admins used to (I think still do) push parents to “give kids the gift of time,” by delaying kindergarten a year, and it’s bullshit. What they really want are older kids who will sit in seats, listen to directions, become star athletes because they’re two times the size of their peers, and eventually get higher test scores due to their “advanced” age. The curriculum gets ramped up so that what is expected in kindergarten is actually first grade, and it goes from there. So, when I stopped in the hallway, Sean struggled not to cry and showed me unfinished busywork, AKA worksheets. These mimeographed nightmares of repetition are what lazy teachers used to shovel out by the bucketfuls. Worse yet, later on my classroom paraprofessional was in the break room and overheard Mrs. Hoag whining: “I am so tired of dealing with immature, crying six-year-olds who don’t want to do work!” Let me count the ways this sent me over the edge: the gossiping, the lack of understanding for developmentally appropriate practices, her general lack of warmth and caring necessary for elementary students (she was used to teaching high schoolers), it all had the latent tiger mom in me roaring. One result was that Sean went to a different school, and another came years later. The name “Haig” was born from “Hoag,” when I was formulating this story.

[4] My younger son Danny struggled terribly in school — and though I had somewhat different issues, I did too. Living through it all is definitely reflected in my writing. “Stay on task” and “FOCUS” were lovely buzzwords that became permanent parts of Danny’s vocabulary.

Mrs. Haig looked surprised, as if she didn’t know the invisible help could talk. [5] “Well. Glad to hear it.”

She pecked a finger on James’ notebook like an angry bird, her words punctuated with every jab. “Now, get going. If you’d apply effort and focus, you’d be done by now,” she sniffed haughtily, and Walt pictured the apple-throwing trees from The Wizard of Oz. “Or maybe you don’t mind sitting out here every recess for the rest of the year?” [6]

James shook his head but didn’t speak.

“All right, then,” she said, and strode back to her room.

Walt watched James stare at the eggshell blue wall in front of him, his body swaying, and after a few minutes he laid his head down on the paper and closed his eyes. Walt’s gaze darted to the classroom door, plastered with mocking red hearts.

There’s no love here, schmuck. It’s all for show…[ 7]

[5] I’m fascinated by the unseen and underpaid wheels behind the scenes that help keep our schools (and society) running smoothly. Janitors, secretaries, bus drivers. More often than not, these figures become part of the best memories for kids.

[6] James (Jimmy) was Danny’s friend in fifth grade. And though Jimmy (to my knowledge) didn’t have a Walt, he did have a weasel-y principal who didn’t have the balls to confront a veteran teacher about her outdated and cruel practices. These things are always defended with some nonsense about installing responsibility, consequences of actions, blah, blah, blah. The principal did feel my wrath about the whole deal during a parent teacher conference, but the problem was, Jimmy wasn’t my kid. So, I had to stay in my lane, in other words. THAT did not sit well…

[7] Aside from writing, one of my other passions has been early childhood education. I spent a lot of time in schools, and though most of the staff were caring and devoted, there were too many who should’ve picked other professions. Or retired a long time ago. The worst part now, is that the good ones are being driven out by a terrible system and terrible parenting.

He glanced back at James’ motionless face, and his stomach flipped with nervous dread long forgotten. The kind that meant you were in for a whipping when your father got home.

God help the kid if she came out and found him sleeping. [8]

He closed the locker and slid past James, and with every step down the shiny hallway his anger increased. He hoped the needles in his chest wouldn’t start clawing again, and just as quickly he shuttered the hope. The hell with it. If today he departed the earth, so be it, but he wasn’t going down without saying his piece. [9]

The boy should be looking at a blue sky, not a blue wall.

[8] Over the years, I witnessed lots of kids who just came to school regularly exhausted. Heads on the desks was a mortal sin, of course, but I often wished we could just let them be for fifteen minutes. Always, always, I got the argument that if this was “allowed” the class would immediately be tattling or want to get out of work. The automatic distrust that kids would not let it go if you simply explain to them, “so and so is tired. We will let her get some rest so she/he can feel better.” Wrong. The kids can and do understand.

[9] My hill to die on is advocating for children in a world in which their developmental needs are routinely dismissed. Usually, to make the adult’s life easier or more convenient, or because Tanzania’s test scores are such and such and we need to add twenty minutes to the day and subtract two recesses to not fall behind. No. What we need is to feel uncomfortable enough to take real action, and that’s what Walt does in “Saving James.”

What are your thoughts on Cassidy’s notes? Did any of them strike you as relatable, surprising, etc.?