Non-uniform day for ‘Children in Need’ today – and this morning my 14 yr old donned an Iron Maiden t-shirt. The ‘Iron’ element suddenly reminded me of this day in 2013 – and of what he wore to the Infants school for yet another biggie charidee day – Comic Relief. I gave him a quick outline:
I got a phone call from the headteacher of his Infants School during the morning break; “Hello, Mrs Longden, I’ve got 6 unhappy little boys in my office here – after being very badly behaved. And I’m ringing you first, out of all the parents, because I know you’ll understand exactly what I’m saying here...”
As a result of the Am-Dram levels in her voice, I immediately realised what she was up to – hamming it up a bit – for effect. She carried on with; “And I’m sorry to have to tell you that all 6 of them were fighting with each other. They wouldn’t stop – and in the end, the playtime supervisors had to pull them off each other. So, I do hope you’ll support me in my actions, Mrs Longden. I’m confiscating their red noses and locking them in my drawer here.“
I could tell that she was semi-stifling a laugh and so I agreed yeah, yeah we’ll support you in your actions etcetera.
And then I put the phone down and thought …’Well, thank God it was just that. When I heard her voice, I thought he’d gone and bitten another teacher.’
And my second thought was ‘Anyway. What the hell does a school expect from a bunch of 5 year old infant boys – being allowed to attend school, dressed up as superheroes, whilst very probably still high on Coco Pops?’
My son’s take on being reminded of all of this was; “Urgh – yeah. We were only trying to kill each other with our superpowers. Plus, she never gave us our red noses back. How are you ever supposed to trust a teacher after that?”
