Happy Halloween
Despite being tired and depressed, I'm going to honor a RATYHTL
Halloween tradition. Here's a very, very rough draft of a story I
wrote on the train this morning.
Coach Podestra The Obscure
"OK ladies, let's look alive out there!"
And that's when the boys suddenly stopped in their tacks, exchanged
glances of curiosity, and raised their hands in unison. It was Jeffery
Mullheimer who was the first to speak up after realizing, following a
brief, uncomfortable silence, that Coach Podestra would not be
acknowledging them, either individually or as a group. "Excuse me, but did
you just use 'ladies' as a pejorative?"
Coach Podestra blinked hard, as if he expected upon opening his eyes, to
find the boys once again running about the field. Instead he just blurted
"What?"
Chucky Liddell, who was generally considered by other boys to be the
brightest member of the team, and who, for his combination of brains and
athletic ability had been voted Captain, immediately ascertained that the
sudden breakdown in communication lay in the coach's understanding (or,
more accurately, his lack thereof) of the word "pejorative". "If I may?"
he started and then, hearing no objections, continued, "I think what Jeff
is trying to say is that your earlier comment could easily be misconstrued
as being misogynist." as soon as he'd finished the sentence Chucky inwardly
winced suddenly understanding that the coach would face the same issue with
"misogynist" as he had with "pejorative".
Coach Podestra let loose another "What?" but before Chucky could begin to
explain his explanation, Jeffery, who had mistaken the coach's question as
an exclamation of surprise and denial akin to "A misogynist? Me?", launched
into an embarrassed apology saying, "Of course I'm not accusing you of any
malfeasance: not in the least. All I'm saying is that an outsider might
easily mistake your use of the term 'ladies', which I'm certain was used
affectionately as a sort of…well, to be honest, an incitement of the
athletic abilities of women; which would certainly be ridiculous as we are
playing soccer: a sport in which many women - Mia Hamm being one name that
naturally springs to mind - have excelled."
"I must take umbrage," said the unfortunately named Billy Carter, an
offensive left wing, "not with your argument, which is admittedly well
founded, but with your use of the word 'malfeasance'. While I'm sure that
it was technically a perfect usage of the word, I've always
preferred to apply it to public officials."
"I have the same pet peeve about the use of 'malfeasance' but I think that
Jeff was perfectly justified in his usage of the word. After all, if an
adult who is in a position of authority over a group of four and five-year-old
boys - as Coach Podestra is - propagating reactionary philosophies such as
misogyny doesn't constitute malfeasance, then I'm not sure what does," said
Andy Hartman a defensive wing coming to Jeffery's defense.
As Billy was conceding that both Jeffery and Andy were probably correct and
that in the future he would endeavor to be less of a "Linguistic Tyrant"
Keith Chung, the goalie stepped forward and said "I'm, most likely, making
a mountain out of a molehill but did the usage of the word 'ladies' strike
anyone else as …well, homophobic?"
Several of their boys nodded their heads in concurrence and one, Marty
Shoemaker, said "That's exactly how it struck me! Exactly. Thank you Keith
for having the courage to say what I'm sure many, if not all, of us were
thinking."
Emboldened by this sudden praise, Keith, who was normally a rather reserved
child, elaborated on his original position saying, "And the implicit
homophobia is even more disturbing when you consider that we are all nearly
a decade shy of puberty." Then, anticipating a barrage of objections, the
goalie hurriedly added "No, now I'm by no means suggesting that one's
sexual preference is formed during early adolescence; I'm merely pointing
out a little extra element of irony."
At the last comment the boys began chuckling as a forgotten Coach Podestra
stood in stunned silence watching the conversation gradually evolved into
a discussion of everyone's appreciation of Sylvia Plath's poem "Daddy".
Slowly, Coach Podestra walked back to his car. Something in his life had to
change. He didn't know exactly what but he new that a change had to come
soon or he would spend the rest of his life longing to be as erudite as the
preschoolers whom he attempted to coach at soccer. And so he drove. He
drove long into the night, leaving the radio off so that he could think.
Around ten o'clock at night, Coach Podestra formulated a plan for setting
his life back on the right track. He turned his car around and headed.
Shortly after midnight, Coach Podestra entered his home bearing an
expression of relaxed confidence that was so foreign to his features as to
render him practically unrecognizable. This is most likely why his wife of
thirty-one years, who was laying in bed reading a book about the Ark of the
Covenant, mistook him for an intruder and shot him through his right temple
with a small pistol which she kept on her nightstand, killing him instantly.
Rodney on 10.31.05 @ 08:07 PM EST [link] [No Comments]
