Chapter 32 – Forcing a Square Peg

The Vice-Principal had a strikingly Gollum-like appearance, which I suppose could have allowed him some acting opportunities, but that’s a bit off-topic.

I mentioned earlier that everything had a nickname. This includes people. In a coming chapter, I’ll draw some distinct lines between generations that were in close proximity during my early years. Among these generations, sometimes only a few years apart, there were significant differences.

Differences in the way we thought – subsequently in the way we acted.

One of the norms that shifted while I was young was the idea of nicknames. It seemed to me the generation before ours gave everything and everyone a nickname. I’m not talking about shortened names like Dick for Richard or Bob for Robert but descriptive, often belittling nicknames.

This practice seemed to wane in our generation or at least soften into descriptive but neutral, often affirming – sometimes complimentary nicknames, but most were just shortened names for someone’s proper name.

Kathleen was Kathy, Richard was Rich, Miriam was Mimi, and Claire was – well, Claire.

There were a few with unique nicknames like John Fadgen, whom you’ll read about in my cop book, whom we affectionately referred to as Fudge – a twist on his last name. Some of us, for whatever reason, were always called by our full first names – David was always called David, and some were addressed by our entire name – even now, folks from grade school call me by my full name, but few, if any, had a pejorative nickname.

I think what was happening, as detailed in the NOTE ABOUT CLASSMATES chapter, was that these rude nicknames died with us. I went into high school fully briefed by my older brother with the existing nicknames of all of the faculty, but none of these nicknames survived the four years we attended the school. Not because we weren’t clever enough to think of any. We were very creative and clever. The whole nickname thing simply got no traction with us.

I have to think; being called to the vice-principal’s office on day one would rattle most people, but I’m not most people. I was preoccupied by something my brother had said about his appearance.

When I walked into the office and all the while he prattled on about how he was going to push a square peg (me) into a round hole (engineering), all I could think was – Chicklet Teeth.

He had large spaces between each of his teeth. He had a tooth, then a space where there should have been a tooth, then another tooth. This was so pronounced; he was known as Chicklet Teeth.

And while I never heard any of my class use this expression; my older brother referred to him exclusively as Chicklet Teeth. When I first met him, the vice-principal, that is, I found it hard to concentrate on what he said.

My instinct was to laugh, but I knew that would initiate something extremely bad, so I focused. When I focus – people think I’ve zoned out. This is among the AS world, something labeled legendary focus. I can sit and monitor everything going on on a street corner in Manhattan, but when I focus, it’s like a laser.

I was distracted because I was supposed to be taking this whole thing seriously, and all I could focus on was his teeth!

Since my two older brothers, bless their electrical-engineering-math-and-science-award-winning-hearts, had graduated from my high school a few years before me, the vice-principal was familiar with the family and was now helping them with the grand design.

I had looked forward to the first day of high school as I enthusiastically filled out the supplied course request form during the summer with my dream courses of art, music, and foreign languages.

I excitedly shared this with Mom. If I play back the tape now, I see an uneasy look on Mom’s face, a clue I unfortunately missed.

I made the mistake of leaving the request form lying on my desk.

Mom had apparently called to preempt the whole initiative.

In the one-on-one with the vice-principle, he described the course of study I would pursue. He took the liberty of designing it personally, and efficiently crossed out my selections, and squeezed the correct course names between the lines on the original form, saving paper and time.

Why waste anything?

Taking the place of these useless courses were things like physics, chemistry, advanced English, and algebra. I was allowed to keep German, which surprised me, because it didn’t seem to fit, but no other foreign language made the cut.

So began freshman year at The West Philadelphia Catholic High School for Boys. (And only boys.)

In various places around the school were small blue and white pennants with burrs on them.

That’s because our school colors were blue and white.

And –

Our school mascot was a Chestnut tree burr.

No, that’s not a typo.

The names of the streets in the center of Philly were named for trees; a chicken-and-egg scenario where one wasn’t sure which was there first. Walnut Street was lined with Walnut trees, Locust Street with Locust trees; you get the idea.

Our high school was on Chestnut Street, and since ripe chestnuts are contained inside a prickly burr, we were The Burrs.

Other schools were named for cool predators like sea hawks, jaguars, or pirates.

We were named for tree flotsam, which clung to the soles of your shoes.

This led to confusion among us Burrs, but provided rival schools a war cry at sporting events.

At any given sporting event, the opposing teams’ cheerleaders would initiate the chant, “What the hell’s a burr?!” leading us to ponder, “What the hell was a burr?!”

I like to look for the positive side in every situation. The thought occurs; since we were a religious school, and the Burning Bush was a Shittah tree, had the school been on a street lined with Shittah trees, we could have been The Flaming Shitts!

Less bristly than The Burrs at least.

Among ourselves, our family, and in the neighborhood, we referred to the school as West. When asked by other Philadelphians where we went to school we would reply, West Catholic. I never heard anyone use the word Burrs, aside from the cheerleaders, of course.

Among the many places I would have liked to have been a fly on the wall, the meeting where they conceived burr as a mascot still ranks high.