How the Bard Almost Did Me In and Then Inspired Me

               How the Bard Almost Did Me In and Then Inspired Me

                Published in Marietta Daily Journal April 23, 2017

            Scary adventures seem to be a constant in my life.  Walking through prison doors to teach convicted murderers, watching my son atop raging bulls, and standing before doctors as a congressional candidate to discuss healthcare are but a few.

            Nothing, however, has ever struck fear in my heart as much as watching Professor Linwood Orange look over my application for student teaching.  All of my college course work was over.  All I needed to finish college and get on with a career was to do three months of student or “practice” teaching.

            But there were four problems.  One, I had to have the signature of the English Department chairman.  Two, the chairman was a Shakespeare scholar, Dr. Orange.  Three, I had made a “D” in his Shakespeare class.  And four, the good professor was staring at my application, saying nothing.

            It was 1966.  English majors at the University of Southern Mississippi called the English Department the House of Orange.  Chairman Orange ruled his domain with a small measure of tyranny.

             After his secretary ushered me back to his inner sanctum, his only words were “Come in, young sir.”  He never asked me to sit down, so I stood nervously.

            Handing him my application, I could only muster, “I need your signature on my student teaching application.”  Bad choice of words.  Mistakenly, I assumed that getting the English chairman’s signature was a formality that would take only a few seconds.

            “So it’s simple as that.  You just need my signature.”

            Before I could mumble any reply, the professor drew from his deep well of quotations penned by the Bard of Avon, William Shakespeare: “Don’t you realize that ‘words without thoughts never to heaven go’?”

            Struggling to process his line borrowed from Shakespeare’s “Hamlet,” I heard Dr. Orange continue: “If there’s an action you need from me, shouldn’t you ask for it correctly?”

            Now he’s staring at me.   And there I stood only by the grace of God and the benevolence of President Lyndon Baines Johnson who had loaned me half the cost of my education.

            I never responded to Dr. Orange’s questions.  He looked back at my application and that’s when the seemingly 5 hours of silence began.  When he reached into his desk drawer and retrieved an old-fashioned, green Ward Grade Book, I knew he was checking to see what my grade was in “Shakespeare’s Tragedies.”

            My mind raced.  What if this man aborts my plans – yea, my dream – to be an English teacher?  More important than a dashed dream, what would I do to make a living?  Let’s see.  Interstate-20 is still unfinished.  The state Department of Transportation would take me back.  There are still three chicken packing plants in my home town.  God in Heaven, please don’t make me have to work at one of those places.  I loved driving the feed, seed, and fertilizer trucks for the Scott County Co-op.  Would they hire me again?

            No, none of that!  I’ll go ahead and enlist even though it means Viet Nam.  Paul and Pete gave their best in the worst fighting against the Nazis.  I’ll follow my brothers’ examples by giving my best to fighting the Communists.  The Army it will be.

             Professor Orange’s next question brought me back to the present, pregnant moment:  “Why did you make a ‘D’ in Shakespeare?”

            “I don’t know.  I read and enjoyed every single play.  And I actually made an ‘A’ in Methods of Teaching English.”

            Unimpressed, the Lord of Orange grew silent, picked up his pen, signed the application, handed it to me without any eye contact, and said. “Sail on!”

            The two words haunted and discouraged me for two years of “junior high” teaching.  The esteemed scholar whose signature and approval I sought didn’t think I was qualified to teach English.  By the time I had paid President Johnson back, I was teaching Shakespeare to high school seniors.  The pleasure was indescribable.  (The Bard will teach himself if teachers handle him right.)

            “What’s past is prologue,” the Bard wrote, granting me encouragement that canceled the discouragement from the House of Orange.

            Discouragement isn’t one of life’s glitches.  It’s one of its features.  It presents us a choice: we can wallow in it or find meaning from it.  Admittedly, I wallowed for two years, but with the help of the Bard and approximately 4000 students who submitted to his study, I have found the Bard to be a great encourager.

            So … “Let me embrace thee, adversity, for thou art the source of wisdom.”

Roger Hines

4/19/17