All about the Benjamins

The Horace Chronicles, #6

September 30

Dear Maya,

Today Mr. Smith told a story. I recorded it on my phone (I've been doing this lately; he says it's OK).

"So I want to tell you about two people," he said about halfway through class about the fights between the British and French in the colonies in the 1700s.  "One is an old woman named Silence Dogood. The other is a young kid -- your age, actually -- named Benjamin Franklin."

"You mean the guy on the $100 bill?" Carl asked.

"Right. Except this is when he was a teenager."

"He was never a teenager," Hannah said. "Teenagers hadn't been invented yet."

"Well, you're right about that. Teenagers are only about a hundred years old. Still, Benjamin Franklin was 16 once. So, for that matter, was I."

"You were not." (It is a little hard to picture, Maya.)

Liz raised her hand. Mr. Smith nodded. "What was the old woman's name again?"

"Silence Dogood."

"That doesn't sound like a real name."

"You're right, Liz: it isn't. Actually, the old woman based her name on two books by a famous preacher named Cotton Mather, who was a real big shot in colonial Boston. One was called "Silentarius.' The other was called 'Essays to Do Good."

"So what does she have to do with Benjamin Franklin?" Carl asked.

"Well, I should start by saying that Benjamin Franklin came from a large family. And he was among the youngest. So his father didn't have a lot of money to pay for his schooling. So he apprenticed the boy to his oldest brother James, who was a printer. Anybody remember how the apprentice thing worked?"

Evan Thompson, who switched into the class after the first week, raised his hand. "That's when you worked for someone for seven years and learned a job."

"Right. So Benjamin Franklin was working for his brother. James Franklin published a newspaper called The New England Courant. The Courant was really the first independent newspaper in the colonies, which is to day that it practiced freedom of the press. Which meant it sometimes criticized the colonies authorities. One of whom was the Reverend Cotton Mather." Mr. Smith paused to drink some coffee. He looked around the room. We were with him -- partly because he did that. It created a little suspense.

"Cotton Mather, for example, had a crazy idea. He thought -- get this -- that you could prevent a dangerous disease like smallpox, which once killed millions of people, by actually infecting them with a mild form of it, but sticking the germs into a cut. That you could, to use a technical term, 'inoculate' them."

"Crazy man, crazy," Carl said. He was really into it today. Maybe he got some extra sleep or had a good breakfast or something.

"Well, James Franklin said it was crazy. He also said that colonial authorities were too lax in going after pirates. Which landed his ass in jail."

"Pirates?" This from Deana.

"Yes, pirates. They were common in those days. French, Spanish, even the English did it. Lots of money to be made by raiding ships of rival nations. And there were lots of ships going in and out of Boston. It was the largest port in North America at the time."

"The seniors are going to have Pirate Day next week."

Mr. Smith ignored this. "James Franklin wasn't in jail long. And it didn't stop him from tweaking the Boston authorities. So he was pleased when he began getting a series of articles slipped under his door by this old woman, Silence Dogood. She made fun of Harvard students, local ministers, and the like. She was a widow who made clear she wouldn't mind getting married again. She even got some marriage offers."

"Did she get married again?" Hannah asked.

"No."

"Why not? Was she good-looking?"

"No."

Hannah squinted. "How do you know?"

"Well, actually, I kind of do know," he answered. "Good-looking, yes, I think so. But not a she. Silence Dogood was not actually an old woman. She was an adolescent boy named Benjamin Franklin."

I think Mr. Smith expected a laugh or some sense of surprise. But we didn't say anything.

"Young Franklin had written the pieces anonymously. And there were very popular. So his brother was upset when they stopped coming. But when he found it it was his kid brother, he got mad. So Ben ran away. To the new and rapidly growing city of Philadelphia." Another sip of coffee and a glance at the clock. Class was almost over; Dave was moving stuff around on his desk. 

"So what do you make of this guy?"

"He was smart," Carl said. "Funny."

"Does he seem like the guy on the $100 bill?"

"Not really. So what happened next?"

"What do you think happened?"

"I dunno. He wrote the Declaration of Independence?"

"No. That was mostly Thomas Jefferson. Besides, it's 1723, and that's over fifty years away."

"Wow. He was old."

"By then, yes. But Franklin did a lot before that. We'll talk more about it tomorrow."

So there you have it Maya, Ben Franklin, teenager. He was probably too cool for the likes of us. But I like hm anyway. 

         

      

One messed-up poem

 

 

The Horace Chronicles, #5

September 22

Dear Maya,

For the past couple days we’d been learning about slavery. Mr. Smith had us read about stuff like the Triangular Trade. He explained how slavery was different in North America than it was in South America (apparently North American slaves had it a little better because the weather was better and they got more food – if they managed to survive the trip over). He explained that things in the English colonies got worse for slaves around 1700 than they’d been in 1600 because the slave owners were getting nervous about poorer white people and thought they might keep them from getting too mad by making them feel at least they weren’t black. That whole Bacon's Rebellion thing which I mentioned in my paper. I found this stuff interesting. But I think Carl was getting bored, and some other kids were too. Yesterday I saw more kids staring out the window than I’d ever seen in this class. Almost as bad as English, where we were trudging through The Tempest. I think the idea was to have the English and History doing similar stuff, but it just wasn't working. Ms. Guzman went so slow. I also hated reading the play online, but I wasn't going to pay $5 for it, and I definitely wasn't going to ask my dad.

So I was a little surprised when Mr. Smith called up some poetry on the Smart Board. “OK, kids,” he said, putting down a mug of steaming coffee. “Today I have something for us to read. As you can see, it’s a poem by Phillis Wheatley—’’

“—her name is spelled wrong,” Hannah said. “My great aunt’s name is Phyllis. Shouldn’t this one have a Y in it?”

“She was named after the slave ship that brought her to America.”

“Well it’s still spelled wrong.”

“People were less fussy about spelling in those days,” Mr. Smith said. He picked up his coffee again. Reminds me of a hundred years later, when Andrew Jackson, who some people thought was illiterate, said he couldn’t respect a man who knew only one way to spell a word.” Mr. Smith sipped his coffee. I think he expected people to laugh, but no one did.

He put the mug back down. “Anyway, Wheatley was a slave—’’

“—Can I go to the bathroom?”

“Yes, Deana. As I was saying—“

“—Can I go too?”

“When Deana gets back. Wheatley was a slave—“

“Wait: a poet who was a slave?” This from Danny Kaiser.

I thought Mr. Smith would be mad to be interrupted again. Instead, he smiled. “You got a problem with that, Danny?”

“No. I mean, it’s just . . . it’s just a little weird. I thought slaves did like hard labor.”

“You thought right. As we’ll see, if we can ever get to the poem, that this Phillis Wheatley, no 'y,' was a pretty unusual woman. She was born in West Africa some time around 1730, and came to Boston. She wrote this poem around 1750 when she was about 20 years old. But let’s put aside the details for a moment. What you see here is the whole poem. Who wants to read it?”

Liz Ling’s hand shot up. “All right, Liz,” Mr. Smith said, “go at it.”  I shot a look at Jasmin Randall, who is black. I wondered what she was going to make of this. Her face was blank, looking at the board. Lisa read:

'Twas mercy brought me from my Pagan land,

Taught my benighted soul to understand

That there's a God, that there's a Saviour too:

Once I redemption neither sought nor knew.

Some view our sable race with scornful eye,

"Their colour is a diabolic die."

Remember, Christians, Negros, black as Cain,

May be refin'd, and join th' angelic train.

“That is one messed-up poem,” Danny said.

“How’s that, Danny?”

“She’s saying she’s glad to be a slave!

“Where does she say that?” asked Mr. Smith, reaching for his mug again. He didn’t look at Danny when he asked, which I think made the question seem less in-your-face

“She’s saying it was mercy that brought her here! It’s like she’s been brainwashed or something.

Mr. Smith put the mug down. Deana came in. Michaela went out. “We all agree then? The poet is a messed up, brainwashed slave?”

Silence. I kinda thought Danny was right, even as I suspected he was somehow wrong. Jasmin's face was blank. 

“Maybe she’s been brainwashed by Jesus.” It was Hannah. She always seemed to be the one to break the silence, as much out of impatience as anything else.

“What do you mean?” Mr. Smith asked in that even way of his. “How does Jesus figure into it?”

“Well, she says ‘there’s a God and a Saviour too,’ doesn’t she?”

“Yes she does. You think she’s wrong, Hannah?”

“How do I know?”

“Well, how does anybody? She apparently believes that Jesus Christ is her Saviour. Do you?”

“Well, if you’re into that kind of thing, I guess. It depends.”

“Depends on what?”

“Whether you believe in God or whatever.”

“What I’m asking is whether you do.”

“You’re asking me?”

“Yes, Hannah. I’m asking you.”

Hannah seemed confused and annoyed. “I don’t know,” she said. It’s clear she wanted Mr. Smith to stop. I wondered if he would. But then Danny came to her rescue.

“I don’t,” he said. “I’m Jewish. But I don’t really believe in God, either.”

“Well that makes sense, then.”

“What do you mean?” It was Carl. I guess he had decided to follow the conversation. He seemed a little suspicious of what Mr. Smith was saying about Danny.

“If you don’t believe in God or Jesus, then hearing someone say she became a slave was a blessing wouldn’t make a whole lot of sense. Of course, one of the things she’s saying here is that she was once just like Danny. She didn’t believe, either. But now that she does, she’s experienced a ‘redemption’ she neither sought nor knew. What does ‘redemption’ mean?”

“Like in bottles?” It was Deana. I wondered if that was a serious answer, and whether she was thinking of the bottle-cap thing Mr. Smith did on the first day of school, which seemed like a long time ago already.

“Kind of," he said. "What happens when you redeem a bottle at the supermarket?”

“You get a nickel back,” she said. 

“Right. You get paid back. You think the narrator of this poem is being paid back?”

“Yeah, I guess.”

“With a nickel?”

“No,” Carl said, taking over for Deana. “With heaven.”

“So she believes and she goes to heaven. Belief is a good investment.”

“Yeah, something like that.”

“Hmmm,” Mr. Smith said, stealing a sip of coffee. “What would the Puritans say about that?”

Liz raised her hand. Mr. Smith nodded.

“They’d say she’s wrong. You’re not supposed to try and get to heaven by believing.”

“Is that what she’s doing, Liz?”

Lisa paused. You could see her thinking. “I guess not. It sort of happened to her. She said she wasn’t looking for it. It just happened.”

“Right. The grace was irresistibly conferred on her, just like the Puritans said it should be. Actually, they said it had to be that way: faith is a gift you receive, not something you just go ahead and take, or decide to go after, for that matter. After all, you can’t make yourself love somebody. It’s something that happens to you. Who knows: maybe faith will be irresistibly conferred on Danny someday.”

“Yeah, right.” But Danny was talking to himself. Mr. Smith had turned his back and was walking back to the Smart Board. He stood next to the poem. “Let me ask you something else,” he said. “Who is this poem addressing? Who is she trying to reach?”

Silence. Mr. Smith offered an answer: “Other slaves?”

“No,” Carl said. “They can’t read.”

“Right. So who, then?”

More silence. I decided to say something. “Well, she says ‘Remember, Christians.’”

“Right. Read that line again, Theo.”

“Remember, Christians, Negros, black as Cain/May be refin'd, and join th' angelic train.”

“What is she saying?”

“She’s saying that Christians should remember that black people can get to heaven too.”

“But are black people Christians?”

“Yes.”

“Really? Even though they’re ‘diabolic,’ which is to say from the devil?”

“Sure.”

“Sure, Theo? Is it really that obvious?”

“To me it is.” Was Jasmin looking at me? I was afraid to check.
 
“How nice for you.” (That felt like a slap, Maya.) “But what about the people she’s talking to?”

“I guess not.”

“No, it wasn’t obvious. But here’s one other complication. She says Negroes are just like Cain. Who was Cain?”

“I learned about him in Hebrew school,” Danny jumped in. He’s the guy who killed Abel.

“Right. And God condemned him to exile. Just like slaves are in exile in America. Because Cain was a sinner. Like we’re all sinners. Black people and white people alike.” Mr. Smith scanned the room. Then he looked up at the clock.

“One last thing. The poet describes her race as ‘sable.’ Anybody know what ‘sable’ means?”

“My grandfather drives one,” Deana said. “A Mercury Sable. He keeps it very clean.”

“What color is it?” Mr. Smith asks.

“Red."

 “Damn.” Mr. Smith smiled. “ ‘Sable actually means black. It’s a kind of animal with black fur. The fur trade, as you may remember from last week, was a big business in the colonies. So ‘sable’ is a byword for quality, almost a brand like Apple. So she’s describing her fellow people as valuable, which of course they were from an economic standpoint in the slave trade. Do you think that’s what she means?”

Again, no answer. But I think we all understood the answer was no.

“Maybe Danny is right: she really was brainwashed. But whether or not she was, I hope you can also see she was pretty sharp. I hope you agree that there’s a lot going on here, more than we can really get at. Tonight’s homework is on the web page. See you tomorrow.”

It was a good class, Maya. But the thing I kept thinking about was something Mr. Smith said in passing: “You can’t make yourself love somebody. It’s something that happens to you.” Is that all there is to say? Is it really that simple? Not to get carried away, but that seems like another form of slavery. Maybe I should rebel. But I just don’t want to.

Pouring

 

  

The Horace Chronicles, #3

in which we see a teacher make an opening move

September 5

Dear Maya,

The first day of school was really long, because it was really hot. By the end of first period I could feel the sweat trickle down the back of the new Beatles vintage Abbey Road t-shirt my mother got me at Target. Mr. Alfonsin took mercy on us for gym, saying it was too humid to try and do much, and let those of us who wanted to throw a basketball around. At lunch Janito and I grabbed a piece of pizza and went outside to the upper field, where a breeze was beginning to blow. By eighth period some really thick clouds began to roll in and you could hear the rumble of thunder in the distance. When I went into room H-234 for Mr. Smith’s class big wet drops began sneaking in under the open windows. Storms like this usually came later in the day. 

When I got there a couple kids had already arrived, and Mr. Smith was sitting at his desk. He had He had on light brown pants, and a green shirt. His gray hair covered his head, but it was also kind of thin, like a halo rising off it. There was a bottle of water on the desk, a stack of textbooks, and a book he was reading really intently. It was battered and thick and had Post-It notes coming out the sides. I staked out my usual position on the near the front of the room but on the side, close enough to feel those drops.

This was my first time in H-234, which was known as Mr. Smith’s room. There was a lot of stuff tacked to the walls – a yellowed front page from the day after Obama got elected; a picture of Central Park in the snow; postcards from all over the United States. There was also a map of the North America in 1733, a poster of Silence of the Lambs, and another from Gone with the Wind, which surprised me because I thought that was a movie about how great slavery was. There were also lots of index cards with words on them that I couldn’t read from where I was sitting. I’d have a look at them later.

“Fifty two minutes and counting.” It was Carl Shamsky, whose books landed with a thud as he sat down next to me. I saw one of them was American Pageant, a book I was supposed to order online and forgot to. Shit. I saw a lot of kids already had it. And my Dad would be pissed. “How’s it hangin,’ Theo?”

“Hey Carl.” I never much liked Carl, Maya, but I can’t quite figure out why. Something about the way he always seems to want your attention. But I don’t know if that’s fair. Particularly since I was probably going to need to borrow his book. 

“Hey, isn’t Janito supposed to be in this class?” he asked.

“No, he had to switch into Clark because of the jazz band.”

“Oh, that sucks. My sister had Clark. I had Dyson. She was OK. So was Bergmann. Of course anybody is better than Pavlak. I had him for earth science and he was unbelievably . . .”

I tuned Carl out and surveyed the rest of the room. A few faces I recognized, but nobody I’d really consider a friend. Alan Greenberg was there in back, sitting next to Derek Thompson. They looked hot, tired, and wishing they were anywhere else. I also saw Deana Michaelis, Hannah Wise and Lee Agnelli – the Mean Girls of Hudson High – giggling over something, probably making fun of someone. Probably me. On the other side of the room was a girl I knew from English last year, Liz Ling. She said some interesting things in class, but I never talked with her outside class. You’d probably like her, Maya.

Just then a big flash of lightning lit up the sky outside. The Mean Girls shrieked – you could tell they just liked the sound of their own voices. I’m not sure whether it was the light or the noise that led Mr. Smith to look up from his book and look up at the clock at the wall behind me (I always sit with it behind me, Maya – I can’t stand watching it crawl.) He closed the book and stood up, taking us in. Just then a big crack of thunder led the Mean Girls to go off again. Mr. Smith pursed his lips waiting for both to pass without comment. I thought that was interesting, but I wondered it the girls would take it as weakness.

“Hi kids,” he said quietly, walking around to the front of his desk, folding his arms, and waiting for the chatter to subside, as it did. He used his head to gesture the board behind him. “I’m Horace Smith. Welcome to 11^th grade AP U.S. History. As you know, we have a test coming up at the end of the year, and we’re going to have to keep a good pace. In order for that to happen, I’m going to depend on you to do the reading, which we’ll talk about in class. One thing I’m going to avoid doing, as much as I can, is simply reviewing what’s in the book. That will bore the hell out of me, and, more important, that will bore the hell out of you.”

Can you remember a teacher using the word “hell” in class, Maya?

“Truth is,” he said, "we have a limited amount of maneuver here. I have a job to do, which is getting you ready for that test, and your job is to prepare for it too. Actually, I suppose you have multiple jobs to do – this course is one of many you’re taking, and you’ve got whatever else you might have going on. The team, the play, whatever. To some extent, our interests overlap – we both want you to do well – and to some degree they don’t. I’m probably going to want more work out of you than you feel is necessary, and at least some of you will figure out loopholes. I, for my part, am not supposed to give every one of you an A, so you’re not only competing against each other but against my professional standards and my memory of the kids who have come before you.”

I stole a glance around the room. Everybody was paying attention, even the Mean Girls. I don’t think they were used to be talked to this way. I bit my lip to hold back a smile I feared would turn into a laugh.

“Anyway.” He dropped his arms to his sides. “I know it’s hot – the rain should help, but I know you’re all tired. Your homework tonight is Chapter One, the whole thing. I figure you’ve had the whole summer off and might as well jump right in.” He looked a little awkward, even apologetic, his hands on his calves. Then, suddenly, he tapped them. “Just one thing I want to go over before I let you go.”

He turned, a little abruptly, and sat again at his desk. He reached over and grabbed his bottle of water. This was the first time he was drinking it – I could hear the cap click.

“I have here an authentic bottle of Poland Spring water,” he said, which sounded a little funny. “You see this?” He held up the cap. “This is one of the new ecologically correct caps that uses less plastic than the old ones. After school today I’m going to take this cap home and add it to my bottle cap collection.”

He paused, his eyes scanning the room for a reaction. Carl’s eyes were furrowed in a what-the-fuck kind of look.

“Tell me,” Mr. Smith said, looking down at a piece of paper that I guess what his class list. I think he forgot to take attendance. I saw him silently count the students in the room, make an annotation and look up again. “Deana Michaelis. Where are you?”

“Here?” I turned around to see Deana look startled, then frightened – why was Mr. Smith calling on her? “Tell me, Deana: where you keep your bottle cap collection?”

“My bottle cap collection?”

“Yeah,” Mr. Smith responded, with a touch of impatience. “Your bottle cap collection.” He stood up and started walking toward her.

“I don’t know what you mean.” Deana would have been angry if she wasn’t so scared.

“You don’t know what a bottle cap collection is?”

“No?”

He shifted his gaze. “You: what’s your name?”

“Hannah?”

“You sound about as confident as your pal Deana, Hannah. Want to check and make sure that’s your name?” A few people laughed. I did too, but felt a little guilty. It wasn’t really fair for a teacher to make fun of students like this. 

“Well, Hannah, or whatever your name is. Where do you keep your bottle cap collection? At your beside table, maybe?”

Hannah seemed to decide, without being entirely sure, that this whole thing was a joke. “Um, like, I don’t have a bottle cap collection.”

Mr. Smith looked stunned. “Wait a second,” he said, staring at her, sounding amazed but not entirely serious. “You’re telling me you don’t have a bottle collection?”

Hannah had her confidence back (I was kind of sorry). “Yeah, that’s right. Don’t have one.”

“Wow.” Mr. Smith seemed stunned, unsure what to say or do. Then he turned around suddenly. “What about you?” he said to Carl. “Surely you have a bottle cap collection.”

“Nope.”

“You?” He was looking at me. And, really, Maya, I don’t know where my answer came from. “I sold it on eBay,” I said.

“Whoa,” Mr. Smith said. “Harsh!” But his eyes were dancing.  I don’t think I’ve ever been happier about a teacher being happy with me. “Well, tell me something son,” he said. “What’s your name?" 

“I’m Theo.”

“Tell me this, Theo. Did your bottle cap collection have one of these eco-friendly Poland Spring caps?”

“Yeah, it did.”

“And one of the older, full size caps?”

“Yes.”

“Any flip tops, like from Dr. Pepper or Pepsico products?”

“Of course.” I was getting into this.

“Yeah, well, my bottle cap collection has one of the old, full-pull off caps from a 1981 can of Budweiser. Don’t even try to tell me you have one of those. And I wouldn’t sell it for a million bucks.”

I didn’t know what to say about that. I did wonder later, though, if tabs were the same thing as caps.

“And what about you?” he asked Dave Trask, who probably smoked a joint at lunch. “Nah, man,” he replied. Don’t save bottle caps. I throw them in the trash.”

“In the trash? You throw them away?”

“Yeah.” Dave wasn’t looking at Mr. Smith. He didn’t seem to know, or care, if Mr. Smith was kidding.

“Don’t you know anything about history?”

Dave looked away, as if he was being hassled, which I guess he was. Mr. Smith walked to his desk and sat down again. There was a long silence. I thought this would bother him. I know I was getting restless.

“What does any of this have to do with history?” Hannah finally asked. I don’t know if she meant to sound jokey/annoyed, but she sounded more mad than funny. “I thought this was AP U.S. history. Why are we talking about bottle caps?”

“Well, now, Hannah, I’m glad you asked. You wonder what bottle caps have to do with history. If we’re going to talk about history what to you think we should talk about?” “I dunno. Books, maybe?" 

Mr. Smith didn’t take the bait. “Well, sure. You got one of those. Your homework tonight is reading from a book. I've got a couple extra if any hasn't got one yet. Anything else?”

“I dunno. Like documents?”

“Yes. Documents. Definitely. We’ll be talking about those. But let me ask you something. What if those documents aren’t in English?”

“You could, like, translate them.”

“Yes, though my Spanish isn’t that good. What if they’re in French? Or Chinese?”

Hannah shrugged.

“Or what if they’re in an ancient language that nobody actually speaks any longer? And what if those documents got lost in a fire, or got water damaged, or got used as toilet paper by invading armies?”

“That’s gross,” Deana said.

“Well, maybe. But what then?”

Liz Ling raised her hand. She was actually the first person in the class to do that. “And who are you?” Mr. Smith asked.

“I’m Elizabeth. You could look at their buildings. Or their artwork. You could learn about history that way.”

Mr. Smith nodded. “Yes, Elizabeth, that’s a very good answer. That’s exactly what a lot of historians do.” He paused. “But unfortunately lots of buildings and artwork also perish in fires or end up buried under water. So what do we do then?”

Liz didn’t try to answer that one. Neither did anyone else. Another long pause. This time Mr. Smith broke the silence.

“You over there. What’s your name?”

“Dave.” He answered as if he felt some sacred rule was once again being broken: You just don’t call on people if they don't raise their hand. “I said I don’t know.”

“Oh, but you do know, Dave. Don’t you remember?”

“Remember what?”

“Trash.”

“Trash?”

“Yes. Trash. That’s what you said you did with your bottle caps. And that’s exactly how some people – they tend to be anthropologists more than historians, but it’s the same idea – learn about what happened in the past. They look through the trash. They figure out what had or hadn’t happened by looking through piles they discovered of what people had thrown away. They figure out when a pile got there by looking at how wide or narrow the pipe stems were that people had used up or that had gotten broken, for example. Pipe stems vary in size. Like the length of girls’ skirts. Sort of a fashion thing. Actually, sometimes what other people thought of as trash we think of as artwork. And vice-versa. Like bottle caps. I think of them as treasure. But Dave here throws them away.” He paused. “And Theo over there, crassly tries to make a buck. Heartless bastard.”

Everybody laughed, even Dave, sort of. I did, too.

Mr. Smith stood up again. “In tonight’s reading you’re going to meet lots of people – a lot of them Native Americans – who lived hundreds of years ago. In a lot of ways, they’ll be like you: they worked and played, loved each other and hated each other. But they’ll also be different from you in the things they cared about, the things they saved and threw away. Now they’re gone. We try to remember them, but the record we have is incomplete. And the way we understand them isn’t exactly the way they understood themselves. Sort of like trying to understand you in terms of bottle caps. Not exactly a lie, but probably not the way you want to be remembered. Something worth keeping in mind as you do the reading. See you tomorrow.”

The rain was tapering. I turned around and looked at the clock. Mr. Smith was ending class a few minutes early. “See you tomorrow,” Hannah said as she walked out the door. Mr. Smith nodded. “A couple other kids said thanks as they left. 

I was among the last to go. "Could I borrow one of those books you mentioned? I forgot to order it."

"Sure," he said, picking one up off the stack on his desk.

"Do I need to sign it out or anything?"

"Nah. I got a bunch. I kinda collect them. You can keep it as long as you like."

"Really?"

 He looked at me for what I felt was the first time. "You want to borrow it for the whole year?"

"Could I? Really?"

"Well, there doesn't seem to be much demand, and I still have a few. So go head, Theo. I know you're good for it."

Thanks!"

"No problem, kid," he said, turning back to the book he was reading. "See you tomorrow."

A few days later Janito and me went to see Riddick at Ridge Hill. After the woman at the entrance to the theater tore my ticket in half, I saw a trash can and was going to throw it away. But then I changed my mind and shoved it in my pocket. When I got home I put in a mason jar on my desk where I keep paper clips and stuff like that. I don’t think my movie tickets are going to be part of any archeological site or anything. But I think I want to keep track of my own history.