Story 89 Pranks at work: The Suit

Pranks. They sound so juvenile. So much like middle school antics, but in the Physical Education department in my school they are alive and well.  In some ways, teaching is like the army or prison life, but without the pushups or soap drops. What I mean is that a lot of what we do is the same routine over and over again.   Bill Murray understood this in his acclaimed film Groundhog Day where every day of his life is repeated.

    I told my friend Peter once that “I do same thing five times a day in the same room for the rest of my life.” The point is that  humor can help us handle monotony. Fortunately, I am the type of person who can watch a film fifty times and not get bored, and usually can laugh at myself too. Other people are not that lucky.  Anyway, back to the pranks.

      Prank 1: “The Suit”:    We have an excellent teacher in our department named John.  We love to bust his balls.  He works extremely hard, but like many rookies is a bit gullible.  So , last year we asked him if he brought his suit for open school night.  Everyone played along.  We broke out our ties and looked at them to see if they were right all the while showing him how conscientious we were, and on the appointed night,  we noticed that John was in his best Sunday suit.  He asked us, “Aren’t you going to put on your suits?”

“Soon,” we replied.  But as the night got later and conference time approached he looked around, and realized that he was the only one wearing a suit.  He laughed, and just to show he could take a joke, wore his suit the whole night.  

      The following term once again we asked him if he was wearing his suit.  He replied that, “I’m not going to fall for that one again.” However, this time, we actually did dress up.  We all wore shirts and ties except for John who simply smiled and said, “What’s going to happen next year?”

“Next year we’ll wear women’s dresses.”  I said.

“I hope I can a transfer before that.”  He said with a laugh. And unfortunately that’s what happened to him temproarily, but we never wore dresses or even a tie again. Maybe we should have just to honor him.

Life Lesson 89:  When in Rome do as the Romans did, but when in school, take that with a grain of salt, and dress to impress, without wearing a dress.