Slackers who have inspired me...
This entry was posted on Saturday, November 11, 2006 4:44 PM and is filed under Characters I've known.
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Mr. Morrill |
For a college course, I was asked to observe a teacher. I searched until I found a slacker. His name was Mr. Morrill. The following semester, I became his student teacher. Here's his story:
Morrill's dad, a Chicago judge, sent him to a small liberal arts college. After graduation, Morrill loafed around the house for a week. The judge gave him an ultimatum: He had two weeks to find a job or go to law school. Tired of school, and not wanting to be homeless, Morrill took a job with the one employer who didn't roll their eyes at his history degree - the U.S. Army.
All of Morrill's Army stories center around anti-efficiency slacking. He would volunteer for "missions". A mission usually consisted of driving a Jeep into town to buy a carton of smokes for a superior. He would drive as fast as the Jeep would go - in first gear. Piston rods would shoot out of the hood by the time he got to town. Then he'd radio a repair team. They'd dick around town together, and all return home sometime that evening.
After being discharged, Morrill went back to school and got a teaching degree. After a few years, Morrill got bored with inner city teaching. During my student teaching, I accompanied him to a job fair. An upper crust school district had several openings. To talk to a interviewer, we were asked to take a deli number. Our numbers were in the 700's. They were on interview number 200. Morrill went on a mission. He was going to steal a lower number. Finding no success, we added our sad resumes to the resume tower (it was 2 feet tall), and hit the road.
Several years later, I was on a train riding from Seattle to Chicago. I looked up, and saw Morrill and the judge. We talked from Seattle to Denver. During their trip, the judge must have persuaded Morrill to move on with his life. Last I heard, Morrill was a lawyer.