AP ENGLISH - First day of Junior Year

AP English and I did not get off on a positive start. Ms. Regan seems to have an affinity for the style that Moby Dick- our summer reading book- is written in, a style that mainly consists of long winded sentences. Speaking of long winded- which can sometimes be used as a delicate word to describe those who talk way too much- the class consists of Sasha, Ben, Zohra, Analise, and Hannah. When in conversation with Sasha, one is lucky to get a word in. Ben has been known to prattle on and ask way too many unnecessary questions. Zohra can single handedly use up most of the oxygen in a room. Analise, I believe, has evolved to breathe through her ears, that way she doesn't have to pause when talking to inhale.
A few minutes into the class, the dreaded Caitie Horan walked into the room and the little hope I had left of actually enjoying English class this year drained away.
Ms. Regan asked us how our first day was going- her first mistake. Immediately several of the above people jumped to express their dissatisfaction with the school's new policy of no cell phones whatsoever, which we had learned of a few hours previous. This was introduced to the entire school's population, admittedly rather abruptly, by Ms. Boudreau, the school's new assistant headmaster. Mr. Watson, the new headmaster, had just finished a great, enthusiastic, and charismatic speech, introducing himself. Not only did she not exactly introduce herself, like he did, she also sort of launched right into the "nuts and bolts" of how this year would operate. As soon as she said this bit about cell phones a great many students in the auditorium started booing her. It turned out that a lot of people like using their phones during the day to check out Facebook, text friends in other classes cheat on tests and anything else that would help them actually learning and doing work in school.
In fact a few of these such kids happen to be in my AP English class, such as Hannah and Analise, who immediately jumped upon voicing their obviously well thought out, experienced, and not at all judgmental opinions on, to put it in Hannah's words, "that woman," saying that they didn't like her from the start, from when they first laid eyes on her. They simultaneously knew in their hearts that this woman was a bad apple. Ms. Regan explained to us exactly why this new rule had been put in place, that it was being put in place in all of the school systems all over Massachusetts because of the Phoebe Prince tragedy, a girl who was new from Ireland and was being bullied in school, via texts, and eventually hanged herself in her closet. Everyone agreed that this was a good reason but that Ms. Boudreau had failed to explain this to us so we didn't see the sense of this decision at the time. A critique of Ms. Boudreau started up what was sort of a repeat of their criticizing of her earlier. Around this time, about twenty minutes into the class, I raised my hand to point out a few key things about the situation that they might not have known and might change their opinion. I would continue to raise my hand for the next forty minutes, as Hannah H. was called on three times, Analise twice, Zohra twice, and that is not including how many times they called out. I raised my hand through three "sub"-topics, the biggest one being respect versus fear. It seemed that most of the class thought that true respect could only exist with some feelings of affection. That you had like the people you respected. That respect with fear was not "real" respect. Now, I strongly disagreed but it's not like I got to voice my opinion on that matter because I was still raising my hand for my first thing about Ms. Boudreau. Throughout this discussion about respect and fear I could not ignore the dawning sense of a certain approaching doom. I realized that despite the high hopes for this class that I had carried through the door of this classroom not an hour before, I was not going to actually enjoy myself in English for another year in a row, that this class was only going to be a little less boring than the others because it might be fun to watch the budding relationships of Analise and Zohra crash and burn during the year. But it wouldn't be that entertaining so the first was still a condemning thought. I also realized that these girls were fools, absolute fools, because if there was one thing out all of the life lessons that I know, it is that respect cannot exist without fear. The two go together hand in hand, no matter what. Any kind of respect must at least have a little fear otherwise there is no basis for that respect.
At some point I became incredibly fed up. Both my arms had fallen asleep from being thrust up in the air, which caused the blood to drain out of them. So I stuck my hands in the air one last time and sort of flapped them around, hoping Ms. Regan would at last somehow spot the movement coming from the back of the room (i.e. the other side of the world). It didn't work. So I planned to do it one more time in a last attempt to attract her attention. Hoping I looked like a bad case of occasional epilepsy, I timed it so that when her head swung my way, my hand shot up in the air.
It worked and she said, “Oh, yes?” in an encouraging way that suggested I had finally had some sort of brain connection and put up my hand just then, for the first time. I said, “Um, I’ve been raising my hand for sort of a long time so –”
“Oh, my gosh, are you ok? Are you gonna be all right?” She interrupted me, sarcastically, midsentence.
“My heart!” I cried, just going along with it to show her I wasn’t really complaining, even though I was rather pissed.
She put her hand to her ear and cried back, “I can hear it breaking!”
“Um, what I mean is that what I’m going to say is about Ms. Boudreau. She’s new to this position, her old job was some sort of corporate one, so she might not be used to dealing with kids our age, whereas Mr. Watson used to be a headmaster at some other school. He has a lot more experience catering to students, and we do take some catering to. The former administration who left at the end of last year, just let everything go, they had everyone just throw their locks in giant boxes, without the combinations or anything, so this administration has a lot of other work and organizing to do.”
Later that day I was waiting in the hall for someone who was going to give me a ride, when I heard the wonderfully nasal voice of Tessa complaining about yours truly. Apparently I had somehow annoyed her with my comment, and here she imitated a high-voiced version of me, “I’ve been raising my hand foreverrrrrr-”
So I came around the corner of the hall, fast. I looked at her. She looked at me and said something like “uh,…”
Which I sweetly interrupted her with an excited, “Tessa!” I widened my eyes innocently, smiled in a friendly, pleasant manner, “You have one of the loudest voices I’ve ever heard. It’s almost like people don’t need to even bother getting close to you. They can here you from all the way down the hallway! Ha ha” I walked away. I wonder if she appreciated my wit. Probably not.