High School PE Taught Me How To Conjugate Verbs. Sort of.

Eleventh grade. A tough one. Acne. So on. Eleventh grade: English and PE classes and other classes I don't remember at the moment. English class was into verb conjugation. PE class was not into exercise because it was my turn for locker room duty--caged room with baskets to hold student stuff.

So. Back to English. We had a book with lots of examples of conjugations. Each example was presented in two columns, one singulars and one plurals. Hour after hour I stared at all the examples and tried to learn the conjugations. Memorizing all the examples was tough. I would stare, close my eyes and try to remember what the conjugations looked like, and then open my eyes to check. I wrote the examples over and over. I was making progress.

But. Test. An English test over these conjugations was coming up. In fact, on the particular day I am remembering the test was later that day.

While protecting the PE baskets I kept pouring over the illustrations and I knew that I was making progress but I also knew that there was no way I was going to get all of those things perfectly remembered.

I decided to stare at the illustrations, close my eyes and try to say the things. I knew that I would have to write the examples on the test, but I was grasping for anything that might help me remember.

Then I experienced one of those moments of enlightenment, one of those moments that comes close to proving that God exists and that God is just. Sort of. As I said the examples I suddenly realized that what I was saying sounded familiar.

I shout
You shout
He shouts

We shout
Y'all shout*
We shout

Damn. This conjugation thing is just a fancy word for how I talk. Everyday. All the time. I tried it out with other verbs. It worked. I looked at the examples in the book. I said the first person singular (another fancy thing) and then I was able to complete the whole example.

Why did nobody tell me that these things, these conjugated words, were nothing more than everyday chat? I had never heard of Molière, but I must have been as astounded and delighted as Jourdain. Without knowing what I was doing I had been conjugating as far back as I could remember. Amazing.

Gym ends. Returned stuff to students. Ate lunch. Took test. Aced it.

*I was reared in the southern United States. We had the advantage of having a regularly used, distinctive second-person plural pronoun.

I cannot help but wonder how I got through the sixth grade without passing my standardized test

Back when. OK? Back when.

Back when I was in grade school I dutifully walked the five or so blocks from home to school, passing each day the house known to all students to be the residence of a man who was evil because that's just the way he looked.

At school I settled into the routine. One room. One teacher. All day. We got marks of some sort. I'm sure of that. The marks might have been OK, Needs Improvement....I do not remember exactly. But I know that we got marks.

I also know that we moved from first grade through sixth grade based I suppose on some computation from OKs and Needs Improvements. Somehow that never seemed to much matter.

Now I find myself thinking of standardized tests because standardized test are all the rage today and I am trying to remember if I took standardized test when I was in grade school. Maybe we took standardized tests. Maybe I forgot. Maybe I was absent that day. Maybe standardized tests just were not all that important--no nearly so important as the evil man who had a house between school and home--standardized test just not all that important. Could be.

On the other hand, standardized tests are at the center of education today.  No, no. Standardized tests are the center of education today. How could it be that we would have missed out on such a treasure. How could it be that I went through the sixth grade and was allowed to journey on to junior high if I did not complete standardized tests?

I mean, how would grade school teachers know that I was ready to pass on to junior high teachers if I had no standardized score to prove that I had learned to cipher and read?

So there I am. No, here I am. No better off than when I began writing this. Might I have gone to junior high without documentation of more than OK and Needs Improvement?

 I could ask my brothers. But my brothers probably don't remember any better than I do. Or don't.

Life is full of mystery. Sometimes you have to shuffle along without knowing everything. Unless, of course, you have a standardized test.