In my high-school days, I was famous for joining groups.
I was a member of Pep Club, a natural extension of how much I loved cheering at athletic events...and a natural extension of many of my friendships. My small group of buddies and I spent many a Friday or Saturday night at basketball games, in our uniforms of red vests and gray culottes, screaming as loud as we could for every basket and free throw...not to mention having already spend much of autumn in the bleachers cheering every touchdown and extra point. To the best of my recollection, I was never a "leader" in it, in that I didn't hold an elected or appointed office. But that was one of the few instances in which I didn't!
I was a member of Thespians, again, a natural match. I loved the theater, still do. And I earned my stripes through many an hour of securing props, doing makeup, and even--wonder of wonders--being one of the student directors for three one-act plays my senior year.
And I was a member of the staff of the literary magazine. By all reasonable measures, I was in line to be editor-in-chief my senior year; I'd served with distinction all four years in school, and all my peers knew I was the best there was. But then, I butted heads with the faculty advisor...and things got interesting.
First, someone submitted the lyrics to Jimi Hendrix's song "Little Wing" as a poem, signed only "J. Hendrix"...which I promptly brought to her attention. Clearly meant to mock us, to "dare" us to know where it'd come from. Well, I did. And I said so.
She pooh-poohed the concern, told me it had been submitted "anonymously" by someone who wanted to "use a pen name," and that surely I was mistaken. I offered to bring in the album cover of the Hendrix recording from home and show her, but she told me that wouldn't be either appreciated or necessary. And so, our literary magazine published--as if it were original--song lyrics for which we could have been sued, seemingly without concern or worry.
(In 1970, that didn't draw attention like it could have in 2022. Just sayin'. )
The second was my discovery of more plagiarism--of one of MY OWN PIECES of writing--submitted by a former friend who'd basically fallen out with me. She'd turned it in as work to her English teacher, gotten an A, and her teacher had submitted it to the magazine.
You can imagine my feelings when I read it...and who had supposedly "written" it.
How did she get it, you ask? Simple. In my early teens, I was a fledgling writer whose close buddies enjoyed reading her work. So, I'd shared it.
This piece was haunting, emotive, and pretty darned good for the 15-year-old I'd been when I'd penned it... but it was also MINE, not hers. Not even two years later, which was when it surfaced.
I squawked. I demanded to talk to both her and her English teacher. I offered to bring in other friends who'd read it, from my hands, two years before. And I kept squawking.
The advisor, faced with my adamant protests, unbent enough that she supposedly went to the other English teacher, who confronted the girl, who admitted to the plagiarism. And the piece was removed from consideration in the magazine.
But she was allowed to keep the A. Without redoing the work.
I was livid. And I let the advisor know it. I told her, point-blank, to her face, that this was wrong. That letting this girl get away with keeping a grade was, in effect, rewarding her for cheating.
What did I hear in response? "Oh, she apologizes."
To which I said, "Not good enough."
To my knowledge, no other demand was never enforced.
And from that point on, I was apparently regarded as "trouble."
The advisor gave the editor-in-chief job to a sophomore in one of her classes, one who had less than a tenth of the experience I had but who was one of her "pets"...and I quit.
This all by way of demonstrating that, when I enter a group, seemingly inevitably I end up becoming a leader in it. For better or worse.
Sometimes, that leadership isn't appreciated at all.
Sometimes, that leadership gets you publicly vilified.
But then, again, sometimes that leadership "thing" can pleasantly surprise you.
As it has lately, for me.
More on that in Part 2!
To be continued...
Janny
No comments:
Post a Comment