Classroom Situation

Jeff Taylor. Fot. Sławomir Ostrowski

A typical situation in a classroom. A hot afternoon and a crowded classroom. A female student, I’m hot. Can we open window?. Most of the other students including the men, Sure, whatever.

These are the plastic windows, good at keeping rooms warm in the winter. The cheaper ones or older ones sometimes fall out of the hinge settings and then cannot be closed. The window seems to be hanging on a hinge.

When this happens, all hell breaks loose. Not because it’s a serious problem; it looks easy to repair. And it must be repaired! The oncerned people will not rest until that window closes. And they gather together, taking turns, to wrestle with that window or give advice as a choir. How about this! Try this! Why not this!

Of course, the Unconcerned, which includes the men, watch with little interest. They didn’t start the mess, so why should they care?

Meanwhile the quest to Repair the Window carries on.

At this point the male Unconcerned are punished for not being interested. And in Poland the men must always care. I’ve found out the hard way that the worst thing for a man to say is: I don’t care.

He might as well say, I don’t love you. I’m leaving you and the kids. And I’m a Gay Satanist Communnist Black Jew. At least that would traumatize Kaczyński (that guy has to get laid).

So one of the men finally attempts to fix it… And he makes it worse. Now the window is barely hanging on by that one hinge. You can see the metal of the hinge bending. And the Concerned, the women, start to blame him. It’s your fault! Look what you did!. That poor bastard.

One of the pushier Concerned tries once more to fix it. And she succeeds! So the ones who caused the whole commotion feel satisfied and validated. Almost smug. The Unconcerned guy who wanted to avoid it, now feels useless, less of a man. And that same first woman says, I’m hot. I guess there’s some moral here. How life is a vicious circle?

You decide.

(jt/kpias)