My first writing prize was awarded to me in the eighth grade. Every year our school allowed the eighth grade class to perform various skits and musical numbers in front of the entire student body as a kind of rite of passage on the final week of school. That year (1974?) I submitted a script to the teachers. It was a script I had typed on my Smith-Corona with two fingers (hunt and peck) and consisted of a bevy of short skits and musical numbers (yeah, I wrote the music, too!) that my friends and I were to perform.
Much to my amazement, the teachers allowed my script to pass muster and my friends and I went to work. I directed, choreographed, and even made a cameo appearance in the final production which we performed on the gym floor to a sell-out crowd. (Actually, no one purchased a ticket. The students were forced to attend by order of the principal, Mr. Huffman. He "Huffy" was the main target of my script. I, of course, barely graduated, and to this day, he has been my enemy for life.) Why the teachers allowed this monstrosity on the stage I still don't understand. But I loved their vote of confidence in my satirical skits and parodies, which I had already mastered by age thirteen.
The student body rioted. It was a hit. There might have even been a few broken windows. Perhaps a broken pelvis. But the reviews were stellar.
And me . . . ? I think more than a few of those teachers were glad that my typewriter and rapier wit were finally moving on to high school. I was already six foot two inches tall, weighted one hundred and forty pounds dripping wet, and could type fifty words a minute blindfolded, and by using only two fingers. Only God knew what would happen once I learned how to type like a normal person using all ten digits.
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