The Points of Mr. Watts’ Class

Mr. Alan Watts was an English teacher at Bellingham High School during the 70s. He was a timid and fun-loving man who was not at all like the coach-teachers who would sharpen axes on their grinding wheels and thump their chests during class. The requirements for Mr. Watts’ Class included your pencil, a notebook, the English book, and a tetanus shot.

My best friend Chuck and I, to fulfill our list of general requirement classes, signed up for English to get it out of the way. As it happened, we and 25 other juniors were assigned to Mr. Alan Watts’ class. He was a legend at BHS. There were always Watts stories floating around the school and many times, because of his character, the student body would talk him into being part of an assembly skit, of which he always seemed to fit the part.

Chuck and I were assigned seats in the back left corner of Mr. Watts’ classroom. Our desks were positioned next to the corkboard wall which was covered with 8 1/2 x 11 sheets of paper, all of which had been neatly tacked or stapled there.

Sitting next to us was a guy named Paul who wrote all his theme papers on the topic of “goat marbles.” I don’t think that was the only thing he knew, but it was his way of exasperating Mr. Watts and letting him know that he hated English.

Sitting at my desk, next to the cork board on an unusually boring day, I stared at the papers mounted there. I started thinking about the possibilities of the common thumbtack. As a child, I remembered watching “Our Gang” movies where Spanky would place a tack on a chair and wait for Alfalfa or Buckwheat to sit on it. It produced some hilarious pratfalls. But I thought to myself, would it be as funny tacking a high schooler? It certainly wouldn’t work in the axe grinder’s classes or for that matter, anyone else’s class, but it just might work in Al Watts’ class.

The next day, Chuck and I arrived in the classroom early.

“Hey Chuck,” I said. “watch this.”

I removed a tack from the corkboard and placed it on the empty chair belonging to “Goat Marble Paul.”

“Mitchell, don’t you ever grow up?” was Chuck’s comment. “Oh well, it’s Goat Marble’s chair. It could be funny.

We waited as the rest of the students entered the class room. Then, in entered Paul with his flaming red hair, plaid shirt, and corduroy pants. He walked to his desk, slapped his books on the desktop and swung into his chair. He didn’t look down to notice the tack on his seat, but why would he? He plopped his butt onto the chair and made full contact with the tack.

“Yikes!” he yelled as he jumped back up. This caused the rest of the class and Mr. Watts to all look in his direction.

Paul did what could only be described as a river dance around his desk with the palm of his hand on his right butt cheek. Finally, he found the silver head of the tack and pulled it free. This of course elicited laughter from the room and a faint smile on Al’s face.

When you find something that works, go with it.

Goat Marble Paul was not sure who placed the tack on his chair, but he was going to get even. The next day he was in class early and sitting in his seat. As we all filed in and sat down, I heard a girl squeal and jump up. She had found Paul’s tack, which was obvious by the way her skirt was puckered where the tack held it to her hip.

From then on, everyone was a target. If you didn’t check your chair before you sat down, chances are you would be jumping up in pain. Everyone had a small stockpile of tacks to use on someone else. I kept 20 behind a sheet of paper next to my head on the corkboard. The strange thing was, everyone was targeted except me.

Then one day, Mr. Watts entered the room after the bell had rung. He stepped behind his desk and sat down on his large wooden chair. Immediately he shot out of the chair like it was spring loaded. As he spun around to look at the seat, we could all see the three silver headed tacks attached to the back of his black dress pants. Someone had tacked the teacher. Although nobody fessed up, we believe it was Paul’s response for the “F” he received on his last “Goat Marble” essay.

“Ok, that’s it! Put all the tacks on my desk. There will be no more tacking.” Mr. Watts ordered.

“That’s no fair!” Chuck blurted. “Mitchell started it all and he didn’t get tacked once.”

The room turned unusually ugly.

And so, we went back to boring English. But, three weeks later, I had a nurse’s excuse to walk to my optometrist to be fitted for contact lenses. The doctor dilated my eyes and went through the normal procedures to find my correct prescription. Walking back to school after the appointment, I was given dark glasses because of my extremely blurry and dilated pupils. Entering the school, I was ten minutes late for my next class . . . Mr. Watts’ English class.

Because he locked his door when the class bell rang, I stood outside and knocked, class books in hand. Mr. Watts opened the door to let me in. Still wearing the dark glasses, I made my way to my table, set down my books and flopped onto my chair.

Now, let me describe in detail what happened next as if you were watching it in slow motion: My buttocks hit the chair seat. I immediately felt the prickles of 50 tiny needles. My mouth opened and I shouted something that shouldn’t be said in school. Pushing upward and backwards with my legs, I came out of the chair, tipping it over. Now in a backroll, I saw my feet facing the ceiling. I then landed on my back only to hear tacks scattering all over the floor.

Upon restanding and trying to avoid the tacks on the floor, I turned to reveal to the class the 20 or so silver tack heads that were still attached to my backside. Realizing that removing the tacks might difficult, I limped to the wood shop to borrow a claw hammer. I then returned to the class, which Mr. Watts allowed me to reenter through the locked door.

As I sat back at my desk he announces to the class, “Ok, now we are even.”

Goat Marble Paul laughed about it for about a week and I became very popular in the class as the best pratfall they’d seen since the “Our Gang” movies. They also found it very funny to yell, “attack” when I’d walk by.

So, there was another Watts story to float the halls of Bellingham High. And for me, I got two things out of his class:

1) A sore butt and

2) The ability to put a sentence together.

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