Wednesday, April 4, 2012

D - Detention

I had never gotten a detention before.  I didn’t even know where the detention room was or what teacher was in charge. Walking into the senior science lab afterschool was like discovering some kind of alternate dimension. With the blinds pulled half way down, the gray winter light shinning off black-top tables gave the familiar classroom a sudden, sinister air – the perfect meeting place for high school’s secret delinquent population. 

I say ‘secret’ because I had no idea who I would find in detention. I couldn’t recall seeing anyone ‘get’ detention and if I had, I certainly hadn’t wondered what happened to them after the fact.  For me, detention had always been some abstract concept.  Yet there I was.

My crime?  Talking too much and passing notes in French class- believe it or not. I was only a couple months into my freshman year and I think the teacher wanted to make an example out of me- let the other freshman know that high school is much more serious than middle school so we better watch our step. Little did I know, ten years later I’d be able to speak French better than that professor with my tongue duct-taped to my chin. (for those of you just following- I live in France)

I was a freshman at the time so I didn’t recognize half the students around me- most of them sophomores, juniors, or seniors.  To my disappointment, there was no consequential bad boy in a leather jacket waiting to sweep me off my fourteen-year-old feet. Nobody talked - although a few students sat there with their arms crossed, looking appropriately surely and difficult. I asked if we were allowed to do homework. The teacher said ‘yes’ so I cracked open a book and got to work. Forty minutes later, it was over and I went back to my life as a non-delinquent with no regrets.

Did you ever get a detention in school?  And of course -what got you there? J

32 comments:

Karen Baldwin said...

Yup, I played a joke on a teacher who DID NOT think it was funny.

Cristina said...

No "Breakfast Club" for you, huh? LOL
I don't think I ever got detention. And it wasn't for lack of doing things I wasn't supposed to. It was more like all the teachers thought I was an angel and so they never paid attention, muahahaha!

Jennifer Joyce said...

I was a bit like Cristina. If you were a bit of a swot, you got away with a lot more.

TC Avey said...

I didn't get detention, not that I didn't deserve it a time or two, but for whatever reason I didn't end up in detention. Guess I'm was a really good brown noser! Not sure what happened, but I have a feeling I would DEFINITELY get detention now.

Natalie Aguirre said...

No I never did. That's so weird yours was because of French class and you know live in France.

Alex J. Cavanaugh said...

I was a good boy - no detention.

farawayeyes said...

Detention and I are old friends. Started thinking of it as just another class period. I really wasn't 'bad',just couldn't keep my mouth shut.

Tonja said...

I was terrified of getting swats. I'm not that old - they seriously were still swatting kids with boards in the 80s. I never did anything wrong at school until my senior year, when I realized I was so known to be a rule-follower that I could walk past the principle and go home in the middle of the day without anyone questioning it.

Kimberlee Turley said...

My first detention was because I was late to middle school since the power had died in the middle of the night and my mom's clock battery back up failed.

(This was before cell phones.)

Our school had an attendance problem and so they were very strict and would give detentions just for being even 5 minutes tardy.

My mom refused to write a note saying we were excused and so I had to go back on a freaking SATURDAY to spend two hours working in the library.

Only later in life did I realize how much it must have stunk for her to have to drive us all the way back there on a Saturday so that we could fulfill it since we lived over 20 minutes from the school.

Cherie Reich said...

No, I didn't get detention, but I did have a teacher tell us that everyone usually gets detention at least once in their high school career. Now I think he said that to scare us, but it worked.

Slamdunk said...

Fun topic CQG. I almost had it once for talking, but did not ever have it. Detention was a real pain at our school because you missed the buses and your parents had to coordinate a way home for you--which often meant lots more punishment than detention.

Roland D. Yeomans said...

Detention for our school was having to write whole chapters of our textbooks for homework while still suffering through class! Great post. Thanks for the nice words on Alex's blog, Roland

Anonymous said...

Why am I not surprised that you are the loquacious sort, who would get in trouble for talking too much? LOL

Um, yes, I've gotten detention...

A few times...

For...

*whispers* fighting.

Guess I'm kinda scrappy. But the fights were in self-defense. I swear. Oh, and I won every time. :D

mshatch said...

I had a few, mostly in 9th and 10th grade. Then I learned how to play the game and have my fun, too. Not that it lasted, of course :)

Suzi said...

I was boring, I never got detention either. But if I had, it would've been for the same things you did. With all the notes I wrote in high school, I don't know how we never got caught.

I still have all my notes I got from friends and now I question if I ever listened in class.

Do girls still write notes today? I understand texting is the thing, but I sure hope the art of note writing has not been lost.

Old Kitty said...

I had a "sports detention" - and it was a team effort! My class were so bad the teacher made us to extra 30 minutes of sports - well running around! Boooo! LOL!!

No bad boy in leather jacket for me too! Sigh! Take care
x

Stephanie said...

LOL! I've only had detention 3 times, and all were kinda bogus reasons! And one was from my French teacher too!! I was late to her class...in my defense. I had to come from the entire opposite end of the building, AND, the day before, one of the kids had turned her clock a minute or two fast so we could leave early (It was the last class of the day). The others- got caught carrying my coat in the hallway, and instead of participating in gym, me and a bunch of girls went back in to the locker room to talk. Out detention was the cafeteria after school....and there were usually a large amount there...it wasn't like a cool club or anything. Just detained you from getting out of there.

Gail M Baugniet - Author said...

Once I was blamed for kissing a boy on the school bus. The nun finally determined that another girl with the same first name was the culprit. The accusation was worse than detention, for me :)
http://gail-baugniet.blogspot.com Theme: A World of Crime

Tamara Narayan said...

I was a goody-two shoes, but my eighth grade teacher did give everyone in the class a wap on the wrist with his strap one day. I can't remember if it was for fun or if the whole class had done something naughty.

Haddock said...

Oh yes I was famous for that "talking in the class"
(what else are we supposed to do?)

Shannon O'Donnell said...

I was a goody-goody in school and would have died if I ever got detention. Now I know what great stories it could have provided! LOL. :)

Jaycee DeLorenzo said...

I don't think so...no. I was a goodie girl. :D

Happy Hump Day!
My D

Kristi said...

I was too much of a nerd for detention...but those other kids who got it? So cool! LOL

Jenny S. Morris said...

I'm trying to remember getting it. If I did, it must have been a similar experience. Why couldn't there have been a hot guy in a leather jacket with his motorcycle waiting to take you away when it was over?

Jen from http://falling4fiction.blogspot.com/

vic caswell said...

no detention for me either...
i'm wondering if that's so common here, because us writers are in our heads too often to make a bunch of trouble?

Carrie-Anne said...

The few times I had to stay after were because I'd been a little late to class or hadn't done homework. Of course, my Course II (Geometry) teacher didn't understand when I couldn't stay the day she wanted me to, since I was at that time picked up from school instead of taking the bus, and my mother would freak out if I weren't out to the car on time. I stayed after a few days later to make it up, and was still reported as having missed detention. I told the office person I'd made it up, and apparently the math teacher hadn't had any idea why I was really staying after class that day. I suppose, at the time of high school I went to at that time (and given that this wasn't one of the honors classes), she genuinely couldn't understand a student with parents who gave that much of a damn.

I had two cold cafeteria detentions in junior high, for beyond-stupid, unfair reasons, and I never went. I ripped up the detention notices and washed then down the drain of the bathroom sink at home. I never got in trouble for not going, if anyone even noticed I'd never shown up. At my junior high, cold cafeteria detention was an hour-long detention in the cold caf (we had two cafeterias, one serving hot food and another cold), as opposed to regular detention in the classroom.

Melissa Sugar said...

I was the girl who got detention a lot. I got it many times for talking in class, being tardy (my biggest offense),talking back to a teacher once and once for skipping school. I got in so much trouble at home for that one that I straightened up after that (well until I got sent to Military school). Omg, I just realized how bad this all sounds.

Neurotic Workaholic said...

I think I was only in detention once, and it was because I was goofing off in class. I still giggle when I think about it, because I was normally very well-behaved and quiet in class. But I remember that a friend of mine and I were trying to push each other out of our chairs when the teacher wasn't looking. I also remember how she whirled around at the last second with this angry look on her face, because that's when she caught me.

Unknown said...

Loved reading all these detention stories!

--Damyanti, Co-host A to Z Challenge April 2012

Twitter: @AprilA2Z
#atozchallenge

A.L. Sonnichsen said...

Yep, I've had a few detentions in my day. But I'm proud to say I never got a Saturday detention. Those were reserved for the REAL delinquents, I guess. LOL!

Karen M. Peterson said...

This sounds so much like my experience with detention. I only went once in high school, for something really stupid. There weren't any cute bad boys and there was no talking. It was the most boring hour of my entire four years at my high school.

My crime?

I had been absent from school one day, and when I came back, I had to get a re-admit form from the office that had to be initialed by all of my teachers and turned in at the end of the day. My 4th period teacher forgot to give it back to me and left early so I had to go to the office for a duplicate.

Yes. Seriously. That's what landed me in detention.

Sarah Tokeley said...

In my school you'd have had to steal a teacher's car for anyone to bother with a detention.

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