Science Class

I’ve taken some science classes in my day, which day they were taken I’m not exactly sure, but at some point in my life I remember being in a science classroom. I remember because science class rooms are so distinct from other classrooms, with their long black slab tables, posters of Einstein and apple trees and long equations with a cartoon worm looking them over as if to say, “Yes, even a worm could figure this out.”

Then of course there’s the clutter, my God the clutter. It always seemed that all available space if not already covered by some tearing and wrinkled poster, corners dotted with holes from the disappearing push pins and curling edges, was covered by random scrap pieces of paper, some bearing red marker or blue pen, others, just pencil, faded and scribbled. All hung in a manner, which would indicate they were there to cover small holes in the wall.

Besides the walls being in shambles, the entire front of the room, from the first row to the blackboard, was filled with a nondescript assortment of collapsing and half filled boxes. Most of the items in the boxes were either broken or missing integral parts to necessitate function and were all unaccounted for, lost to years of budget cuts and student handling. The labels on these boxes, at one time a predominant black Sharpie, had been crossed out six times over and covered with an assortment of tapes; scotch, duct, and masking, to name a few.

Along the wall where the windows once opened were long browning horizontal blinds, long gone the days when they opened with the spinning of a white plastic rod, now in pieces below the wall length furnace.

In two corners of the room were ten foot tall oak cabinets, which seemed to always be leaning forward just waiting to release their burden and collapse onto the next person who dared place another variety pack of construction paper onto their bending shelves. The hinges creaked with exhaustion, never allowing the doors to completely close so that the class could always see the lime green glossy poster on the open door facing us.

This poster outlined the ten rules of safety all scientists must abide by. Number one stated that if you were to get something in your eyes you were to immediately flush them out with the room’s eye washer, a device attached to the teacher’s black slab desk that looked identical to the device that dispensed gas. Which was which had always been a subject of debate, for neither was ever used in the entirety of my scientific schooling. This may be the reason why I can’t understand the existence balloons.