So, a couple of years previous to David’s kindergarten goat rope round up, his older brother Charlie had undergone the same appraisal. I had worked nights the preceding evening, and got off work just in time to drive into town and join the fun.
For those of y’all who HAVE worked nights, you can ignore the next little bit. For the rest of you, pay attention. Night shift workers generally NEVER are fully caught up on sleep. On days after work, they are acutely-on-chronically sleep deprived. As for me, I am NOT at my best, when poorly rested.
So, we rolled in to the cat-rodeo that is kindergarten round up. One of the tasks, among others, is the child has to print his/her name. Our darling little boy had, of course, completed this process, and another earnest young teacher was reviewing the assignments. There was the clock face, and the stick man drawing, and the colors identified. All was at baseline until she came to the print-your-name part.
“Well, you see, he printed his name as S-h-u-r-l-e-y, and that is wrong, you see…”
I couldn’t stop myself. I interjected, “Unless, of course, we had named him Shurley, right?”
The poor woman stopped in her verbal tracks. I could almost see her head spin, and she bent to the package of papers, furiously flipping pages, and examining each one, seeking verification that Charlie’s name was, indeed, Charlie. Or Shurley.
After a minute or so of paper flipping, and eyeball spinning, The Plaintiff, Charlie’s mother, patted the teacher on her arm, and reassured her, “Ma’am? My husband worked all night last night, and he sometimes thinks that he is funny. Charlie’s name is in fact Charlie, and, yes, he misspelled it. Can we continue?”
For years, his siblings teased him about being named Shurley. And in answer to the inevitable question, “Surely, you jest?”
“I’m not kidding, and stop calling me Shirley!”
Musings of A Stretcher Ape 