Fear of the Dangling Participle

Sharon Browder FINAL VERVION
9/12/07 11/10/07
“I” Piece - A Moment in Time - Revised Piece # 1


FEAR OF THE DANGLING PARTICIPLE

I had made the cut. It had come down to me and just one other teacher. The position I was interviewing for would be my ticket out of a bad school and into a good one. But I blew it.

The panel and I met in a conference room off the main office. I was on one side of a large table and the six of them were seated across from me. This was the English department headed by, an aged, stern looking woman who, I was sure had seen many teachers come and go. I also imagined, that it was the ones she had dismissed, who had given her the self-righteous, smug look on he face. Now it was my turn to answer their questions, while they weighed my answers.

After introductions all around there were some harmless questions all teachers expect to be asked concerning classroom management, what strengths I would bring, and areas of success I had in the past with particular lessons. It was my best suit - I answered with ease and confidence. Teaching was my passion and Language Arts was the subject I loved
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the most.

But then that one awful question - that one which ultimately would be so costly.

That one question was linked to an on-going fear. Some fears can be very rational, like the fear of spiders, which even has a name -“arachnophobia.” Then there are the fears that are irrational, without a “phobia” name - that would be mine - the fear of “dangling participles.”
* * *
All through school I was force-fed parts of speech with scary sounding, unknowable names. Who knows why a verb is also known as a predicate? What is the etymology of a predicate? What about those ant-like prepositions running all over a sentence, needing to be scooped up by commas, separating clauses? Slumped in my desk, I would sit in a soup of parts and pieces of sentences, knowing the dreaded dangling participle lurked somewhere, somewhere hidden just out of my understanding of it.
All I really wanted to do was create magically written sentences. These sentences would be embedded in flowing paragraphs and stanzas, seamlessly transitioning into story, essay, prose, and poem. Surely those pesky participles need not concern my content. For using grammar to write was a division of the brain into segments inferior to the whole. Suffering over those grammar tidbits only stopped the glorious flow of creation!
Although minor to me, some grammar slips were always caught by giddy English
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teachers, waiting to pounce on unsuspecting students. That correction was the one that constantly mocked me when I asked, “Can I…?”, instead of “May I…?”. With a Cheshire cat smile the know-it-all, arrogant teacher would reply, “I don’t know, can you?” God I hated that question but I did not fear it. To tell the truth, sometimes I made
this dreadful mistake on purpose just to be a smart ass. I would answer, “Yes, I can or maybe I can’t.” The “may” in “may-be” was the closest satisfaction I was going to give the purple-haired old bat.
* * *

Now here again sat the purple-haired old bat, reincarnated in the form of the department head of all those hard working English teachers. She slowly and in low, deliberate, tone, leaned in and asked, “How would you teach a lesson about subordinate causes?” My mind went blank and then just as quickly rocketed me back to every grammar lesson I ever hated. But then, worst of all, I became that gifted, smart ass child, again. I wanted to pull out that neat and tidy, model lesson centering around craftily placed clauses, but I did not have the ability to do so.

Instead I became Robin Williams in “Dead Poets Society” leading his fearful, restricted, pitiful students onto the top of the desk of new perspective and unbridled freedom. Those in my class would not settle for dusty, crusty clauses, however creatively presented. My answer was bold, reckless and full of self-righteous indignation.

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I watched the loss of this coveted position play out like my life passing before my eyes at the moment just before death. Of all the things we could have so pleasantly discussed, this was not one of them. Why not ask me about how to get reluctant students to care about language? What tricks did I have up my sleeve that would result in students begging for just one more chapter in a read-aloud book? What about that sure-fire way of engaging your reader to keep reading something you had written? How would an ending to a piece bring the reader back to the heart of the writer‘s purpose? These kinds of questions would have sparked a teacher to show her best hand. But no, it had to be about clauses.

“First of all,” I quipped, “ the need for a subordinate clause would have to relate, in a meaningful way, to whatever we, as writers were trying to communicate. And if failing that objective - there would never be a multiple choice quiz trying to stump students to pick the independent or dependent clauses or sentences full of clauses to underline, then label. In my class, content, creativity, and purpose would rule! We would be fresh and take risks in our writing, while grammar would only come, if at all, in mini lessons. We would be a class of writers in progress.”

Obviously this was not the answer this grammarian was expecting, nor one she would accept from a prospective teacher in her department. I was dismissed with a cool “Thank you. We will let you know our decision soon.” And I knew, I would not get this job.

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I waited for a moment after the other teacher took her turn in front of the waiting
grammar queens. My inquisition was over. I lingered, just outside the door, wanting something. It was then that I heard the infectious laughter erupt from the other side of the
closed door. I knew the other teacher had said something very witty and correct.
Subordinate clauses, and all other grammar morsels would rule her class.

I found my way out of the front office. I knew I had sacrificed this job to the purple-haired old bats everywhere, but I had remained true to myself. As I straightened my shoulders and reclaimed my worth from somewhere down around my ankles, I was glad that I would be heading back to my bad school and my rough, tough, and bluntly honest students. They had always driven me to deliver only the “desk-top” discoveries.
* * *
I unlock the solid, wooden door to my classroom. I take just one step inside and put down my book bag full of plans, graded papers, hopes and dreams. I do not turn on the lights. I pause. I am back where I belong.
The buttery sunlight filters through the only window in the room, giving a soft flood of light across the student’s desks. I can still taste the chalk dust that that lodges in the back of my throat, keeping me hoarse all year. I can smell textbooks and pencils, a mingling of odors I have always found alluring.
Alone, for just a moment, I think of all my seventh graders. Some they will stream into the room like the sunlight. They will each bring something with them, something valuable - a fresh start - a willingness to try again. I too, will meet them with the same
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willingness. We all will face our fears - for some much more dreaded than dangling participles.
I sigh and make my way to my desk, still cluttered with yesterdays remains. I ease a bundle of graded work out of my bag. I run my hand over the top paper, and smile at all the comments I made, which look like fire ants running down the margins. I am hoping that each remark will help the child re-focus and at the same time be encouraged.
There is a faint knock at the door - too soon for students to be in the hall or classroom. I go to the door ready to shoo a student back outside. But I am greeted by Jacob standing there in his army fatigues - a match, he had told me, to those his father wears while serving his latest tour in Afghanistan.
“ Ms. B, I know I’m supposed to be out side, but I had to ask you one thing. I know we have a grammar quiz today but those clauses are all jumbled in my head. I can’t remember just how they go and what they are called. I know for sure I’m gonna fail.

“ Jacob, come inside, and I’ll go over what you will see on the test. But I want you to remember one very important thing - something even more important than clauses - school is the place where it is OK to make mistakes. There will always be another chance to try again. This is one test, but there are many ways to “know” things in this classroom. Did I ever tell you about my fear of dangling participles?
When I was in the sixth grade…
* * *

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“In a landmark case that is bound to excite civil-rights campaigners, a local man was arrested on Tuesday for the crime of dangling his participle in public.” I don’t get it.