SCHOOL. CAN WE TALK ABOUT IT FOR A MINUTE? AS WE’VE ALREADY DISCUSSED, I’m in fifth grade, where mucus in all its forms is a part of everyday life. But I’m not going to talk about that. Also, I’m not going to talk about the corner of the classroom that always smells like a mysterious biology experiment gone horribly wrong. I am going to tell you about school and me.
I’m a good student, no matter what my report card says. My grades just “don’t show my potential.” A lot of kids get better grades, but so what? That’s not a good reason for them to think they’re smarter than me.
I try my best to pay attention during class, but sometimes I start thinking about interesting things like… well… anything else. So I miss out on instructions and deadlines and things like that. You get the picture. But on the good side, school gives me lots of time to think about magic tricks. That’s a form of learning, isn’t it?
I doodle, which is art. I also think about constructing trapdoors and escape boxes, which is engineering. I used to practice my coin tricks, which was physical education for my fingers, until Mrs. M made me stop. She got tired of Nate Watkins diving on the floor every time I dropped a quarter. I told her it wasn’t my fault that Nate was greedy, but she didn’t care. She’s like that. She isn’t mean, but she doesn’t like anything that she hasn’t planned for. You’ll see what I’m talking about. Being a magician has taught me that things always go differently than you expect. Something always goes wrong, so you have to plan for things you don’t plan on. Expect the unexpected. When you do that, you can eliminate it. Sometimes.
While we’re talking about my teacher, this is a good time to tell you that we call her Mrs. M because her name is Mrs. Mortzchinski and she’s tired of correcting kids who can’t pronounce it. The funny thing about Mrs. M is that she has a terrific Russian name and she hates magic. Sometimes life is not fair.
Most of the kids at school are okay (including the spelunker). Cat is great, and there are a couple of other kids I hang out with. They seem to get the whole magic thing, but then there are people who don’t. Nate Watkins, for example. I don’t think I’m giving away any state secrets when I tell you that he is not the sharpest crayon in the box. Brain-wise, he’s more like the crayon someone left in a hot car until it melted.
In case you forgot, Nate is the genius who gave me the nickname Dorko. If I was the kind of person who had a nemesis, he would be mine. Of course, I’m not that kind of person. If I was, I’d do it right and have a hidden underwater lair, an army of minions to do my bidding, and a master plan for world domination that would include exiling Nate Watkins to a moon base with no video games. I don’t have those things. (Though between you and me, I have made sketches in my notebook for a terrific prisoner transport rocket in case I ever get them.)
Anyway, when I got to class Tuesday morning, I set my books on my desk and turned around to talk to Cat, who sits behind me. My elbow hit my math book and—bam!—I knocked it right off my desk and onto the floor.
“What’s the matter, Dorko?” said Nate Watkins, who sits behind Cat. “Can’t make your books fly? Is your wand broken?”
Cat rolled her eyes and made a goofball face to show what she thought of Nate. I just ignored him.
Nate thinks he’s the coolest thing ever because he gets whatever he wants and always has every video game in the universe. You know the kind of guy. You probably have one in your class, too. Nate has mousy brown hair and really square teeth, but the guy in your class might have dark hair or be blond and might have pointy vampire-shaped teeth. It doesn’t matter how they look. It’s how they act that makes them annoying.
Nate is clueless about magic. The sad thing is that he’s not the only one. Sometimes I think Mom and Dad don’t even get it. Sometimes when I want to do a trick, Mom and Dad look like I’m going to turn them into wombats or something, which could never happen because we don’t even have wombats in this part of the world, except at the zoo, and they don’t loan them out to fifth graders. Don’t ask me how I know that. I just do.
Like I said, people just don’t get it. I blame Harry Potter. Don’t get me wrong. I love Harry Potter, I do! But because of Harry Potter, everybody thinks magicians are wizards, which is not the case. I know that you can tell the difference, but I created the following chart for you to share with clueless people you meet who don’t.
I learned a long time ago that there wasn’t any point in trying to educate Nate Watkins, fifth-grade loser. Of course, clueless people aren’t going to listen to you, either. But it might make you feel better knowing some of the facts.
Anyway, I feel like I just told you a lot of important things, but I didn’t tell you anything important that happened at school on Tuesday. Looking back, there was only one really important thing. It happened at the end of the day, when Mrs. M gave us an assignment. Luckily, I was actually paying attention. (Hey, sometimes that happens.)
This was my favorite kind of assignment. A speech. And not some boring speech about some boring famous person or some boring topic like whether school uniforms are good or bad. This was a three-minute how-to speech. Due on Thursday.
I knew immediately what I would do. And it didn’t bother me when Mrs. M went through the long list of things we could not use in our speeches. Saws … amphibians … fire … peanut butter and socks—don’t ask! … ropes … pudding …
I’ll spare you the entire list. It went on for a while and everyone watched me the whole time she read it, but I didn’t care. I knew exactly what I was going to do, and it wouldn’t involve any of those things. I was going old-school. Classic.
I was going to pull a rabbit out of my hat.