Crawdad Creek Chapter Three

Sawyer settles into his new job.

Crawdad Creek Chapter Three

            Sawyer had accepted the position teaching English at Crawdad Creek High School not only in haste, but at the last minute. The school administration and the principal, Wanda Lopez, were still scrambling in mid-August to find a replacement, after Sawyer’s predecessor suddenly and unexpectedly announced his retirement for health reasons at the end of the school year, leaving the school district hanging. They began searching immediately, but prospects were not exactly breaking down the door to move to Crawdad Creek, especially after the town itself had been dragged through the mud for the past year. They needed someone just as desperate as they were. Enter Thomas Sawyer, the ink still drying on his divorce, and looking for an excuse to move away from the toxic waste site his life had become.

            He had earned his degree in English Education at the University of Iowa, where he also had met his future bride, Kelli Knutson, but had given up teaching for writing full time after just a few years. The plan was to live off of Kelli’s income as a bookkeeper, while Sawyer tried to make it big writing the great American novel. Sawyer’s initial offerings failed to resonate �" with anyone. The consensus among the gatekeepers of the publishing world was, thanks for thinking of us, but we did not connect with your work, it wasn’t quite the right fit so we are going to pass, but keep trying as the industry is very subjective, and we wish you the best, and keep us in mind for your future projects, and yada, yada, yada. The writing on the wall clearly told Sawyer, those who can’t, teach.

            Principal Lopez dropped everything and drove over two hundred miles when she found a fish nibbling on her line at Craigslist. She wasn’t going to take no for an answer. There was something so poetic about a small-town English teacher named Tom Sawyer. As it turned out, it didn’t take any effort to reel him in. It seemed like destiny, to both of them. Sawyer was the one now scrambling to put together a teaching plan, just days before the start of school. He visited his new principal the day after moving into his new dump.

            “Mr. Sawyer, come in, come in,” Principal Lopez said, as Sawyer entered her office. “I can’t tell you how happy I am to see you. I’ve been telling everyone about you, but a part of me expected you not to show. I know Crawdad Creek High School is not exactly the Ivy League. I spent most of the summer expecting to have to teach your classes myself.”

            “Nonsense,” Sawyer said. “I wouldn’t let you down. You have no idea how much I’ve already got invested in your lovely little community.”

            “You’re a true gentleman,” Principal Lopez said. “Lovely is not the word that comes to most people’s minds when they first arrive here. I take it you’re settled in then?”

            “Not sure settled is the word that comes to mind, but yes,” Sawyer said.

            Principal Lopez showed Sawyer around his new school, heading to the classroom where all the magic would happen. In true small-town fashion, they ran into one of Sawyer’s old pals in the hallway, his next-door neighbor, Ray, who had been the building maintenance supervisor for the Crawdad Creek School System for over thirty years �" i.e. the janitor.

            “Well, speak of the devil, howdy neighbor,” Ray enthused, as Sawyer and the principal walked down the main hallway, where he was operating a good old-fashioned bucket and mop. At Sawyer’s previous school in the “big city,” most of the building maintenance was performed by high tech, AI robots, so there was something quite touching to see such a throw back to bygone days. He wondered if he might find a Corona typewriter in his classroom as well.

            “You two have met?” Principal Lopez said. “I guess I shouldn’t be surprised. Ray here knows everybody in town, and everybody knows Ray.”

            “He helped move me in yesterday,” Sawyer said. “He never mentioned we’d be working together.”

            “Maybe that’s because you were in such an all fired hurry,” Ray said. He turned to Principal Lopez. “Man gave me the bum’s rush yesterday. Guess that’s what you’d expect from city folks.”

            “Give him time, Ray,” Principal Lopez said. “I’m sure he’ll settle into our leisurely pace once he gets used to it.”

            “You know, where I used to teach in the city,” Sawyer said, “they had robots doing all the cleaning.”

            “Robots!” Ray exclaimed. “You know what I say to that? Phooey, that’s what I say. Can’t no robot care about a job well done.”

            “Amen to that,” Principal Lopez said. “We’ll put our janitorial staff up against an army of robots any day, won’t we Ray?”

            “You’re darn tootin’,” Ray said.

            “Oh, I didn’t mean to insult you,” Sawyer said. “I just thought you’d find it interesting.”

            “Ain’t nothin’ interestin’ to me about robots takin’ jobs away from regular folks,” Ray said.

            “I hear you there, Ray,” Sawyer said. “The first thing I noticed when I got here today is how clean the place is. You’re doing a helluva job.”

            “Tell that to the boss when it’s contract time,” Ray said. “You hear that Ms. Lopez? Seems like all my hard work has not gone unnoticed.”

            “You can rest assured I’ve got your back with the school board, Ray,” Principal Lopez said. “Now if you don’t mind, I’ve got to show Mr. Sawyer to his new classroom.”

            “Be my guest. Don’t dilly dally on my account,” Ray said.

            They walked further down the hallway on their way to Sawyer’s English classroom. The school was a magnificent, early twentieth century red brick affair, with tall ceilings, wide hallways, and a grand stairway with wrought iron railings. There was an unmistakable institutional smell about it. As they were about to head up to the second floor where Sawyer would teach, Bev Campbell and Glen were coming down.

            “Hello, Campbells,” Principal Lopez said.

            “Morning, Wanda,” Bev said. She turned to Sawyer. “So, did Barb get you all fixed up yesterday over to the Piggly Wiggly after I left?”

            “That she did,” Sawyer said. “No complaints.”

            “You two know each other?” Principal Lopez said. “I must say you get around.” She winked at Bev as she said to Sawyer, “Don’t tell me you’re renting a place from her.”

            Sawyer could see he was going to have to get used to a lot of that kind of good-natured ribbing amongst the townsfolk. He had to admit it had a certain charm, but wondered how quickly it might grow old. Bev and Wanda had grown up together in Crawdad Creek, and gone to the same school where Bev now worked and Wanda sent her children. They were on the same women’s bowling league. They shared an intimacy that was rare, or didn’t exist, where Sawyer came from. It occurred to him he should try writing a novel about such characters and lifestyles, not that it hadn’t already been done to death.

            “I figured if I was going to work here, I should live amongst the natives,” Sawyer said, trying to quip his way into the apparent little cult of jocular familiarity.

            “Don’t worry,” Bev said to the principal. “I steered him away from the old Abner place.”

            “Lucky you,” Principal Lopez said to Sawyer. “She’s been trying for years to unload that rat trap on some poor, unsuspecting stranger. Thanks for not scaring away my new English teacher before he even begins. You don’t know what I went through to find him.”

            “No worries,” Bev said. “I knew he was gonna be working here, so I set him up just down the block, right next door to Raymond as a matter of fact.”

            “Yes, I just found out,” Principal Lopez said. “We ran into him on his rounds. They’re already fast friends. You know how Ray is.” She turned to Glen, who had been skulking against the railing. “And how are you doing today, young man? Ready for a new school year?”

            Glen shrugged.

            “We were just working on his math situation,” Bev said. “Kid’s got to get his act together if he wants to graduate this year.”

            “I’m sure you’ll be just fine,” Principal Lopez said to the lad, who had only a passing acquaintance with numbers.

            “Mrs. Garcia’s going to arrange for a tutor to drag him over the finish line,” Bev said.

            “Have you met your new English teacher?” Principal Lopez said to Glen.

            Glen shrugged again.

            “Oh, they met all right,” Bev said. “Don’t be rude boy. You remember Mr. Sawyer, don’t you? He came to the Tastee Freez yesterday.”

            “Oh, yeah,” Glen said, lighting up. “The dude with the gnarly old wagon.”

            “It’s nice to meet you, Glen,” Sawyer said. “I’m sure we’ll have a great year together.”

            Glen nodded. “Sure,” he said. The truth was Glen could barely get a passing grade in most of his classes, other than gym and auto-mechanics, where he shined. The subject that he had been most invested in during the past year was Shelby Harwood.

            Just as the little group was looking for an excuse to wrap up their meeting, a commotion was heard. What appeared to Sawyer to be a random stray beagle came walking down the hallway, with Ray close behind.

            “Someone grab that pooch,” Ray hollered. “He’s messing up my clean floor.”

            Glen sprang into action and scooped the animal into his arms. “Hey, Ben,” he said. “What are you doing in here, Boy?”

            “Somebody needs to lock that mutt up,” Ray said.

            “He’s all right,” Glen said, rubbing the dog’s jowls and accepting a sloppy kiss. “Ben wouldn’t hurt anybody, would you, Boy. Who’s a good doggy?”

            “I suppose you’ve met him too?” Principal Lopez said to Sawyer.

            “No, I haven’t had the pleasure,” Sawyer said.

            “That’s just Ben,” Bev said. “He’s supposed to live at Hidden Acres, but his owners let him run all over town.”

            “Kind of like a town mascot,” Sawyer said.

            “A town nuisance, if you asked me,” Ray said. “Dog poops all over my yard too.”

            “Why don’t you take Ben outside, and I’ll see you at home later,” Bev said to Glen, who took his leave.

            “How’d he get in here?” Principal Lopez said to Ray.

            “I haven’t the foggiest,” Ray said. “I was just moppin’ my floors and he come a walkin’ on by like he owns the place, trackin’ dirt everywhere.”

            “Well, nothing like a little excitement, right Ray?” Principal Lopez said.

            “A little excitement?” Ray exclaimed. “You know what I say to that? Phooey, that’s what I say. Now I’m gonna have to redo the entire hall.”  He searched their faces for some sympathy, and finding little more than a couple raised eyebrows, he huffed back down the hall.

            “Well, you take good care of my boy this year,” Bev said to Sawyer. “And be sure and keep an eye on those two like I told you.”

            “We’ll try to keep the bundles of joy to a minimum,” Sawyer said, trying to further ease himself into the gentle flow of comradery that was apparently ubiquitous in Crawdad Creek.

            Principal Lopez and Sawyer continued up the stairs to the second-floor English classroom. The door was locked and it was dark inside. The principal struggled to find the right key on an enormous ring. When they finally entered, it was stifling hot, and at least half the lights didn’t work. The ceilings were sky high and the walls barren, except for cracking and peeling paint. A gentle dusting of asbestos was a distinct possibility. There was a three-ton metal teacher’s desk at the front by an old-fashioned chalk blackboard, and several rows of two-hundred-year-old wooden school desks. Sawyer gathered he would be teaching in a nineteenth century insane asylum. There were half a dozen huge windows looking out across the street to the Piggly Wiggly parking lot and the court/sheriff/jail/city building. If any students stepped out of line, justice would be swift.

            “Place just needs a little fresh air,” Principal Lopez said. Sawyer thought about where he had just heard that before. It occurred to him it would make an excellent slogan for the town at large �" Welcome to Crawdad Creek. Place just needs a little fresh air.

            Principal Lopez went over to the ancient pane glass windows and broke some of her nails trying to undo the locks. They both pushed mightily against the windows in a generally upward direction, as the principal’s many bracelets jingled. They refused to yield. They had quite possibly not been opened since before the turn of the century. The previous English teacher was nearly as old as the school itself, and not a fan of drafts.

            “I’ll have Ray take a look at these this afternoon,” Principal Lopez said. “We’ll have to get these lights up to speed as well. I promise you, I’ll have it all worked out by Monday morning.”

            “Just so I’m not surprised,” Sawyer quipped to Principal Lopez, “will the students all be wearing shoes, or should I expect some bare feet?”

            “You never know around here,” Principal Lopez replied with a wink. “Keep an open mind.”

 

The first day of school found Sawyer welcoming students from a wide variety of ages and grades, ranging from eighth through twelfth, as well as an impressive range of reading abilities, roughly from first through eighth, with a few notable exceptions, all thankfully wearing appropriate footwear, although with questionable choices in fashion, it being the United States of America and all. As Bev had feared, Shelby and Glen arrived together for their senior English seminar, and sat down in the back of the class right next to each other. Sawyer didn’t feel like waging a war on day one with the young Bonnie and Clyde. First, he had to figure out just how familiar they all were with their native tongue. They could all no doubt earn an ‘A’ in the latest teen speak, but he was responsible for their proficiency in two out of three of the famous ‘R’s.

He introduced himself briefly, and then jumped right in. Whether ill-advised or not, he handed out a copy of Nathaniel Hawthorne’s The Scarlet Letter to each student, and had everyone open to page one. He went down the rows from front to back, and asked each student to read a couple of sentences out loud, just to see the range of abilities. They were supposed to be high school seniors, and the book had been standard school reading material since the beginning of time. For all he knew, some of them might have studied it before. Not surprisingly, for some students, such as his one immediately apparent over-achiever, Dannisha Washington, the words flowed mellifluously, while for others, it was as if he had asked them to read ancient Sanskrit. Shelby Harwood, having spent most of her years in private school in Washington D.C., showed promise, although the same could not be said for her Romeo.

            “I can see we’ve got some work to do,” Sawyer said to his class.

            He wondered if his students might be able to read the text more easily if he could upload it to their smart phones, so they could view it in a format they were used to looking at all day long.

            “How many of you have already read this book?” Sawyer asked.

            The students looked around at each other first, like they were being asked to cast a ballot. A few hands went up, including Dannisha’s of course.

            “Good, then it will be new to most of you,” Sawyer said. “This is going to be your first assignment for the year. We’re going to read this together, as a class, and discuss it, and answer questions as we go along.” The students gave him mostly blank stares. Dannisha smiled. Shelby passed a note to Glen in the back of the room. “I realize I’m new around here, and you’ve been getting your English lessons from old Barnaby Jones,” he said, pausing, but failing to see any sign of recognition. Apparently, he was the only aficionado of twentieth century television references. “You can google it later. Anyway, after we’re done reading, you’ll each be writing a paper for your first grade.” The class heaved a collective groan. “So, you are listening, good,” Sawyer said. “For today, let’s just talk about the first few pages we read. What did you think of how Hawthorne opened the narrative?”

            He looked around at the students, who cast furtive glances at each other. No one wanted to stand out. Well, almost no one. Dannisha waited a respectable amount of time, trying not to seem too eager, even though she always did �" everyone knew from their years of schooling together that she was the class oracle �" and slowly raised her hand. Sawyer could already anticipate that this was going to be the norm for the rest of the year. There was one in every class. He would find a way to pull the teeth out of the rest of them, but he would let Dannisha shine for the time being.

            “Yes, you,” Sawyer said, pointing to his one bright and shiny pupil. “Tell me your name and what you think.”

            “Um, I’m Dannisha, but everybody calls me Danni,” she said. “It’s a public shaming, really. We still do the same thing today, only we use social media. They used to do it right out in the open. I guess what I’m saying is, nothing ever changes. There will always be people who want to judge other people.”

            “That’s very good,” Sawyer said. “Anyone else want to expand on what Danni just said?”

            Most of the class continued staring at the floor or looking around sheepishly at each other. Sawyer scanned the room for proof of life. He noticed Glen handing the note back to Shelby. Sadly, for Glen, he happened to be one of the only other students Sawyer had met so far.

            “Glen,” Sawyer said, catching the young man’s attention, who gave him a startled look of horror. “What did you think of the opening passages we just read?”

            “To tell you the truth, Sir,” Glen said. “I didn’t know what was happening. I mean, why can’t the guy just write in plain English? Who talks like that?”

            “Okay,” Sawyer said. “I can understand your frustration. It’s certainly true that people used to write and speak in the past a little differently than what we’re used to. Did anyone else have the same problem with the text?”

            Now Sawyer got plenty of enthusiastic nods and hands in the air.

            “Well, all I can say is, I hope you’ll bear with me as we forge ahead,” Sawyer said. “You get used to it.”

            It was going to be a long year.

           

Author's Note: If you're enjoying the book so far, please let me know what you think. 

           

Reviews

[JayG]

Take a deep breath, because this will sting. It deals with issues invisible to you, that while unrelated to how well you write, or your talent, are critical.

The first thing that hit me is that your profession is getting in your way.

In becoming a lawyer, you took the nonfiction writing skills that are all we’re given in school, and honed then to the dispassionate clarity that’s required by your profession. And it’s those skills you’re using in writing this. So, the approach, as it is for all nonfiction writing, is the fact-based and author-centric skills you’d use in preparing any legal document.

As a result, the facts are clear, and accurate, and, read with all the excitement of a report because we're hearing about the events secondhand, from a dispassionate external observor.

You open with three paragraphs, 393 words of generic scene setting, and, irrelevant to the scene backstory, in which the protagonist isn’t yet on the stage. But fair is fair. It's HIS story. So, we’re on the third standard manuscript page and the protagonist has yet to come on stage.

I stress this because for you, this is clear, concise, and meaningful, and exactly what you set out to say. But it’s detail, and history, not story. As Sol Stein puts it: “A novel is like a car—it won’t go anywhere until you turn on the engine. The “engine” of both fiction and nonfiction is the point at which the reader makes the decision not to put the book down. The engine should start in the first three pages, the closer to the top of page one the better.”

• As he approached his new hometown...

Here, the protagonist finally appears on stage, approaching his destination. But then, after placing him in his car, you stop the action, step back on stage and provide a 442 word info-dump of information that's irrelevant to the action.

So we’re on page five and nothing has happened in the story. We’ve had four pages of the author talking TO the reader about things unrelated to his immediate goal, his personality, or, the plot.

• He pulled into the Tastee Freez, which happened to be staffed that day by a couple of local kids who would soon play a significant role in his life,

Obviously, based on this, we’re not with him. And he’s not our protagonist. Instead, he’s someone you talk about. So basically, you’re transcribing yourself telling a story as if to an audience. But, in all the world, who but you knows the emotion to place into the narrator’s voice? Who else knows the gestures, the expression changes, and the body language that goes into the storyteller’s performance?

For you, as you perform the story, it lives. But the reader has a storyteller’s script, with no performance notes. For a better idea of what the reader gets, have the computer read it to you. For a true picture of that, try Sol Stein’s example:
- - - - -
“Each Friday afternoon at three, while other students decamped for their homes, the lights were on in the Magpie tower high above the rectangle of the school. There Wilmer Stone met with Richard Avedon, then a poet, who became one of the most famous photographers in the world, the editor Emile Capouya, Jimmy Baldwin, myself, and a few others whose names hide behind the scrim of time.

What went on in that tower was excruciatingly painful. Wilmer Stone read our stories to us in a monotone as if he were reading from the pages of a phone directory. What we learned with each stab of pain was that the words themselves and not the inflections supplied by the reader had to carry the emotion of the story.

Today I still hear the metronome of Wilmer Stone’s voice, and counsel my students to have their drafts read to them by the friend who has the least talent for acting and is capable of reading words as if they had no meaning.”
- - - - -
Like most people, myself included, you left school believing that writing-is-writing, and that you have that taken care of. And the pros make the act of writing seem so natural and easy that we forget that like the field of Law, Commercial Fiction Writing is a profession, whose body of specialized knowledge must be acquired and perfected.

But because we ARE the storyteller, and we begin reading our own work already knowing the characters and their backstory, the setting and situation, and the progression of a scene, our own writing always works for us. And who addresses the problems they don’t see as being problems?

The fix? Simply add those missing skills and practice them till they’re as intuitive to use as the nonfiction skills you now possess. You’ll find the learning filled with, “But wait.... That’s so obvious. How could I not have seen it for myself?” That’s entertaining, till you find yourself growling the words, and pounding your head on the table. 😆

But in the end, you’ll love the huge boost in the readability once the protagonist becomes your cowriter, whispering suggestions and warnings in your ear.

In fact, as some point your protagonist will, in effect, straighten, cross their arms, and glare as they say, “Wait! You expect me to do THAT, in this situation? With the personality, background, resources, and needs you’ve given me? Are you out of your MIND?”

And they’ll be right. They’re always right. And the day that happens, you truly are a writer, and will learn that living the story as-the-protagonist, is where the true joy of writing lies.

Try this: Dwight Swain’s, Techniques of the Selling Writer, is the best I've found to date at imparting and clarifying the "nuts-and-bolts" issues of creating a scene that will sing to the reader. It’s an older book, and the scan-in from print isn’t perfect, but it's free to read or download on the Internet Archive site linked to below.

https://archive.org/details/TechniquesOfTheSellingWriterCUsersvenkatmGoogleDrive4FilmMakingBsc_ChennaiFilmSchoolPractice_Others

Give it a try, but read it slowly, with time spent thinking about how each introduced point relates to your writing. And practice using the point on your existing writing to make it part of your tool-kit, or you’ll forget you learned it three days later.

Then, after six months using those skills, read it again. With a better idea of where he's going, you'll get as much that's new as you did the first time.

He won’t make a pro of you. That’s your task. But he will give you the knowledge and tools to do it with if it’s in you. Before I found that book I wrote six endlessly rejected novels. But one year after finding it I got my first yes from a publisher. Maybe he can do that for you.

And for what it may be worth, my articles and YouTube videos are meant as a general overview of the traps and gotchas that catch most of us when we turn to writing fiction.

Hang in there, and keep on writing. It never gets easier, but with work, we can become confused on a higher level.

Jay Greenstein
Articles: https://jaygreenstein.wordpress.com/category/the-craft-of-writing/the-grumpy-old-writing-coach/
Videos: https://www.youtube.com/@jaygreenstein3334

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“Good writing is supposed to evoke sensation in the reader. Not the fact that it’s raining, but the feeling of being rained upon.”
~ E. L. Doctorow

“It ain’t what you don’t know that gets you into trouble. It’s what you know for sure that just ain’t so.”
~ Mark Twain