I am More Awesome Than You

There comes a time in every man’s life when duty calls, when natural forces storm into the heart and wrench him to his feet, to stand up and be counted, and man up to the chaotic vicissitudes of the natural order. This for me was that moment. When duty, my duty as an American called from on high, a clarion blast that said, Be Awesome.

And so I was.

I roared out the words the teachers had given me:

“In this modern age, as we advance, with proud strong strides into the 21st century, as society advances, as we are borne forward on the inevitable tsunami of history, English is no longer simply a tool. Nay. It has become so much more. It is now a vessel of knowledge, a vast archive of accumulated wisdom and strength. To know English, to know a foreign language, is to live in a world that has given you a second pair of ears, another pair of eyes, let it be said, yes! Another head!” 

“Are you ready kids?!” I roared at them.

The children danced behind me, vibrating with readiness.

I went back to the front of the stage and spread my arms out to the vast undulating sea of rainbow pennants, to the stone faced seriousness of the government officials, to the hopeful, happy and proud faces of the parents and I thought, this is the moment.

To the audience I implored, “The children need us! They need to know that we are with them! Is that right ?!” And a massive wave of proud parents, of government officials, of the strong and honoured brethren of those privileged few on stage gasped back in a tidal wave of pride, “Yes!” And I said, “That’s right! And to do that we’re all going to sing together! Are you with me?!? And again, a gale force hurricane of sound hit me, “Yes!!”

Then let us begin.

The first tinkling notes of that melody floated out over the heads of the audience, that tune that we all know so well, that forms part of the mental universe that we as humanity inhabit.

Young innocent children. Hopeful teary eyed parents. Craggy, grey faced government officials; all thousand of us put our right hands in. We put our right hands out. We put our right hands in and we shook them all about. We turned ourselves around. And all thousand of us, together, for the future, for English, did the hokey pokey.