Diary of a pre-certified teacher, Vol. VII: National Geographic Explorer

The most Howard Stern moment came the day that me and this guy nicknamed Ig were working in the ticket booth out front. They had built the both with two-inch class, and when talking through it it was difficult to understand the other person. Customers on the outside could hear us only if we got right up to the round hole in the middle of the window. The ticket booth was where you dealt with a lot of angry, disappointed people. People who had lost their tickets. Who didn’t have tickets but didn’t know it was sold out, and they had driven to Washington from Pennsylvania, and couldn’t we give them a break. And people who were just jerks. Ig and I were in the booth when a guy came up to my window and started complaining. What did I mean we were sold out? He was visiting from Germany! His plane left in three hours! The Web site said nothing about being sold out! Where was my manager?

I farted. Loudly.

Ig jumped. The man, clueless behind two inches of near-soundproof glass, kept talking.

“I wanna know who is in charge here—“

I let him know again. BWWWWWAAAP!!!!

“I’ve been a subscriber to National Geographic since 1957—“

BBBBBBRRRRRRRAAAAPPPPPPP!!!!!!

I stood there facing the man and nodding. He had no idea I had almost blown out the back of the ticket booth. He just went on. By now Ig had his head down. He was shaking with laughter. “Supervisors,” he radioed, “can we get some Lysol in the booth?”

After four months, I finally left the job. The self-scheduling had caused problems. Some kids were only working one day a week, leaving others to work overtime. They extended the weekend visiting hours, from 10 to 6 to 10 to 8 or even 9 if there was a special event. Some people were scheduled 9 to 10—that’s 9 a.m. to 10 p.m., and sometimes several days in a row. Adding to that, new dictums came down from the worst supervisor, a control freak I called the Red Skull. From now on if we couldn’t work and even tried to find a sub—a common occurrence—we would be written up, even if we had sick leave hours. In short, there was no calling in sick. No more stand-up on the walkie-talkies. We had to treat our fellow employees with “respect.” A 13-hour day came with one half hour for lunch, no dinner, and a possible fifteen minute break was “at the discretion of the supervisor.” And so on.

So: we couldn’t take a sick day, even if we had the hours to do so. We couldn’t give each other good-humored shit. No stress-relief on the microphone. And, if Red Skull was working, best to pass out rather than take five for some fresh air during a 12- or 13-hour shift. I was enduring such monster shift when I suddenly felt dizzy, and my legs went numb. I was in the hallway, directing visitors from one part of the exhibit to the other. I sat down on a stool (they provided us with those—the job would not have been possibly without them) and tried to stay focused. I had been there for 11 hours, and my post-chemo legs were giving. But I had kept up for four months, and only one more hour to go. I had to do it. I suddenly realized that I was having a National Geographic Explorer moment; I had to retain consciousness, push ahead, stuff down the pain. I was like Admiral Perry on the North Pole or Jacques Cousteau at the ocean floor. And it was happening inside the lobby of the National Geographic building itself.

I gave my notice that day. Three other workers had done the same the day before. The thing was breaking apart, and soon would be just another museum/retail establishment with overly serious bosses, no benefits and heavy turnover. Before leaving, I stopped by the 7^th floor to see dad’s old office. Near it was his picture with a description:

“It’s a magazine of discovery,” said Thomas Brehon, here shown studying a map of Christopher Columbus’ journey to the New World. Using computers to calculate the voyage, Brehon discovered the original Columbus landfall in Samana Cay, Bahamas. Washington, D.C., was Brehon’s home town. He was wired into the city. He wrote speeches for JFK. And there was no contradiction between the Irish Catholic poet and the journalist with a soaring world view. The two sides of Thomas Brehon played against each other like a harp to produce vivid pictures of Jerusalem and Alaska, Ireland, the Australian outback the Minoans, articles that betrayed a deep streak of compassion He was the magazine’s top word man for ten years. He offered his writer’s that most frightening of freedoms: trust.

I got on the subway to go home. I felt spent, and still had no idea why I was alive. But I knew it wasn’t to check coats. As the train came up from the underground, I saw the lights of home. On my iPod was a U2 song, “Moment of Surrender”:

I was speeding on the subway

Through the station of the cross

Every eye looking every other way

Counting down ’til the pain would stop

At the moment of surrender

Of vision over visibility

I did not notice the passers-by

And they did not notice me

Augustine Brehon is a name assumed to protect the author, who is currently receiving his education certification near Washington, D.C.