Frankie's Apartment: Go Easy On The Soap!
That's the best advice anyone's ever given me.
Are you reading this Sudsy The Ghost?
Cartoon of Frankie from back in his Laundry-Mat days.
You could never have enough sudsing.
Some people still call me Soft Water. You should hear some of the other things they call me. The other day Zipcar called me to tell me the person returning the car I was going to be driving was gonna be late. Once, my father called me a shmuck for lighting the dining room table on fire. Mr. Stonehill called us the worst class in the history of the school in 7th grade Social Studies. The thing I liked about Social Studies was those map curtains that they'd pull down over the blackboard. Weird thing about our blackboards was that they were green.
My screen-print teacher called me mud. "YOU ARE MUD, YOU ARE ALL MUD!"
I felt so bad for her that day. I was supposed to be one of the "good" kids, I felt like I let her down that day. She always gave me the impression that she remained a teacher for those few students that showed an interest, the ones that really learn and get it. I was supposed to be one of those students.
-And then she caught me, I was just like the rest of them. I felt so sorry, I wanted to apologize to her, but how could I? It was only her and like 10 of my peers, my boys!
Weeks later, I would skip my lunch period and go see her. At first she didn't let me in. After several attempts of me trying to break into her classroom, she finally asked me what the hell do I want. "Why don't you go write on the walls some more?"
I apologized for whatever happened and then I asked her how is she doing, not how the class is, not what our next project was. I asked her, how is she doing? I was geuinely interested, I had tremendous respect for her as a teacher and for her phenomenal drawing skills. We spoke and chatted and there was mutual respect. I did alot of growing up in that print class. I learned so much more than the curriculum intended. But yeah, she called me mud! What does that even mean?
-Our chalkboards were black in the print class. We also had dry erase boards in white of course.