The Death of Art

My junior high art teacher was crazy.

That probably isn't an exaggeration. Those of you who knew her will recall that she mumbled to herself constantly and would tend to randomly brush her teeth during class.

Mrs. Miller was her name, and despite the fact that she was a lunatic, she was actually a fairly nice lady.

The last time that I recall having Mrs. Miller for art was around about 7th grade. I was in a small class where I was quite literally the only student in the room who gave half a shit about art. The classmates surrounding me were your stereotypical football player types who just took art because they thought it would be an easy class where they wouldn't have to spell anything or read out loud. They spent their days in the class huddled together discussing their sexual exploits (in 7th grade) with the girlfriend of another of their moron kin, and all the while I was just trying to draw the perfect Spiderman.

I did eventually. Draw the perfect Spiderman I mean...

It was on a large poster sheet that my grandmother had purchased for me at Kroger. I don't remember the exact pose but it was your typical "Spiderman diving at you" scene. I remember being quite proud of it. Mrs. Miller enjoyed it as well. She had me include it in an "art gallery" of sorts that she put together after hours at the school one night. I believe it was the first and last time I had ever seen such a thing happen at my school. I remember bringing my parents to it, and seeing student art hanging all over the hallways, and in the art room. I remember wondering where all that art came from, because I was obviously the only person in my particular class who was producing anything, and there weren't too many other students who showed up to view this stuff. Maybe she had other decent classes which made up for the cesspool that was mine. Or perhaps she drew most of them herself in an attempt to make it look like small town West Virginia was more artful than it seemed. I wouldn't have put it past her. She was crazy after all.

Mrs. Miller did not finish her tenure as the teacher of my art class. She was suspended from school for having an altercation with a student. One of the morons from my class. I don't remember exactly what happened? I want to think maybe she slapped him? I'm sure that it was deserved. It was a pity she didn't hit him in the face with a claw hammer. But I digress...

We had a substitute for the remainder of the semester. I think she did eventually return to teach but it was after I had gone. Hopefully she had better luck with students after that... But I sort of doubt it.