#1 Stunna

or More Tales from the Playground


This morning on my way to work I called Jade to see if we were going to try to catch Wanda this weekend. The way things look is if I do, it won't be with Jade. No surprise there. I had kind of written her off once she mentioned inviting Mrs. Stick-Up-Her-Ass-'Cause-She's-So-Damn-Bougie. (And if she is from a similar background as Jade's, then she really has no excuse to be that way unless she's of the social climbing variety.) Seems like Jade does not want to cross the Bay. Not like I did not specifically say that the show was in San Francisco. Thank goodness she's my oldest friend. Anyone else? Would have been dropped by now.

We were still in conversation when I arrived at work so I continued talking (Thank you, headset.) while I got things ready in my room for the start of the day. Then there was a loud pounding on the door since I always lock myself in before school starts.

I told Jade, "It must be Kool-Aid," as I went to the door. It was indeed the child otherwise known as Kool-Aid. (Queenie and I started calling him this after I pointed out that he's always "all in the Kool Aid and don't even know the flava.") He always wants to drop his backpack in the room before school starts.

I continued to talking to Jade while he did this. He yelled a "hello" to her. Actually that was his normal speaking voice. I keep trying to work with him on having an "inside voice."

At the time I was writing the daily agenda on the board. He made some commentary. I think my answer was something like, "Puh-leeze." Jade was able to hear the entire exchange and said that my kids sounded awfully mature. (She teaches first and second grades.) I assured her they were.

When I told Kool Aid that he needed to leave because I had things to take care of, he protested. I prompted him to say his usual response to me. "You just hatin' on me 'cause I'm a Black man." Jade laughed quite a bit over this.

He exited the room, asking, "Red, green, and black. Do you know what that stands for?"

"Africa."

"That's right." And then he gave me a salute that would have made John Carlos proud. And of course, I returned the salute.

Kool Aid chose to don his mirrored Ray-Bans for the first recess. Of course, I had to give him a hard time about it all.

"Who do you think you are? If anyone's a stunna around here, it's me."

"You ain't no stunna. You don't have enough game."

"Ha! I've got more game than you can even imagine."

Yep, that's right. I hit my groove again at work and have been enjoying it. I have not been drained upon arriving home at all this week. (Perhaps I will tell you later how I managed to fuck up some kids' world because I had enough energy to call home.) So feel free to call me Empress or Stunna. Or my old name from college days when I was in student government -- Queen Bitch Shrew. It's all the same to me.