Once up upon a time when I was in fifth grade, I attended Lake George charter school that was not too far from where my grandparents lived. The school days were Monday through Thursday and school would start at eight in the morning to end at four in the afternoon. Before I went to school there I went to an elementary school in Denver, and there was a world of difference. The Denver school I went to was called Centennial Elementary, I always remember being bullied and getting into a lot of fights. So my mom decided to let me stay with my grandparents in the mountains.
One day at school my teacher Mr. Valdez was reading to us out of a book about a half hour before we got out of class. Mr. Valdez had his good and bad days, but a majority of the time he was nice unless you got on his bad side and I don’t think that anyone would be that dumb to do so. He read to us out of a book for the past few weeks so we can discuss what he read about when he was finished. Well after about ten minutes of reading the book he looked up at my friend sitting next to me. His name was Richie, he was a pretty laid back kid, and he was a good friend of mine. Mr. Valdez observed that Richie was doing something to his desk.
“Richie, what are you doing to your desk?” Mr. Valdez asked.
“He just has magazine pictures taped on top” My friend Michael told him. But Mr. Valdez got up from where he was sitting on the table to come over and see what he was doing. Richie was carving a large hole into the side of the desk he was facing. Mr. Valdez had a shocked look on his face. As he was poking my head angrily with his index finger he angrily asked.
“Did you do this too?!” I simply just nodded my head. It was me, Richie, and about four of my other friends in which had done the same things to their desks. Mr. Valdez marched to his desk and called the principle so she could come over to the classroom.
“Oh man! We are in big trouble!” I said in a scared tone to my friend Richie.
“Ok everyone you can leave except for Both the Michaels, Richie, and anyone else who did this to their desks.” After everyone left the classroom, my friends and I just stayed sitting at our desks with frightened looks on our faces. We sat there scared to death because we all knew our parents were sitting in their cars outside waiting for us, especially my grandma, I could not believe it was happening. The principle came through the door after about five or ten minutes of waiting.
“So these are the gentlemen who carved the holes in their desks” Our principle asked.
“Yes” Mr. Valdez stated as they both crossed their arms.
“We are going to have each and every one of you call your parents so you can tell them what you did yourselves.” I was stunned after she said this but it was highly inevitable for them to find out anyway. So while Richie was on the phone with his mother, my grandma walked through the door and I was so scared because I did not want her to hear what I had done.
“Hello.” My grandma said as she came in and shook Mr. Valdez’s hand.
“Hello Mrs. Velasquez Michael is right over there.” He told her. She knew something was wrong when he gave her the “your grandson is in deep shit look”. I waved my hand in the sign of come here. She walked over to my desk, as I was pointing at what I did I said:
“This is what Mr. Valdez wanted me to show you.” I said in a sad tone. She just looked at me ashamed and said.
“Well what do you have to say for yourself?” My grandma asked in an upset tone. I just sat there quiet in my chair thinking how disappointed she was of me.
“Let’s go” She told me. I got up from my chair and we left the classroom. When we were on the way home there was not a single word that was spoken. After a short time of getting home she had received a phone call from my principle.
“Hello…yes…” she said then there was a longer pause
“Alright…I will take care…bye bye” She hung up the phone walked over to me and said “You are suspended from school for a week” There was a silence and I can tell she was even more upset after hearing what my punishment was, although she thought it was not enough.
“You are grounded for one month, no TV, no videogames, and no hanging out with friends” She told me. I accepted the punishment knowing not to argue with her because I would have gotten yelled at, hit, and had even more punishment.
The only reason why my friends and I carved holes in our desks was because we were bored. I know sounds kind of dumb but it’s the truth, and we did not think that they would take it to that extreme. As a matter of fact we had no idea we would even get in trouble in the first place! Well I know I learned my lesson and ever since then I never committed such a foolish act of violation towards school property.
