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B.I. #1 - September 23rd
St. Mark's High School - Principal's office
Middlefield, Vermont
Father Joseph Chimento[7]
Q
I'm thrilled we were selected! A documentary about high school students that doesn't revolve around sex and drug use or cheating or some kind of eating disorder is an excellent idea.
Q
The staff and students have all been informed. I'm sure it'll be strange to have cameras around at first, but we'll get used to it.
Q
Not at all! I'm involved in summer stock here in Middlefield, so...
Q
Certainly. Mr. Halpert is new. He came to us from Scranton, Pennsylvania.
Q
True, we don't often get applicants from out of state. We don't get a lot of applicants from in-state, either, to tell the truth. He said he was looking to relocate to Vermont and he'd done his research. He thought the area was exactly what he wanted.
Q
I suppose the thought crossed my mind, but - we do very thorough background checks here and everything checked out. I just - I sensed a profound sadness. A loss. He wanted to start over - have a fresh start and he had excellent credentials.
Q
I have a little joke about that. You've heard the saying "you don't have to be crazy to work here but it helps?" I say that about being Catholic, so no, it's not a requirement, but it does -
Q
He'd been raised Catholic, so he knew...and I thought that maybe God called him to us. I thought he was running to us rather than running from something. No matter what you believe, we all benefitted.
Q
I think he's doing very well. He's certainly popular with the students. We'd had a creative writing outlet for our students called...I can't even...anyway, it was published annually. Mr. Heiser did a wonderful job with it, certainly, this is in no way...but Jim...Mr. Halpert...he really got the students fired up about doing it monthly. He took them to the Dog River Bridge to throw stuff off of it - he said it was an exercise in letting go and then he got them to write about it. He got them to write some very creative, very experimental things.
Q
Oh, yes, I heard something and there was that one faculty meeting...but I suppose they settled it without bringing it to me, thank God. Seems like a lot of my time is spent as peacemaker so...that's another feather in his cap because I'm pretty sure he was the one. Mr. Heiser can be tough. He's a great teacher, but Paul can be rather...firm in his opinions.
Q
I very nearly didn't - I was going to pair him with Ms. Beesly but as much as this is 2008 and all and they're both single people and there wouldn't be anything wrong...I just wanted to remove any possibility of impropriety or conflict. I thought Jim and Paul might be good for each other. Paul lost his wife about ten years ago - never been the same, really. He's developed that hard outer shell people do sometimes. Jim wasn't like that when I met him. I could tell, you know, he had that sadness but it wasn't through and through. He was still willing to be happy. And from a teaching perspective - you can get stale over time, you know? Set in your ways and teachers sometimes lock into a routine. Jim had lots of ideas - some I wasn't so sure about to be honest, but I knew he'd ruffle some feathers...in a good way!
Q
He was hired for the vacancy left by Mrs. Ketter - she taught poetry and American literature. Neither course had been updated in years and he was really excited about that. He wanted to expand the selections - keep some classics but add in some contemporary writers. He talked a lot about David Foster Wallace and he wanted to teach Infinite Jest in the Lit class. I had no idea if the book was appropriate for our students. It's over 1,000 pages...
Q
Yes, 1,069 pages. It's too long.
BI #2 - September 29th
St. Mark's High School - Teachers Lounge
Middlefield, Vermont
Paul Heiser
Q
I teach Latin and English composition.
Q
Six. I have three kids in Latin III and three in Latin II. Nobody signed up for Latin I this year.
Q
I hope we always offer it and the students who take it, they're good kids. Smart. They want a challenge they don't get in other classes.
Q
Halpert? Yeah, I'm his mentor.
Q
Look, I know you're looking for some drama here. Classic conflict, right? The crusty old teacher, all stuck in his ways coming up against the brash young lion, full of enthusiasm and fresh ideas so we must hate each other, right? I'm supposed to be full of professional jealousy and maybe personal, too, because he's a young, good-lookin' guy. [snorts and shakes his head] You know what? There's no drama here. Halpert's a good kid. We have different opinions about things in the classroom, absolutely. I don't like some of the things he does and he doesn't like my approach. [shrugs] What're you gonna do?
Q
Sure the kids like him! He's only been at this for six years! He hasn't been worn down yet.
Q
Look, I'm not here to win a popularity contest. It is my fervent wish, each school year, that by the end of the term, I will have taken 20 functionally illiterate students and educated them to the point where they can write one, simple, perfect declarative sentence. That is my goal.
Q
Ten years ago, yeah. Joe tell ya that?
Q
No, no, it's fine. I'm sure that's why he paired me up with Halpert. He lost his fiancée a year and a half ago. Ovarian cancer. Just awful, so young.
Q
Not really. We got it all out the first day over beers. I ended up driving him home, he got pretty drunk.[8] He said the whole year has been kind of a blur to him, he doesn't remember much. I remember feeling like that - so lost. It brings you to your knees. No way you can stand back up again without having someone to lean on. [clears throat]
Q
Nah, it's okay. He's a good kid. Screwed up ideas about teaching, but he'll be okay. I think he might have something cooking with that kooky art teacher, Beesly. You know anything about that?
B.I. #3 - October 21st
St. Mark's High School - North Wing - Mr. Halpert's room
Middlefield, Vermont
Overheard from the hallway
Mr. Halpert - So, tell me about the two people in this poem.[9]
[silence]
Mr. Halpert - No ideas?
Student - The author's horny.
[laughter]
Mr. Halpert - Thank you, Jason! There it is! Okay, yes! He's, uh, he's longing for someone and that longing is turned into a physical craving that he can't...uh...well, maybe we don't need to go into that right now
[Laughter]
Mr. Halpert - Okay, it's almost last bell, so for Monday...
[class groans]
Mr. Halpert - I know! For Monday, I want a poem. It doesn't have to be in sonnet form! It can be any form you'd like.
Student - On what topic?
Mr. Halpert [groans] - I have to give you the topic, too? Okay, here we go.
[class settles]
Mr. Halpert -[sits back against the desk, arms folded, then he reaches to tap fingers against mouth] I want you to think of someone in your life. The most important person in your life. Someone who has had a huge impact on your life - positive or negative or maybe both. I want you to write about how you feel when you think about that person. I don't want a biography! I want to know what you feel when you think of that person. And then I want you to edit and edit and edit the thing. Take out the words that aren't about feelings and leave me just the raw emotion. Make me feel something.
Student - [unintelligible]
Mr. Halpert - No, Matt, you don't have to do all that. Guys, don't make this harder than it has to be! It can be as little as four lines of very simple words, but they have to be powerful words. Choose wisely, make each one count.
[class groans]
Mr. Halpert - Dazzle me with your creativity and your courage! See you Monday.
B.I. #4 - November 7th
St. Mark's High School - North Wing - Mr. Halpert's room
Middlefield, Vermont
Pam Beesly, Jim Halpert - overheard from the hallway
J - You just don't think, y'know that it'll happen. [sniffs loudly] You don't go into it with those thoughts and it was just, um, it was a sucker punch and...[growls] man, so pissed, so mad for a long time but you can't be mad. You can't let yourself...if you get caught up in your own head like that...you don't want to waste whatever time you have left together being mad
P- Yeah, I can imagine...
J - Can you? Can you imagine it?
P - Well, I didn't mean...I mean, I guess I what I mean is I can...
J - Y'know, you can't. You just can't.
P - I'm sorry, I didn't...
J - People say they know or they can imagine and you know you just don't have any fucking clue about it until you're there...
P - No, of course, I
J - and even in the middle of it you're not even aware, I mean, you're so aware, really just and you're trying to soak up every last bit of this person, their eyes, and just every last bit but you're afraid to focus on one thing because you might miss something else...
P - Please don't feel like...you don't have to tell me anything
J -[sighs] Look, Pam, I'm sorry. You're a good friend and I'm sorry I didn't tell you sooner and I don't mean to be a prick...
P - It's okay and I'm sorry, too. This isn't the right time or place and now you're upset...
J - I'm not upset, I'm not.
P - Okay. Are you angry?
J - No, no. I'm not angry and I'm not upset, I just...fuck, I don't know what I am. I just...don't know...
P - Are you hungry? [both laugh} Because I make great...instant pudding [laughter] and I can call out for pizza better than anyone.
J - [laughs] Really?
P - Yeah...and listen, I can make the real cooked kind of pudding, I mean I know how, but I actually prefer the instant, so why don't you come over after work?
J - To your house?
P - Yeah...yeah. It'll be fun. You can yell at me some more and I'll make pudding. You can haul out my high school yearbooks and make fun of me. I have lots of wine.
J - Well, since you have wine...okay. It's a date.
B.I. #5 - November 17th
St. Mark's High School - Letters publishing office
Middlefield, Vermont
Jason, Emily, Meg, Matt
Q
Emily - The name was Mr. Halpert's idea. He said that a lot of The Bible is made up of letters -
Meg - Epistles
Matt - Whatever - it goes "a reading from the letter of St. Paul to the Klingons"
Emily - Pretty sure there aren't any Klingons in the Bible, Dork Boy.
Matt - Paul wrote to like a lot of people. We can't be sure.
Emily - [loud sigh] Whatever! The point Mr. H was making is that back then, letters were the only means of communication across long distances and not everyone knew how to write. It was a very big deal.
Jason - So "letters" has two meanings - the letters of the alphabet and like love letters
Meg - Not just love letters, but written messages.
Emily - I would love to read his stuff. He promised us before the end of the year he would.
Jason - Yeah, I don't know. He's so...weird.
Emily - He's not weird!
Meg - You love him. You're in love with him and you want to have his babies.
Emily - [rolls eyes] Who doesn't?
Jason - I don't but I think Matt does.
Matt - I do and I'm straight. He makes being a dork seem cool. I don't think he's weird.
Meg - He's private - almost secretive, y'know?
Emily - Well, he's new. We just don't know him very well yet.
Q
Matt - Yeah, we had a literary thing with Mr. Heiser, but it just didn't...
Emily - It was an annual thing and like a contest so
Jason - It turned into a popularity contest over whose stuff got in there and it was all lame.
Matt - Yeah, Heiser wanted us to stick to like traditional forms for poetry and most kids, I mean, nobody I know reads that stuff, let alone writes it
Meg - So last year like only two kids even submitted anything and Heiser said there wasn't enough to even justify the cost of publishing
Jason - the paper and ink
Meg - yeah, so there was nothing
Emily - But right away, Mr. Halpert started asking us about it and we weren't very excited.
Matt - And he asked us why and we told him about Heiser and he was like ‘forget that, okay? Let's just have a fresh start. We'll reinvent it and it'll be something new.'
Meg - So we were like, cool, whatever, we'll see.
Emily - The next day, he read us this Neruda poem.
[Jason groans]
Jason - You mean the sex one?
Meg - No, not the sex one! The topaz one.
Jason - The girls went batshit crazy over it
Matt - Dude, even I got a little choked up
Meg - Mr. H...he got kind of...
Emily - his voice totally broke! You could hear it, like he was going to start crying
Meg - And nobody, God, you could hear a pin drop we all just like held our breath like what do we do if our teacher starts crying?
Jason - yeah the room was dead silent while he read it
Matt - Man, he didn't even really read it, y'know? He knew it by heart, he just recited it from his head even though he had the book in his hands.
Q
Matt - Love Sonnet Seventeen. I wish I could remember stuff like he does. It's amazing.
Emily - I have it! I asked him if I could borrow the book and I copied it into my notebook [flips pages]...here!
Meg - Matt, you read it.
Matt -[nervous laugh] You really want to hear this?
Q
Matt - Okay. Don't laugh. [laughs] Okay, here goes.
I don't love you as if you were the salt-rose, topaz
or arrow of carnations that propagate fire:
I love you as certain dark things are loved,
secretly, between the shadow and the soul.
I love you as the plant that doesn't bloom and carries
hidden within itself the light of those flowers,
and thanks to your love, darkly in my body
lives the dense fragrance that rises from the earth.
I love you without knowing how, or when, or from where,
I love you simply, without problems or pride:
I love you in this way because I don't know any other way of loving
but this, in which there is no I or you,
so intimate that your hand upon my chest is my hand,
so intimate that when I fall asleep it is your eyes that close.
Jason - [kissing sounds] It's a bromance!
Matt - [shoves Jason with his shoulder] Shut your face, asshole. It's not a bromance - it's just, okay, I never had a teacher like him before, y'know? He's cool. Some of his jokes are lame, okay, but he like knows they're lame so that makes them kind of cool.
Meg - I liked what he said about writing letters, when we started. He said it can be more intimate than whispering in someone's ear and that just, wow. I mean, I like to write but I never thought about it that way.
Jason - He said that sometimes, for whatever reason, it's hard for you to just like say things or maybe you want to say something without being interrupted and you can write it down and give it to someone.
Matt - And they can read it over and over and it's like you always have that moment, y'know? You can always feel that again or hear them.
Q
Emily - No, he's not married. I don't...
Jason - He doesn't talk about himself a lot.
Meg - He seems lonely to me. Like hurt.
Matt - But he's really funny, too, y'know? He's always cracking jokes and he's funny.
Emily - He needs a girlfriend.
Meg - Like you?
Emily - Exactly! Yeah, no, he needs a girlfriend like Ms. Beesly.
Q
Jason - Yeah, the art teacher. Super hot.
Meg - I love her. I've taken classes with her every year. She's so awesome.
Matt - She's crazy. She's gotten in trouble with the principal a bunch of times - we were scared they were going to try and fire her last year.
Q
Meg - It all started with Freda Kahlo. She's a huge fan of Freda's and she was telling us about her life and how she used painting to express herself when she was recovering from her accident and surgery and how she married Diego Rivera but was bisexual and how they were both communists or something.
Jason - Oh man
Emily - There's stuff you don't want to talk about in a Catholic school
Matt - And no matter what - stuff that gets said in class always has a way of making it to the person it's going to piss off the most.
Meg - And that's exactly what happened. The discussion went off topic like crazy and it was all over the place, but mostly it was about women and how women are portrayed in art and TV and movies and stuff and she was trying to get some of the kids to look at things objectively, y'know? Critically? From a feminist...
Jason - The F-word
Meg - Yeah, these are discussions that just don't happen here. So, some parents heard about it and complained. We heard Father Joe defended her to the parents but he was so pissed at her.
Meg - Yeah, he was really mad and she ended up on administrative leave for a week.
Emily - She went to New York City and stayed with her sister, right?
Meg - Yeah, and she came back with like a million amazing photographs.
Jason - So awesome
Q
Meg - I think they're friends. I've seen them just like talking.
Jason - They eat lunch together sometimes.
Emily - He needs her! He deserves to be happy.
Matt - I think she might need him, too. She needs a boyfriend.
B.I. #6 - December 1st
St. Mark's High School - North Wing
Middlefield, Vermont
Pam Beesly - Burchfeld Art Building, Second Floor
Q
It is cool, isn't it? This was the groundskeeper's house when the school had boarding students back in the forties. Mrs. Bryant and I are the whole art department and we share the building. She has the front and I have the back and that...suits both of us just fine.
Q
Oh, it's fine, you know? I mean, she has her ways and I have mine and they are just...wow. Totally different! But it's fine, she's a fine teacher.
Q
Well, I know the likelihood of any of my students becoming gallery material is pretty slim and that's no slam on their talent. I've had some super-talented kids. But it's nearly impossible to get to that level, to be noticed. I want to give them something else, I guess. I want them to know art is created in a larger context, you know? Not in a vacuum. And the picture or the painting or the poem, whatever it is, becomes more meaningful when you understand it in context. [looks away, fidgets with her necklace] This stuff is really important to me.
Q
[laughs] Oh, Freda! Freda's gonna get me fired one day! But...I can't not talk about her. I can't not say there is a feminist perspective. Especially for the girls...they have to get that. I don't know what the hell I'm doing at a Catholic school. [laughs] Who told you?
Q
They're good kids - Meg's one of mine, she's really great, and the rest are Mr. Halpert's writers, right? Yeah.
Q
Jim? We're friends, yeah.
Q
Well, he was hard to get to know right away, I mean, he's quiet at first before you get to know him and he was new here so that didn't help. He was shy.
Q
Yes, I, um...I found out in a strange kind of way. We'd been kind of hanging out and eating lunch together and stuff and I knew he was from Pennsylvania...Scranton...but he didn't tell me much about why he moved and I just didn't push it. Anyway, I went over to his classroom at the end of the day several weeks ago to see if he wanted to go have a drink or something and his classroom door was open and it was so quiet that I almost walked in, I thought he'd dismissed his class early. I mean, usually, close to last bell on Fridays this place is crazy, but anyway, I stopped outside the door because I heard him talking to his class and I ended up standing there and listening to him...um, while he read this poem.
Q
Yeah, Neruda. It just...it was so beautiful and I couldn't see him from where I was, I only heard his voice and I could tell how moved he was reading it...
Q
Really? The kids tell you that? Wow, of course they did. So anyway, he dismissed his class and he was obviously...emotional and I asked him about it and he told me about Sarah.
Q
I felt...well, when I was standing out in the hallway, I was just blown away by the words but really by the passion in his voice and it just all made sense to me.
Q
Okay. I was attracted to him right away. Instantly and very.[10] And I'll admit that I was pretty forward in the beginning because I was interested, you know? And I was excited to have a new teacher here around my age and he was so dorky with the horn rims and the chinos but just gorgeous, you know, with that hair and in that really casual way and he seemed smart and like he just needed to loosen up a little because it was almost painful to look at him sometimes and I kind of...threw myself at him. At the Homecoming dance. We were chaperoning and I'd had a couple glasses of wine before I left the house and I sort of backed him into the corner by the girls' locker room and...well, let's just say, it didn't go so well. I pretty much scared the crap out of him. So, I apologized and it was all very awkward and embarrassing and I was afraid he was always going to be weird around me after that, but it was okay. He cracked a joke and after that we started eating lunch together.
Q
We're all fragile in some way, I think. I just tried to be a friend, you know? I tried to make him laugh, I made him eat a lot of pudding. [laughs] I took him to a bar to listen to some live music and after he got that scared shitless look off his face, I think he had a good time. Course, he had a few drinks and that never hurts. He just...he needed a friend.
B.I. #7 - January 3rd
St. Mark's High School -
Middlefield, Vermont
Jim Halpert - Burchfeld Art Building, first floor
Q
Happy new year to you, too! You guys must be wrapping up, huh?
Q
It is good to get home. Did a little road trip back to Scranton, which was fun, spent some time with the family. Yeah, holidays were good. Now it's on to the spring semester.
Q
It does feel like home, isn't that nuts? [laughs] I've only been here since August, but it feels good. I'm settling in.
Q
We've been, uh, spending some time together and it's...nice. It's good. She makes me laugh. We're...um, we're going skiing today, it's the last day of vacation, so we're going skiing. Cross country. [holds up wineskin] With wine. [smiles and shrugs] She's forcing me.
Q
Well, I've been writing a lot. Poetry mostly.
Q
I'm thinking about it. I know how tough it is, but Mr. Heiser has some contacts in publishing. I guess it's worth a shot. You never know, right?
[7] You already know Father Joe. Joe's the guy who is still hanging onto some affectation from back when he felt the first surge of power through his young and manly loins. Unfortunately for Joe (and you). that first brush with manhood came around 1964. He's like the lost member of the Rat Pack, a smoother, pinker, rounder version of Dean Martin. He was first in line for the hand-me-down pinkie rings from Uncle Carlo. He does the two-handed handshake: grip with the right and grip and do an odd patting thing with the left. He claps you on the shoulder and squeezes just a little too hard. You know Joe and you like him despite all his weirdness or maybe because of it because if there's anyone who looks as out of place in rural Vermont as you feel, it's Father Joe Chimento.
[8] If you were involved in this conversation, you would not hesitate to give Heiser a good hard kick under the table. What the fuck, Paul? You wouldn't have gotten so drunk if it weren't for him ordering and talking and ordering and refilling when you were in the john and then the shots. Unfair.
[9] The poem you just read to the class is Sonnet XI by Pablo Neruda. It's blatantly sexual and could probably get you fired, but this is your senior poetry seminar and your kids are pretty cool. It's a big love affair in that class every time you meet - you've never had a class so responsive and there are some pretty decent writers, too. You're taking a risk by reading this poem and there are giggles and snorts, but you feel strongly about treating them like adults. In their own adolescent way, they know about love and longing and lust and desire, or they think they do. You figure they can get it in a music video or they can have Pablo tell them what it's all about. Besides, you're convinced that the two boys in class are getting laid on a regular basis. Fuckers.
[10] What? That is insane. But, she did corner you against the water fountain when no one was looking, grabbed a handful of your sweater and pulled your face down to kiss her, didn't she? And didn't that get your mind going places it hadn't been in awhile?
