Lunch

[Shadowknight 54]

So, today was going greatly, and I was looking forward to a great lunch with my friends. I went to the cafeteria and got my food, balancing it on my palms as I made my way back to the Grassy Knoll outside my school, and, more specifically, the third tree from the door.

A bit of background information before I continue. On the first day of freshman year, me and my friends really didn't have anywhere to sit. So, in an act of drastic rebellion, one of my friends moved about fifty feet from the tables (but still on the Knoll) and sat down on the sidewalk, in front of the third tree from the door. The rest of us followed suit, and we found that it provided just enough shade to keep us comfortable. Over time, people joined us and people left us, each man searching for the best habitat to suit his needs. But through this process our group became more refined, more pure. We became a close-knit group known as "The Third Tree Crew". We were energetic, frequently telling stories and making references to music and movies and video games from all different time periods, and sometimes even yelling our ideas to the sky, sharing them with the rest of the school. We have a few jokes that are not unlike some internet memes, addressing topics ranging from Billy Idol to the obese man who rode into our hearts on his industrial-sized riding lawnmower.

Sophomore year passed in much the same manner, with more jokes being created, more references made, and more study-raves (dance parties during which we discuss World History topics) being held. We begin to discuss the tree itself, assigning it the role of a father figure and giving it a spirit of its own. It's become a tradition that is accepted, and the Third Tree Crew becomes known by all and loved by most.

Then, today happens. We congregate at the tree to enjoy our lunch and discuss the first day, but we don't have long to do so before the administrators of the school approach. They inform us that they have received complaints about how we are too far away to be supervised (though we are about twenty feet closer to the school than the lunch supervisor) and that, as a result, we are being required to vacate our patch of shade and move elsewhere. In shock, we all stand and move away in silence, unable to comprehend the events that occurred. A few of our members break away from our family, falling into other less perfect groups. The Third Tree Crew has been unwillingly broken apart, forced into a diaspora of sorts. We're in a state of wandering, we no longer have a home. Our father-tree no longer has us to keep us company, and with nothing remaining to live for, shall begin to wither into a state of cold loneliness.

This is, in my opinion, unacceptable. Our crew was the cleanest of all the Knoll-inhabitants, always picking up our trash, and we were never even there on Thursdays, the day when we attended environment club. We never told dirty jokes, we never cussed, we never beat anyone up, we never climbed under the school, we never had sex in the bushes, and we never even got in the way of people who wanted to pass by (all of those things are things that other students have done in the past few years). We frequently have pleasant discussions with the teachers about politics or our studies, and we are always friendly, leaving our doors open for anyone who wishes to join us for a meal or two.

Why anyone would complain about us is beyond me, and I plan to appeal to the administration in the next few days. We can get an endless number of people to vouch for us, from students to teachers, people who passed us once to our closest friends. I'll design a flyer that we'll all put on our binders and lockers, talking artfully about our diaspora and recruiting people to join us in our attempt to restore things to their natural state.

We all have a place where we belong, and our crew belongs at our tree.

[Aethix 129]

Well that's stupid. You've clearly proven yourselves trustworthy, but if you go to a big school, more likely than not the administration views you as a bunch of numbers.

Good behavior should be rewarded. If not, it serves no purpose.

At any rate, you should try to appeal to their senses. I don't know about your school personally, but I do know that school authority figures can be jackasses.

[Arcane 12]

That's freaking ridiculous.

[Shadowknight 54]

The thing is, I go to a really small school. Our classes have a total of 120 people, so there's only about 500 people in total at the school.

I suspect that our neighbor school is to blame for the complaints, as they are mostly bad children who haven't earned the freedoms that we have at our small school. They've filed complaints about us before, and they talk a lot about how we're all snobs and preps and the such, so we aren't exactly liked by the general population of the area.

It doesn't really matter who filed the complaint, though, all that matters is that we convince the administrators to change their mind on the matter.

[Joshawott 7]

I remember I went through a lot of hangout areas during lunch the past three years in high school. My school has ~2500 students, so there's more freedom as to where we can go around campus. Freshman year I spent with a few friends walking around campus as we ate. We usually settled in the amphitheater, but we usually would migrate from area to area. Sophomore year, I ate lunch with a few friends in my physics class from freshman year. Then for the last five to ten minutes of lunch, I'd walk with them to their history class (even though it was a bit of a pain that I had to walk across campus to RO). Last year, I hung out in my Japanese class, and would sometimes migrate between that and my academic league advisor's classroom. Because I had journalism after lunch then, I'd sometimes spend lunch in there finishing up stories for the school paper.

What I think is particularly funny about hangout spots during lunch is that they're more segregated by ethnicity than social hierarchy. The main hallway is where all the Mexican kids hang out, known as Cholo Hallway. There's a hallway intersecting it where all the Filipino kids who speak Tagalog hang out known as Fob Hallway (Fob as in "Fresh Off the Boat"). At the end of one of them is a tree known as Fob Tree. The quad in the middle of the school is where the freshmen hang out, and there's a large tree in the middle of it where all the seniors hang out known as Senior Tree. There's a shaded area next to the gym where all the burger grills are where the Pacific Islander and black kids go, and next to it is the ROTC classroom where all the RO heads eat lunch. Most classrooms are open for students to eat lunch in as long as the teacher allows it, and usually it's clubs who eat in there.

[Shadowknight 54]

Interesting. At our neighbor school, everybody has to eat in the cafeteria. No exceptions.

My school is more like yours, except for the evident change in heart they've had suddenly.

[real link 0]

dude that sucks and i feal your pain, at my school the stupid gym teacher decided that it was a good idea to close the library on sunny days, as a result i now have nothing to do half the week after i eat my lunch. also some idiot decided to build the whole freaking school on top of a ginormous hill, so now i get headaches and my ears pop on my way home and to school (if you don't understand how that works you don't understand how huge this hill is)

[Otis McNutt 395]

Lunch was never a big thing for me in school. Very rarely did I ever buy lunch I mostly brought from home. And aside from the people sitting with me, I mostly sat by myself. It gave me a chance to read, sketch, play my gameboy or do some class assignments I missed.

That changed in Senior year of Highschool when we could leave the grounds for lunch. A bunch of us would go down to Hometown buffet, that place had the BEST French Toast I ever had in my life!

Edited 25 Aug 2009 by Savanti Romero (see edit history)

[Shadowknight 54]

Ahaha, today was the best. We broke the system, and there's nothing the administration can do, because we're not violating any rules.

Ok, so they told us that the sidewalk where we sat was not somewhere we could stay, so we had to leave the sidewalk in front of the tree. So, today, we ate on the side of the tree that's grassy. The administrators came over to talk to us, but even they acknowledged that they couldn't get after us for not breaking rules.

We beat the system in a single day. We were just like, "Let's be rebellious and tempt fate by continuing to sit by the tree, just in a smart-alecky and clever way." And it worked.

They'll probably come back to fight us tomorrow, but whatever.

[Arcane 12]

FIGHT THE POWER!

[Aethix 129]

Viva la revolution!

[swordplaymaster12 0]

Some other language!

Also, I probably wouldn't have the juevos to staand up against athority like that. Of course, I'm only 13, so I barely have any experience with rebellion.

[Yuna_Rikku_Paine_Fanboy!! 0]

Hahaha! Go shadowknight! That's what I would've done, even though I would've told you to do something else. XD