Mr. Weiss

“Je t’accuse…”

He had a round face, was almost completely bald except for close-cropped gray fringe, wore short sleeve shirts and a bowtie every day. With a sly look and a hint of merriment, he’d burst into the classroom, remove his jacket and place it on the back of his chair, then stand before the class in a moment of silent anticipation.

“Je t’accuse…Je t’accuse…”

“I accuse you…” What was he accusing us of, in French, in our eighth grade English class?

“I accuse you all of being in a rut!”

And of course, we were. Thirteen years old, a suburban Queens, NY Junior High—this was before they retitled them “middle schools.” We lived in mostly-traditional families in our middle-class Baby-Boom bliss. Our ancestors were Italian, Irish, Jewish or four or five generation American. We pledged allegiance “to the wall” as Queens native Paul Simon said—but we visioned the absent flag as we mumbled along to the class loudspeaker with one hand over our hearts. Classes were crowded, one teacher for every 35 students.

Our fathers went to work and sometimes our mothers. But dinner was on the table every evening. Lunch was carefully packed in our tin lunchboxes featuring painted scenes from our favorite TV shows, the same shows we all watched. We did our homework, studied for exams. The girls wore dresses or jumpers or skirts and sweaters or nice pantsuits. The boys donned shirts and slacks and the occasional blazer. Nobody wore jeans to school.

We listened to the Beatles, the Rolling Stones, Motown. We worried about nuclear war with the Soviet Union. We made posters about brotherhood—which meant the races all getting along—we collected food for the needy at the holidays. Lyndon Johnson was President. It was 1965. And except for a few of the edgier students, our political consciousness wouldn’t be raised to the point of protest for several more years.

Of course we were in a rut.

But Mr. Weiss, who taught us poetry, who would sprinkle his lessons with lines from Shakespeare or the Bible—”if someone ever asks you about a famous quote, guess Shakespeare or the Bible and you’ll be right 95% of the time” he instructed—our Mr. Weiss had a reason for accusing us all of being in a hopelessly bland existence, cocooned in a safe, boring rut. Mr. Weiss wanted to give us the world.

He vowed to give “extra credit” to any student who would endeavor to scramble out of their rut by experiencing something interesting, something even adventurous, and write up a brief report. Some of the students groaned at the idea—studying for tests and acing them, that was how we supposed to get ahead in class. But I relished the notion. I was already keeping a journal, filling it with my ideas and essays, poetry and the keenest observations a 13-year-old in an over-protective household could conjure. Now one of my favorite teachers had sanctioned venturing out into the world beyond and bringing back the wonder to the rest of my peers.

I began to compile a list of potential rut-busting activities, all of which I could claim as legitimate assignments from my teacher. All of the Big Apple opened up before me.

I had already been allowed to take city busses around Queens without my parents to shop and especially to Flushing, a transportation mecca from which Long Island Railroad trains and the Number 7 Subway line originated on their journeys to Manhattan. And my parents had been taking my sister and me on New York City subways since almost before we were old enough to walk. It wasn’t all that difficult—protectiveness or not–to get permission from them to take the bus to the subway and travel on into Manhattan—that island of my fondest fantasies. Of course, I was to go with a friend—as long as it was still daytime and we promised to return by suppertime.

“And two places you definitely need to stay away from,” cautioned my father: “Times Square and Greenwich Village.” My Dad was a five-generation native New Yorker who had been born in the West Village, but had become dismayed by its lately becoming the headquarters of Hippies, with head shops touting hookah pipes, new age emporiums and bars catering to the gay culture, He also railed against the theatre district’s descent into squalor, XXX-rated theatres and pornography parlors.

“Oh don’t worry, we’re just heading out to do some shopping at Macy’s,” I and my friend Nina assured him.

Of course the first place we headed was Times Square. We really had no choice, The Number 7 subway terminated there, so we rationalized that it was inevitable. Nina and I were both starving, so we went into a Chock Full O’Nuts coffee shop and sat at the counter. It was her idea. Her family kept Kosher and she was desperately craving a ham sandwich. I ordered a hot dog.

From there, it was a magical 36-block walk down Broadway to Greenwich Village. We’d wander over to Fifth Avenue and end up at Washington Square Park to join the crowds gathered around folksingers with guitars belting out tunes by Bob Dylan or Peter, Paul and Mary or—if they were really serious, Pete Seeger.

We’d take a side foray down Eighth Street to visit Azuma, a vast store that sold incense and imports from India, then return to Broadway and stop at the block-square street market to try on sunglasses or scarves or cheap jewelry. There were vintage clothing consignment storefronts, art galleries, postcard racks. We’d spend our meager allowances and save enough for a pastry while relaxing in a coffee shop on Bleecker Street, a subway token and bus fare tucked carefully into an extra pocket so we’d be able to keep our promise to be back home by supper.

Trips into Manhattan offered the ripest opportunities for me to earn extra credit from Mr. Weiss. There was Central Park with its zoo; museums, Chinatown, and ethnic restaurants of every possible imagining. And it wasn’t only me and a friend on the prowl. With my parents, our family faithfully visited the Rockefeller Center Christmas tree each year and warmed up inside 30 Rock. I savored the building’s Art Deco flourishes and marveled at the oversized labor-themed murals of Diego Rivera painted on the walls and ceilings that had so angered John D. Rockefeller. On New Year’s Eve, we’d go see the Rockettes dance at Radio City Music Hall followed by a first-run movie emerging from the theatre just in time to see the ball-drop heralding in the new year as we shivered in the cold several blocks south of Times Square.

All of these experiences propelled me from my “rut”–in Mr. Weiss’s term–and increased my appetite for the enchantment of variety and the quest for something new. Movies made the “out-of-my-rut” list: The Sound of Music, Cat Ballou, and Dr, Zhivago in 1965 alone. There were also family vacations: Saratoga Springs, Hershey, PA, Cooperstown, the Thousand Islands.

It was an especially good time to be an intrepid teenaged adventurer. Less than two miles from where we lived—a quick bus and one subway-stop ride away–was the New York World’s Fair. And across the subway platform, the entrance to Shea Stadium, home of my beloved New York Mets, still in their infancy.

I filled journal after journal with my adventures and regaled my classmates with my stories and they did the same for me– putting a beaming smile on Mr. Weiss’s face. And the extra credit? I don’t even remember what it amounted to or how it might have contributed to my academic achievements. But it didn’t matter. That was never the point.

The point was that playing it safe and staying within your comfort zone robbed you of life’s richest rewards. That the infinite variety of culture in the world can connect us to each other and to the deepest part of ourselves. That what we can learn from answering the call of adventure is more valuable than any lesson in any book and more satisfying than a good mark on a test paper.

Learning that has sharpened a lifelong and profound hunger in me for new places, sites, tastes, sounds and variety of experiences that will never be sated.

I blame Mr. Weiss for that and I will always be grateful.