Embarrassed by my Quote of the Day

A number of years ago — in the last century — I did some substitute teaching. One day I was assigned a high school English class. Fortunately, I had a detailed lesson plan.

The class was reading John Steinbeck’s Of Mice and Men. I read ahead on what we were to read aloud in class and was a little distressed to find the dreaded “N-word.” Even worse, when the class filed in, I noticed that there was just one black student in the class. So, I decided I should get ahead of the issue. I spoke about understanding a book in the context of the time it was written. I talked about the importance of creative license and the necessity of writers being true to the world and their vision. And about how rational people could disagree on these things.

As I opened the floor to questions, I felt prepared to deal with this sensitive issue.

A young woman in the front row raised her hand. I called on her.

Her question was, “Mr. Scrubb, did you know your zipper was down?”

I’ve had worse moments of embarrassment, but this is among the worst I’d be willing to share.

We all would like to avoid such moments. But we can’t always.

This is what Tina Fey had to say about a moment she was willing to share:

“For my first show at ‘SNL’, I wrote a Bill Clinton sketch, and during the read-through*, it wasn’t getting any laughs. This weight of embarrassment came over me, and I felt like I was sweating from my spine out. But I realized, ‘Okay, that happened and I did not die.’ You’ve got to experience failure to understand you can survive it.”

Though I didn’t check it at Snopes, I do think it is a Scientific Fact that no one has actually 'Died of Embarrassment.' Sure, it’s unpleasant, but we get through such times, especially if we have the grace to acknowledge the awkwardness and move on. You’ll never really accomplish anything if you aren’t willing to risk looking silly.

*Kids, you may not believe this, but there was a time Saturday Night Live was willing to mock Democrat politicians.