Blackboard Jungle

October '92 was the quincentennial of El Descubrimiento De America and for most of the month my eighth grade social studies teacher rhapsodized piously about Cristobal Colon's capricious seafaring.  This  stonewall straggler of the rapidly distressing Italian section of town (called “The ‘Burg” long after the last German speakers departed) gave off amperes of tribal pride as he recounted the Genovese (this is long before a unified Italian state) navigator's struggle to convince Reina Isabel de (brand spanking new) Espana that silken Asia was closer than it appeared on scientifically accurate maps. Though hoarse from bocce-ball victory maduros and stooped by scoliosis, my teacher proved to be a consistently arresting orator on par with the majority of my later college professors.