The Idle Fisherman

The contrast between Mr. Rosen and Ms. Monique was striking.

Naturally, a constant cloud of stress always hung over the little green house. No one escaped the reading tests, the stopwatch, or the candle that had to be earned layer by layer—word by word. Think of it as wading through a thick swamp of sentences, each step heavier than the last. But no matter how intense the nerves grew, Ms. Monique had a way of calming them with her soothing presence, her tight perm, and grandmotherly perfume, which mingled with the scent of old paper and sweaty children. As for the interior, she did what she could to give that green-painted container a homey touch, almost making it seem like we were reading for pleasure. Nothing could be further from the truth: points were awarded, levels measured, hierarchies built among 7-year-olds—but it felt cozy. At least, that’s how it seemed to me, a student who got to color his flame by mid-second grade. Classmates who clumsily dragged their half-finished candles through 4th, 5th, and 6th probably remember the house differently—as a green nightmare, an annual torment preceded by sleepless nights haunted by an annoying gang of children’s book characters. Needless to say, these are just assumptions, built on memories from two decades ago.

With Mr. Rosen, the stress was more unrelenting, absolute, and inescapable. Nothing about his classroom felt cozy; at his desks, silence reigned. He dished out lines, barking out last names of those he deemed 'disobedient'—a judgment that shifted depending on Rosen’s mood, the incident, and (especially) the student. Nelson had less leeway than Esther, let’s be honest. If Tessa had thrown up on her desk instead of Joy, Mr. Rosen probably wouldn’t have grumbled and sighed; he’d have helped. And if Laura had been the one picking an itchy, mucus-filled nose, she probably wouldn’t have been labeled a “fisherman.”

Rosen seemed to burn through all his energy and enthusiasm at the start of the school year. The exuberance with which he sang “Ping and Pong play ping pong” initially seemed promising but quickly turned out to be a false start. After that, not much was left except for “In winter when it rains, the paths run deep.” That’s the sound of mornings in third grade. That’s the atmosphere I associate with Mr. Rosen. That’s the mantra of an idle, red-headed fisherman, drifting through life in his green Ford Focus.

I accept things as I remember them, and from that, questions naturally arise. The beauty of questions, though, is that they don’t need answers to be satisfying. In fact, the unknown fills with imagination, which is far more interesting. So, go ahead:

Who wooed whom back then: was it Ms. Monique who pursued Mr. Rosen, or the other way around? Was it love at first sight, or ‘love’ out of convenience, a choice made due to a lack of better options? Who leaned in for the first kiss? Did Mr. Rosen already have a beard that scratched against Ms. Monique’s carefully painted lips? How much passion can there really be between two teachers at a small-town elementary school? Did they ever do it in the little green house, on the same table where kids tried their best to race through outdated sentences in exchange for a paper candle they had to color in, following rigid rules? Did Mr. Rosen ever sing ‘The Idle Fisherman’ just for Ms. Monique, maybe as a warm-up before his very first class? Did she laugh—openly or to herself, with joy or with pity? Is there still talk, laughter, and dreams in the Rosen household? Is Mr. Rosen still the spark in Ms. Monique’s life, or has he been snuffed out long ago? Did she ever burn for him at all?