Thursday, January 22, 2009

An Open Letter To Mr. Aidone

Hey there, ah, heh-heh, how's it going? Glad to see you made it to 2009! I see you know the ol' Googling-Your-Own-Name-Trick. Excellent. And how proud you must have been when as you were waiting to see why your name was here, the blog's banner came up with a picture of a graffitied wall with "Clem Sux" written on it. Uh, heh-heh, I can explain that. You see, uh, ok, it's like this...um...OK, I got nothing. It's my brother's fault, though. He drew it. And, um, in the first ever posting of this blog when I said you were "the decidedly "Bad Cop" in the Good Cop/Bad Cop thing he and Mr. Hughes, the principal, had going on", ok, that was my brother's idea too. And the cheating on a chemistry test thing? Yeah, you know this is all just for fun and entertainment, right?

In all seriousness, you seem to be generating a lot of comments to your comments. Everyone at the WPSG blog enjoys hearing from people from the past. Even though you were the heavy hand of the law back in the day, I haven't heard from anyone yet that truly didn't like you. Everyone seems to think you were a pretty fair guy, even if you scared the crap out of us when we got caught doing stuff. So, well done, sir. Actually, most of our shenanigans occured outside of school. I also think that while we were pretty high in food chain from about 1980-1984 or so, relative to the Bergs, Yanatellis, McGills, Fuscos, Malarkys...we were pretty small potatoes in the trouble department. I would love to read a memoir about all the tom foolery that occurred at James I. O'Neill, but that just can't happen, can it?

On the plus side, none of us (that I know of - not all members are accounted for) in the West Point Skateboard Gang are in jail or turned out to be mass-murderers! We turned into responsible (for the most part), productive citizens and parents. A couple of us have "Dr." in front of our names (certainly not me, though), and at least 4 of us (including me) are in education. While you weren't a favorite teacher to any of us, you represented authority, and even if we were scared of you or we "fought the law" by writing "Clem Sux" every once in a while on a desk, your presence was memorable enough to be discussed in the first ever posting here. So good luck and stop on by here any time you'd like!

Hey, one last thing. You know those letters from their parents students were supposed to have in order to use the smoking patio? My brother's was total bullshit! My parents would have freaked if they had known he was smoking in school (those were the days, huh?). I think he should be suspended.

13 comments:

Anonymous said...

Wow that was great Chris! I just laughed my ass off cause my letter (permission to smoke on the patio) I wrote myself in the girls b/r on the 1st floor before turning it in! Those were the days! Clem really didn't bother me. I had to laugh cause he reminded me (personality wise) of the Principle who played on Welcome Back Kotter! But looking back on my years at JIO, Clem will always be remembered! And not so much in a bad way...he was fair and sometimes funny!

Anonymous said...

Mathdude: You've made my heart smile today!

Tony Alva said...

There's no pinning the blog banner on me buddy. I think if one reads the first couple of posts on this blog the real culprit and person responsible for slandering Mr. Aidone is pretty evident, and that person would be you Mr. Casey Anthony Mathdude.

Feisty Democrat said...

SV: Gasp! You too turned in a fake smoking patio permission letter?! What are the odds?

N2: So, you know it wasn't me who drew the blog banner, right? It was definitely my brother.

TA: Let's review the facts. 1-You turned in a fake permission letter for the smoking patio. 2-You were 10 times the thug I was. There, that's enough to convince me.

Anonymous said...

Nice letter Chris. It made me laugh...especially where you blame your brother for all the bad stuff. I guess that could be because that is how it was.

I was thinking that it is so funny to see how time and such changes one's perspective. I had the unfortunate experience of having to rely on substitute teaching for a time in upstate NY. So many of those kids were fucking monsters and deserved (along with their parents) to be shot. It was appalling how much time dealing with them took away from the kids who actually wanted to learn something. Of course I was one of the minor league shitheads when I was in high school. Failed 1oth grade at O'Neill but ended up with a PhD after it was all said and done.

I applaud Mr. Aidone for sticking it out.

Cheers

Anonymous said...

Yeah, Mathdude? Alva's my classmate (even at Sacred Heart back when you all had crew cuts)...I've gotta stick with him.

Jackson said...

Up-bup

Anonymous said...

So you guys are actually surprised I wrote fake letter huh.....well, well, well.....i wasn't an angel back in the day....hell I hung out with Terry Dixon!!!!!!!!! ahahaha

Anonymous said...

Oh that me wrote wrote that!

djh said...

This was great.

I also think it's a great lesson on perspective. It's funny how we all thought about life and each other when we were younger. I know that I steered clear of MD and TA as much as possible because of my preconceived notions, and I know that TA and MD ridiculed me for being a "goody two shoes". I think now, after touching base with everyone and sharing stories, we have all been surprised by each other and things we just didn't know about each other that helped shape our behaviors when we were younger. I've thoroughly enjoyed my online discussions with everyone, and it's been an eye opener. Of course, who could have such insight as a 16 year old punk ass kid, though? That's why these blogs and FB have been so cool.

And it's surprising to know that some of us didn't have such different views on life, and that many of us shared a very warped sense of humor. Who knew? And I was by no means a "goody two shoes", I just played one on TV. I had you ALL fooled. :-) I was too scared of my parents to do much in high school. Made up for lost time, though.

Jackson said...

I'm confused....

djh said...

Re: Jackson: Said ONLY in jest, but what I have to say to you would start with "with all due respect,__ ____ ________" (fill in the blanks as you see fit.) :)

mitch turner said...

I can't believe you guys forged your notes for the smoking area. I actually got my mom to write the note. No kidding.