The ‘H’ word …

Homework! Oh, Homework!
I hate you! You stink!
I wish I could wash you away in the sink,
if only a bomb
would explode you to bits.
Homework! Oh, homework!
You're giving me fits.

I'd rather take baths
with a man-eating shark,
or wrestle a lion
alone in the dark,
eat spinach and liver,
pet ten porcupines,
than tackle the homework,
my teacher assigns.

Homework! Oh, homework!
you're last on my list,
I simply can't see
why you even exist,
if you just disappeared
it would tickle me pink.
Homework! Oh, homework!
I hate you! You stink!

- Jack Prelutsky

Now that was a lot of swearing because I typed the ‘H’ word! And I don’t blame Jack P (can’t spell his name right) for swearing, because I can understand how he feels.

It’s September 13^th, a day before one of the worst days of your academic year. After almost two months of summer vacation nocturnal routine, i.e. waking up to find that its lunch time and going to sleep once the light goes dim (I mean, after you switch the TV off), you really don’t feel like waking up before the sun is even up but still going to sleep late after you are done with doing all your school work (from making presentations – and phone calls – and packing my bag at night when everybody is snoring).

“I don’t like this!!! I don’t want to do holiday home– I mean, the ‘H’ thing.’ I told my friend on phone today and she said, “Don’t talk about it!” The fact that I haven’t finished it isn’t really frightening because teachers never collect them on the very first day of doom’s year, or the ‘S’ thing. What I don’t get is why they give it in the first place. They don’t really count them seriously or give them marks. All the hard work just goes in the dumps! And it’s an extra pain for them also to check all our works. I really wonder whether they even check it properly. But I don’t think holiday homework – oops! I said the word – benefits any of us in any ways. It doesn’t make much sense to me.

And if they expect us to study on holidays, well I think that’s completely unfair. But I admit that I forgot maths completely, because I couldn’t do the worksheet they have given us. But you really can’t expect people to learn during their holidays and not forget what has been taught. And if you say that the very reason the ‘H’ thing exists is because the teachers in schools– oh! Here I said it again – thinks that we may forget what we have learnt, I think instead we can do a recap of everything once school re-opens and it’s just a matter of recollection. I still don’t believe the ‘H’ thing is a solution.

Well, that’s my point, but I don’t think this is of any use because it is not gonna help me from getting away with my present homework (I don’t care about swearing). So I think I gotta get going, and do my Maths, English, Geo, Science and so on. And oh yes, I must share this on my blog. Can’t believe school is opening tomorrow.

[Splutters]

[Sighs]

And I will keep singing this piece of poem – that I recited when I was in 3^rd grade in front of my teacher and admitted honestly that I meant every word of it and got a minus mark for that – till it sinks in me that it is all a part of being in school and every adult must have gone through this, just like Mr. P (still can’t get his name right)!