by Tony Lastowka & Sean McBride

         Remember when you were in elementary school? C’mon, think back! Show and tell... nap time... getting yelled at for picking your nose... every day was play day. Admittedly, you did learn stuff, but that only happened because the medicine of learning was mixed in with the sugar of fun.

         Now you are older--about eighteen years old give or take fifty years. If you are older than that, this probably does not apply to you, since from what I have been told, school back then consisted of a fat lady who hit you with a stick all day and called you a simpleton, and you liked it gosh darn it! or you spent your recess scrubbing the outhouse with a toothbrush.

         While in school, one concept that is stressed to an abundant degree is the concept of sharing. Sharing is found everywhere in the first several years of education. All day long, Mrs. Teacher teaches little Billy and Jane to share their toys, their chewy chocolate chip cookies (sometimes Mrs. Teacher even helped them “share” those!) and just about everything else. After school, they run straight home to listen to Barney and friends sing “Sharing is Caring!” and other catchy sharing jingles.

         The students still can’t perform basic math, or read at a functionally literate level, but the concept of sharing sticks to them like duct tape on a duck’s butt! By the time they reach college age, they are ready to share with everyone else whether everyone else wants what they have to offer or not!

         Take a college dorm. Perfect example. You walk in, and you’re blindsided by a brutal assault consisting of every musical form available. Everywhere you turn, you are offered generous helpings of decibels, without even having to ask! It makes you feel great that kids have not forgotten what it means to share.

         But the desire to share goes even farther. Just look at the trouble people will go through to find stereo equipment that will allow them to share their music with everyone within a three-mile radius. Some people would attribute it to the frivolous priorities of teens, but that’s not entirely true. The real reason they do this is an uncontrollable, unresolved desire to share! The children who shared the best in kindergarten received the best prizes, creating a Pavlovian reaction to share. When the other students grew up, they subconsciously believed that if they have louder, better stereos, Mrs. Teacher will sashay on in and award them tasty, chewy Tootsie Rolls, too!

         And it doesn’t stop there, my friends; it rolls right onto the road. This is the part that really touches me. Here we have citizens so set on sharing with others that they actually deliver the music. You know who I’m talking about… those people that drive around with the sole intent of sharing their music with others. They don’t have an actual destination, and they never actually get anywhere. They simply drive around all day, bopping their heads and blasting their stereos at tremendous volumes, and then go home and talk about how hard they’re going to bop their heads and blast their stereos tomorrow. I shed a tear when I think about these people.

         However, there is one sharing trait, and one trait alone, that disturbs me. Regretfully, I have noticed that, in general, males are much more likely to share their music with others. I know that females have perfectly decent music to share! I can appreciate Jewel, the Spice Girls, and all those girlie girl stars. But whatever the reason for the females’ unduly selfishness, it demonstrates that Sharing Education in the classroom is unbalanced. Our teachers must stress the merits of sharing to girls especially.

         Ultimately, I draw a simple conclusion from this, a message to people who wish to study or sleep. Be considerate of the students blasting their stereos endlessly into the wee hours of the morning. It make irk you to no end and even cause you to contemplate homicide, but you must realize that they are only trying to share, and you should feel ashamed if you try to keep them from exercising this special, hard-learned virtue.

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