The Day Tut Was Shot

Overheard at the King Tut exhibit at Philadelphia's Franklin Institute as I was exiting the main exhibit and coming into an area where the late King's skeletal xrays were imaged on a huge screen. Looking at the hole in Tut's skull, one of the two men standing in front me declared "It's obvious he was shot. Look at that hole in his skull. What's all the mystery?"

I laughed until I cried. I thought about editing together a book culling all the common misperceptions people have about history such as these people thinking firearms were around in Tut's time.

Things are not what they seem.

You might recall a few months ago I wrote about having an interview at a high school for the arts and not getting it, primarily because I lacked the technical theatre teaching experience. I have since worked to rectify that. I thought I was being shut out of the place I was meant to teach, a place where I could share twenty five years of my life in the arts specifically acting and playwrighting.

Today in the newspaper was an article about one of the drama teachers I worked with during a summer drama camp at this school had been fired supposedly for not accomplishing certain things. Now I read the complaint filed in the court and comments of students and parents of this high school for the arts that the conditions at the school are not very good or safe. Mold exists in public areas, water drips on electrical equipment, the rigging in the theater and the catwalk is unsafe. One of the main rooms for rehearsals is freezing in the winter and hot in the summer. According to court papers, complaints have been made to the school district and nothing was ever done.

Did I escape a situation that was fraught with problems that would only distract me from the achievement I would think I had made getting this job? If all this were true, I would make plenty of noise about the unsafe and uncomfortable conditions to be repaired. There is a chance that making noise is how this drama teacher really got fired in the first place.

I'm already juggling two main writing projects. Maybe this is the route I am meant to take right now.