Way back when I was in the seventh grade, in what was then called junior high school, we had a mandatory class called “core”. To the best of my recollection, it combined social studies and English. Or quantum physics and Sanskrit. Or interpretive dance and the native language that involves weird clicking noises. It was, after all, 45 years ago so the details are a bit fuzzy. Our teacher, Mr. Atkinson, often regaled us with what must have been his favorite bromide to stir his young charges to dream great dreams and change the world. Or, realistically assessing our potential, keep us out of the criminal justice system. He told us, “Good, better, best. Never let it rest. Until the good is better, and the better best.” I can’t tell you what I wore to church less than a week ago, but I still picture Mr. Atkinson saying this. And because seventh grade boys are paragons of maturity, we came up with our own version. It reads as follows: “Worse, worser, worsest. Always let it rest. Until the worse is worser, and the worser worsest.” Rolls right off the tongue, doesn’t it? Mind you, we demonstrated our aforementioned maturity by shooting spitballs at each other and stepping on the backs of fellow students’ shoes as they walked to class, necessitating removing them and putting them back on. We called this “giving flats” and kept a running tally.
I learned any number of things that year, like dissecting sentences, World Book Encyclopedia bios of sixty or more authors, and that the music teacher across the hall had anger management issues and hated kids. Today I couldn’t dissect a sentence with a Howitzer pointed at me, encyclopedias went the way of rotary phones, and the music teacher was killed by police snipers during a confrontation with the illustrator of the Bearenstain Bears books. So at least he died a martyr. But do you know something? “Good, better, best” still resonates with me, more so now because I see the wisdom in it. Now if I, and maybe you, would just stop settling for good…
(Click “Stand on Firmer Ground” for deeper look into Good, Better, Best)