go.Jimmy.go

Wanna Be Startin’ Somethin’ is a song by Michael Jackson that was recorded for his sixth studio album Thriller in 1982. The lyrics pertain to a stranger spreading rumors to start an argument.

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instigator (noun) — someone who deliberately causes or encourages trouble.

I learned that word the hard way. Let me tell you how…

It was a warm afternoon in mid-June, and I was finishing up mowing the lawn. A chore that apparently remains part of the sacred duties of home ownership.

Around the neighborhood, families were already grilling steaks, cracking open cold beers and presenting fathers with handmade cards and gifts. Meanwhile, John Deere and I were making our final pass across the yard.

That’s when I noticed a car pulling up across the street. The four opened and out stepped a man I recognized immediately: Bill Houston.

Mr. Houston had come to visit his daughter, whose family has lived across from me for as long as I can remember.

I’d seen Bill there before, and every time I did, I was transported back more than forty years to ninth grade at Shawnee Intermediate School. Back to the day when Principal Houston taught me a new vocabulary word, and then gave me five days of detention to make sure I never forgot it.

It started in the school cafeteria one Friday afternoon in 1984. I was sitting with friends when a kid named Jeff sat down at a nearby table.

Jeff was better known around school as The Jersey Bomber. I have absolutely no idea how he earned that nickname, but it seemed to fit. He was a tough kid with a permanent chip on his shoulder and spent enough time in after school detention that his parents had his mail forwarded there.

Before long another kid named Tom came through the lunch line carrying the traditional gourmet meal of the era: a slice of rectangular pizza, tossed salad and a half pint carton of milk.

Tom also had a reputation – he liked to fight. Not necessarily because he was angry about anything. Fighting just seemed to be one of his hobbies. Where other young boys in ninth grade liked to collect baseball cards or comic books, Tom collected altercations.

And that’s when a little devil on my shoulder whispered an idea into my ear.

I leaned over to the Jersey Bomber and casually mentioned that Tom had been saying some not-so-nice things about his mother, like calling her ugly. These rumors were, of course, completely untrue.

Bomber shot out of his seat.

The fact that he abandoned a perfectly good slice of school pizza should have told me how serious the situation had become. School pizza was sacred. Personally, I would’ve finished it first.

Seconds later, Bomber and Tom were throwing down in the middle of the cafeteria. Plastic trays went flying. Lettuce covered the floor. Kids were cheering. Teachers were scrambling to regain control. You might say it was basically WrestleMania with a USDA-approved school lunch.

The teachers quickly separated the the two and hauled both ninth grade combatants off to “Principal” Houston’s office.

I figured that was the end of it. I even considered finishing the Bomber’s pizza in his absence.

A short while later, I was sitting innocently in English class when word came that my presence was requested in the ninth-grade office.

Me?

Perhaps I was receiving some sort of award. Maybe my parents had arrived unexpectedly to present me an Atari 2600.

Then I walked into Mr. Houston’s office and saw Tom and the Jersey Bomber sitting there.

Uh-oh.

Mr. Houston announced he was giving both of them three days of after school detention and dismissed them. Then he turned to me and gave me the news: I too was getting three days detention for instigating the fight.

Instigating? What the heck did that even mean?

As far as I was concerned, I hadn’t thrown a punch. I hadn’t pushed anybody. I wasn’t the one who spilled the salad all over the cafeteria floor.

Naturally, I decided the punishment was unjust and simply didn’t show up for detention.

That worked out beautifully. Because the very next day, Mr. Houston called me back into his office and informed me that my three days detention had now become five.

I told him it wasn’t fair and that I still wasn’t going.

He calmly explained that if I didn’t show up at detention, my next option was a three-day suspension.

Suspension? This was a serious dilemma.

I already pictured my father taking off his belt. Suddenly, detention wasn’t sounding quite so bad.

Still, I pleaded my case. I told Mr. Houston I didn’t understand how I could be guilty of something called “instigating” when I didn’t even know what the word meant.

That’s when he casually reached for a dictionary.

He opened the book, found the word he was looking for and showed me the definition.

Then he looked at me.

“Was this you?”

I read it aloud.

“Instigator: Someone who deliberately causes or encourages trouble.”

There wasn’t much left to argue.

Yep, that was me. Guilty as charged.

I served five 90-minute detentions after school. Five afternoons of watching the regular school bus disappear without me, taking the late bus home, and finally getting there around 5:30.

At the time, it felt like cruel and unusual punishment. Now, more than forty years later, I call it a pretty good lesson.

Standing behind my lawn mower that Father’s Day, I realized I’d been staring across the street and thinking about Shawnee for several minutes. Mr. Houston had already disappeared inside his daughter’s house.

For a moment, I considered walking over and knocking on the door.

What would I even say?

“Happy Father’s Day, Mr. Houston. Thanks for giving me detention sometime around the Reagan administration.”

I decided against it. But maybe I should have. Because teachers and principals probably don’t always realize which lessons stay with us. Mr. Houston taught me that sometimes you don’t have to throw the punch to be responsible for the fight.

He also taught me that actions have consequences—even when you’re fourteen years old and think you’re being funny.

And, of course, he taught me one vocabulary word I’ve never forgotten.

Instigator.

I haven’t needed a dictionary to define it since.