By Ben Palmer
“Oh, the poor dear. Look at his face. Bad liver, maybe?”
“No, no, I think he’s just sick…look at the hint of green. Zombie, perhaps?”
“He looks more like The Green Lantern had a risque affair with Gumby and gave birth to a broccoli addicted Shrek baby.”
While you work to forget that image, I’ll clarify that my liver is fine, I’m not Gumby’s love child, and I’m undergoing treatment for my broccoli addiction. However the color of my face on my new ID is out of my hands. The color…the green!
The green! Oh the green! Green that can be seen from 210, regardless of where you are in the school. In the greenhouse? You’re not safe. The plants are like, “Dang, that’s green!” Then they go back to being tended to by your green thumb because your ID is really, really green! But it wasn’t before!
The year started peachy. The IDs were a peach color admittedly tanner than my own pasty skin. After a month or so of getting used to the clashing colors of “Pasty-white-boy” and “Khaki-credential,” which are both available in a Crayola box if you dig to the bottom, I thought I could live with this. The school’s ID smithies, however, had some toil and trouble brewing in their cauldron.
What was in the cauldron? Well, I imagine it’s a mix of Kesha’s vomit, ground up emerald, eye of newt and liver of a blaspheming jew (I only include that to feel well-read.)
I know the color is a school color, and I understand tradition is great. But one of my own traditions is now at stake! At the end of each year I hang up my retired ID in my room. Over the last few years IDs have gone from a pleasing yellow, to a somewhat overbearing blue, to a regulatory gray. Why, oh why, must we resort to crack-nightmare green?
I can only think of one reason, truly: visibility. I doubt that a single student will end this school year without hearing a security guard say, “Let me see that green!”
Aside from the array of jokes I could make relating to this new saying (“You see the stuff when I see the green!”) this is actually a serious matter that could have repercussions through the year. In the past, student IDs were colors that students would actually wear, so IDs could blend in. This year, the only student who blends with his ID is the Jolly Green Giant. And he’s only here because he failed Horticulture. Go figure.
Already in one of my classes a teacher has mentioned that the administration is pushing harder for ID enforcement this year. In a school as big as Lane it is easy to understand concerns about security. All I’m saying is The Green Hornet could just as easily bring a weapon (or an iPod, God forbid) to school, and no one would notice. “Ah, yes, a giant ID. Let him pass.”
My primary complaint, however, is that my new photo makes me look like a zombified version of Kermit the Frog. On the bright side, the wires that control my muppet arms were off screen. If I had known ahead of time that my photo would have this green tinge, I would have worn a black robe and a witch’s hat, and my REAL nose. Those of you who have seen me on a full moon know what that entails.
I did not, however, wear anything ironic. In fact, I wore a red shirt, which makes me look like a zombie Christmas ornament. Hold the holiday joviality.
I’m sure there are kids in the school who will use the ID color to push their agenda, whether it be promoting environmentalism or legalization of certain Schedule I herbs. Regarding the former, I feel their argument is already invalidated by the simple act of printing two IDs for every student. Regarding the latter…well, good luck being taken seriously in Congress when your ID looks like toxic sludge.
I do genuinely wonder what the next ID color will be. I’m sort of hoping on an “Elmo-red” or “Pee-wee’s-bedroom-blue,” but I’m lowering my expectations a bit. With budget cuts as they are, perhaps the most likely color is “Whatever-is-cheapest-hmhmphmhth.” A reminder: these are all real colors. You just have to look deeper in the Crayola box.
Regardless of the endless jokes I plan to make all year, I think we’ll get used to the color. Some students loved it from the start. The rest of us will grow to love them like the cousin that gives macaroni pictures as a present despite being in his 30s. Maybe the new IDs can sit with him at the kiddie table when Hanukkah comes around.
I suppose vomit-color is just an acquired taste. The only consolation we share now is that we all look like zombies. I just hope there’s enough 7th grader brain-matter to go around. Just kidding. Their brains are underdeveloped. Head for the old teachers. I’ll hold them down and you start eating. Just don’t splatter any blood on my ID. Red-and-green isn’t cool until after Thanksgiving.
