The Randomness of School Drug Testing
Oldest child comes home from school on Friday and blasts into my office. “Guess what happened at school today,” he says. Oh, no. “I got drug tested.” As a senior, he’s been practically holding his breath for this moment.
Here’s his version of what transpired:
“They called me out of first period, so I go down there and sit next to this other kid who's a junior and he’s all weird about it and he’s like, ‘There are what, 300 kids in your class, right?’ and I say, more like 700, but he doesn’t say anything but to tell me that the whole
senior class should walk out of school to protest drug testing, and then the school would stop doing them because the school wouldn’t want the publicity.
“And I think, whatever, but he goes on and on with his conspiracy theories until The Woman calls us up. So you know how they put blue water in the toilets so you don’t take your cup and scoop some up? I go up to the table to fill out my form, and I tell The Woman, ‘I think I should inform you that I have a rare medical condition that causes my urine to be blue.’”
I laugh at this and he says, “I know. Funny, right? And she doesn’t even crack a smile. So this other kid and I go into the bathroom, and The Woman follows us to make sure we don’t do anything weird, and she waits outside the stalls. And I just went to the bathroom and don’t even have to go, so I stand there for a minute. Then I hear the kid next to me start to fill his cup and I say, ‘Oh! You want a urine sample.’ And again, The Woman doesn’t even laugh.”
Against my better parenting judgment, I find this funny too.
He continues: “So finally I step out and there’s barely anything in my cup and I tell her that I didn’t have to go and she says it’s fine. But the guy next to me has filled his cup, and it’s like sloshing over the edge and onto his hands, spilling everywhere. You have to pour it into these separate vials and The Woman is trying to help him, and it’s getting all over her hands and it’s like totally disgusting.”
On the way home from soccer that night I’m telling his brother his story and younger brother recalls last year, as a freshman, when he got drug tested. “I’ve only had to pee in a cup twice: once at Dr. Aimee’s and once at school. I’m never sure if I should hold the cup really far away and aim for a three-pointer, hold it up to me for a slam dunk, or pee straight up in the air and go for a lay-up.”
I’m pretty sure urine testing was designed to be taken seriously. Not with my kids.
Here’s his version of what transpired:
“They called me out of first period, so I go down there and sit next to this other kid who's a junior and he’s all weird about it and he’s like, ‘There are what, 300 kids in your class, right?’ and I say, more like 700, but he doesn’t say anything but to tell me that the whole
senior class should walk out of school to protest drug testing, and then the school would stop doing them because the school wouldn’t want the publicity.“And I think, whatever, but he goes on and on with his conspiracy theories until The Woman calls us up. So you know how they put blue water in the toilets so you don’t take your cup and scoop some up? I go up to the table to fill out my form, and I tell The Woman, ‘I think I should inform you that I have a rare medical condition that causes my urine to be blue.’”
I laugh at this and he says, “I know. Funny, right? And she doesn’t even crack a smile. So this other kid and I go into the bathroom, and The Woman follows us to make sure we don’t do anything weird, and she waits outside the stalls. And I just went to the bathroom and don’t even have to go, so I stand there for a minute. Then I hear the kid next to me start to fill his cup and I say, ‘Oh! You want a urine sample.’ And again, The Woman doesn’t even laugh.”
Against my better parenting judgment, I find this funny too.
He continues: “So finally I step out and there’s barely anything in my cup and I tell her that I didn’t have to go and she says it’s fine. But the guy next to me has filled his cup, and it’s like sloshing over the edge and onto his hands, spilling everywhere. You have to pour it into these separate vials and The Woman is trying to help him, and it’s getting all over her hands and it’s like totally disgusting.”
On the way home from soccer that night I’m telling his brother his story and younger brother recalls last year, as a freshman, when he got drug tested. “I’ve only had to pee in a cup twice: once at Dr. Aimee’s and once at school. I’m never sure if I should hold the cup really far away and aim for a three-pointer, hold it up to me for a slam dunk, or pee straight up in the air and go for a lay-up.”
I’m pretty sure urine testing was designed to be taken seriously. Not with my kids.
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Jennifer