Back in the fall of 2021, I invented a child named Andrew.
My colleague, Kelly Lynn, was constantly speaking about her daughter in such glowing terms that I felt compelled to invent a less-than-ideal son for her. So I told her students at lunch one day that she also had a son named Andrew who was poorly behaved and failing school.
“A real jerk-face.”
As a result, she didn’t talk about him much. She kept her bad boy a secret. She was ashamed of this rapscallion.
Many of them initially believed me.
Eventually, she convinced them otherwise, so around Christmas time, I stole her family Christmas card from the wall in the office and had a son added to the photo through the magic of Photoshop. Then I had this new card printed and spread throughout the school.
I even mailed one to her home.
Thus, Andrew attained a physical form.
She wasn’t pleased.
I did this again the next year, but thanks to the wizardry of my friend Kaia and the power of artificial intelligence, we aged Andrew up a bit to make it all seem more real.
Once again, I told her new class of students about the reality of Andrew.
Once again, many of them initially believed me.
Some of them started writing poems about him.
I also taught my own students to ask her casually and occasionally how Andrew was doing.
She was once again not happy.
That same year, Kerry Lynn sought revenge. She placed a tiny device that occasionally chirped like a cricket behind the clock in my classroom. For three months, my students, my paraprofessional, Ellie, and I sought the origin of this sound. We initially thought a smoke detector might be running low on battery, but the custodian informed us that they were hardwired into the electrical system.
Then we thought the sound might be coming from something in the ceiling. Or maybe it was a real cricket hiding somewhere in the classroom.
For three months, we searched. It made us crazy.
Then, one day, while sitting at a table beneath the clock, it chirped, and my friend, Jen, identified the source of the sound.
Hallejulia!
Sooner thereafter, Kerry Lynn was foolish enough to admit it was her.
“So it’s over now,” she said. “You got me, so I got you.”
Our principal, who was standing there at the time, wisely said, “Oh no. It’s never over with Matt.”
He was correct.
Another holiday card was stolen the following year, and Andrew was once again aged and added. This was sent around the school again, but this time, I made copies for all of her students as well.
I also had a card made with Kerry Lynn and her family for “Cluck Like a Chicken Day” — a stupid but real holiday — which I also sent around the school.
Then, back in the spring of this year, I found an envelope in my school mailbox. It looked suspicious from the start. In the classroom, I opened it to find a small tube.
I knew what it was immediately:
A glitter bomb. Sent undoubtedly by Kerry Lynn.
I waited a week until I had to leave early to take my daughter to an orthodontist appointment. Then, while sitting in the waiting room, I sent Kerry Lynn a photo of the room and asked, “Guess where I am?”
“Golfing?” she asked. She can’t stand the fact that I often played golf before coming to school.
I would send her photos from my early-morning rounds just to annoy her.
“No,” I replied via text. “Urgent care.”
Then:
“I’m getting glitter washed out of my eye after Tracey couldn’t get it all out.”
Tracey, our school nurse, agreed to participate in this prank.
Then:
“Happy to be back, teaching my students. Like I should’ve been an hour ago. Except I was blind.”
Her response:
“Noooo”
“Yes,” I replied. “Tracey tried. Scott finally said to go to urgent care.”
Her reply:
“Oh no. I am so sorry. I thought it would be funny. Are you OK? I should not have done that. How mad is Scott going to be? I have to prepare myself.”
I let this text go unanswered for about three hours (because waiting is the worst punishment of all) before calling to tell her that Scott, our principal, was very angry. I would need to file a workers’ comp claim, which would cost the school money, and students could have been blinded if they had been standing closer to me when I opened the bomb.
I told her to prepare for the worst.
Unlike me, Kerry Lynn worries about getting in trouble all of the time. She was terrified.
Then I called Scott to ask him to join the prank, and he told me I had to call her immediately and tell her the truth. “She might actually get physically sick over this,” he said. “This will keep her up tonight. She won’t sleep. She’s going to fall apart.”
“Exactly!” I said. “She sent me a glitter bomb! She deserves it!”
Scott and I went back and forth for quite a bit. He called me “Matthew” at one point, which is a sign that he’s very serious.
Finally, I agreed to call.
I waited a couple of hours, just to allow Kerry Lynn to suffer, then, before taking the stage at a keynote that evening, I called Kerry Lynn and allowed her to apologize and grovel for quite a while before saying:
“Don’t you wish I had found the glitter bomb and known who had sent it? Maybe never even opened it? And then maybe brought Clara to a dentist appointment, took a photo of the waiting room, and sent it to you, claiming it was urgent care. Wouldn’t it be great if I had lied to you about glitter in the eye, insurance claims, and Scott? Then maybe… just maybe, I let you lose your mind for a while before Scott insisted I call and tell you the truth? Don’t you wish that had happened instead of all this?”
“You didn’t,” she said.
“I did,” I said.
She was so relieved that she couldn’t be angry. Scott was right:
She really was losing her mind.
Later, she sent this text:
“I called my husband a little while ago to tell him you never opened the glitter bomb. He was laughing hysterically for like four straight minutes. I hung up on him.”
The next day, she came to my classroom. “You really got me. It’s finally over. You win.”
I was already in the midst of my next prank.
I had already purchased eight books, with titles like:
“How to Appear Normal at Social Events”
“How to Stop Farting in Public”
“You’ve Been Pooping All Wrong: How to Make Your Bowel Movements a Joy”
The “You’ve Been Pooping All Wrong” workbook
“Mommy Drinks Because You Cry: A Coloring Book”
Then I began sending them to her anonymously. I had one placed in her mailbox on a day I was absent with Post-it notes attached that read, “FYI.”
I sent her one via interoffice mail from another school.
I sent one to her through the US mail.
I waited to hear whether she suspected me, but she told no one about these books that kept arriving week after week for the final six weeks of school.
“How could she not know it’s you?” people asked.
“I think she’s been so blindsided that it’s impossible to comprehend what’s happening.”
The last book I ordered was “How to Totally Control Your Husband,” but it was blank. Only the cover was real. Inside, my students and I wrote our advice on how to control your husband,
Or why engaging in a prank war with Matthew Dicks is a bad idea.
Or just creepy drawings designed to frighten her.
Each student took a page and did what they wanted. So, too, did Ellie.
Then, on the last day of school, we crept into her classroom and lined the walls while she was retrieving her class from PE. When they returned, they found themselves surrounded by fifth graders. I was sitting in her chair, book in hand, waiting to reveal the prank.
She had no idea it was me. Her responses included:
- She was utterly baffled about why someone would be sending her these books,
- She was too embarrassed to tell anyone.
- She removed one of the books about farting from her mailbox in front of the PTO President and had to quickly hide it behind her back.
- She wracked her brain trying to figure out what was going on.
I had gotten her again.
But then she said this to her class:
“Boys and girls, over the last five years that Mr. Dicks has been pranking me, he’s really made me smile. He’s brought so much happiness and fun into my life. You know that I don’t smile often enough, but these pranks have really brought me joy.”
Then she hugged me, thanked me, and told me how much she would miss me. Kerry Lynn was genuinely sad about my retirement, and I often found myself standing beside her in those final days with tears in her eyes.
I loved what she said to her class that day. It meant the world to me.
Someone might read the story of this prank war and think:
- Matt is cruel and mean to his colleagues,
- What a terrible waste of time and money.
- Matt always takes it too far.
- When will Matt grow up?
I know of at least one colleague who thought this (and was dumb enough to tell it to someone who loves me).
But I’ve always thought this about a good prank:
It makes people laugh.
It makes the day a little more interesting.
It lets the person you’re pranking know that you were thinking about them. Putting real effort into those thoughts. Taking time to bring joy to someone.
You don’t prank people you despise.
You don’t prank people who are irrelevant to you.
You don’t prank people who you don’t care about.
Whenever I’ve been pranked over the years, it’s been a reminder that the person or persons perpetrating the prank were thinking about me. They held space in their mind and heart for me. Effort was exerted to make a funny thing happen. And now I have something I will never forget.
Kerry Lynn understands this, too.
I didn’t prank the mean lady down the hall who was always bad-mouthing me to my colleagues behind my back.
I didn’t prank that teacher whom I didn’t know very well.
I didn’t prank the teacher whom I like but also find a little annoying.
I pranked Kerry Lynn.
I can’t wait for her to see what I have in store for her next year.
