I was going through some old papers yesterday and I found an essay that I wrote for my 11th grade history class. The assignment was to research the year that I was born and write 1,000 words on the biggest events and most memorable legacies of that year. I was given a week to complete it, and naturally I waited until the study hall period before the class in which it was due to even begin it, using absolutely no reference materials whatsoever.

Here is the opening sentence:

It should be said right off the bat that the year 1972 was far more than simply the 160th anniversary of the War of 1812.

As you can see, I was off to a great start. Not only did it include historical information and employ it in a manner that the reader, namely my teacher, had never thought of before, I had also managed to use up 25 words towards my goal. The rest of the opening paragraph is as follows:

No, the second year in the decade of the 70’s (that’s right, the second year, not the third. Many people often forget that there was no year “0”, and therefore 1970 would in fact bet the LAST year of the ‘60’s, not the first year of the ‘ 70’s) was chock full of events that will not soon be forgotten by those that study history, commonly known as “historians.” Come with me now as we investigate this complex, fascinating 12-month epoch known as…1972, AD.

I knew from years of experience with last-minute essay writing that the easy part was over. The opening paragraph was all fluff and buildup; the next paragraph would have to contain actual facts. So:

1972 began at the stroke of midnight on January 1st, 1972, and ended at midnight, December 31st, 1972.

At this point I sort of hit a wall. I remember looking up at the ceiling and chewing on the end of my pen a little bit. Being sixteen at the time, I’m sure sex crossed my mind at least ten times during the five-minute bout with writers block. Then I refocused and pushed on.

365 days passed in that span, encompassed in 52 weeks and spread throughout 12 months.

I must have been really desperate, because at this point I listed the names of the months, then the names of the days of the week, and, for some reason, a detailed explanation of what a leap year is, even though 1972 was not a leap year.

I’d exhausted the scientific approach, and I knew I’d have to bite the bullet and discuss some actual events. I had no idea what happened in the year I was born. Even if I could remember back that far, the fact that I was born at the end of October would have left only two months worth of material. I decided to start with general things, and hopefully become more specific as I went on.

1972 saw the continuation of some long-standing traditions of American life, such as Labor Day, celebrated on the first Monday of September, 1972.

This was all well and good, but at some point the teacher was going to expect some kind of information that pertained exclusively to the year in question. I decided the best I could do was list some things that I thought happened around 1972, and hope I got lucky.

Presidential scandal rocked the White House.

That was always a safe bet. My next bright idea was to reference an event that I knew was occurring in 1972, but about which I knew no actual details.

The Viet Nam War continued to rage in 1972. This conflict was a complex, hard to define series of events that experts today still find difficult to explain in a way that could make easy sense to the layperson. Any attempt to condense the happenings of even one year of that unfortunate period in American history and its implications would be foolhardy and even offensive to those who risked their lives in the name of freedom.

If figured Mr. Chesney, my history teacher, would be quite flattered by that last part considering he was a Viet Nam veteran.

I wrote a bunch of other stuff about Volkswagen Bugs and koulats, and somehow I’d managed to bluff my way through about 900 words. But if I wanted to ensure any kind of chance that the weaknesses of the essay could be overlooked, I knew I needed a killer closing paragraph. I couldn’t afford to merely repeat the sentiments expressed in the opening paragraph. I had to get personal about my own feelings about the year I was born, the sappier the better.

In closing, I would just like to express my own personal thoughts on the year in which I was not only born, but also conceived. Whenever I come across a person has been born a year behind or ahead of me, I must admit I look on them with just a bit of pity. I keep it to myself of course, but I have to wonder if they have any idea of just how close they came to being born in probably the single greatest year of the early 1970’s. Sure, ’71 and ’73 have their own merits; we all know that. But I love 1972. Yes indeedy.

The “yes indeedy” seemed a bit cheesy, but was in fact completely necessary, as they were words 999 and 1,000. I literally finished at the bell, walked into my history class, handed that puppy over to batty ol’ Mr. Chesney (Hanoi Harry we called him, though I think his first name was Ed), and sat at my desk, confident that I had once again managed another minor miracle of last-minute essay writing.

You might wonder what I kind of grade I was given. Well, worry not. You see, I went to a public school that spent money on new football uniforms every year while freshmen went without math books. Both Mr. Chesney and I knew that I had more than fulfilled my responsibility to the essay he assigned by my very acknowledgment that he’d assigned it in the first place. Actually completing it almost qualified as extra credit. Sure, I graduated at a far lower level of progress than I should have and spent the first two years of college learning things that I should have learned in middle school, but I loved my public school education. Yes indeedy.