The Free Bird Has Flown

Where would they be today without...?
The receptionist at the Pearly Gates is checking out lockers, handing out towels and filling the soap dispensers: there will be fitness (and crew cuts) for all now that Leonard has arrived, and there's no doubt that the receptionist didn't have to ask, "What's Your Name?" Rock 'n' Roll Heaven has opened wide its gates for one Leonard Skinner who died this week at age 77, a man described by The New York Times as "the physical education teacher who had the greatest effect on rock and roll history." Sad, but true...one of my inspirations has taken up residence in the Sweet Home Alabama Fitness Center in the Sky...but I guess I can carry on, my wayward sons. (something of a mixed musical metaphor). Yet, he will be forever lionized as the galvanizing spirit behind one of America's seminal rock bands. If you've ever (or never, for that matter) flicked your Bic at a concert and screamed "Free Bird!" you know exactly what I mean...and why I was so inspired by the man, the legend. Of course, all of that came later. The epic saga has its origins in a humid, sweaty gymnasium at Robert E. Lee High School in Jacksonville, florida, circa 1969. This was the eminent domain of one Leonard Skinner, physical education instructor and fashion policeman. this was back in the day when a young man would simply stick his head under the shower to convince the teacher that he had, indeed, taken a shower...back in the day when crew cuts were the norm and anything even resembling a Beatle cut was hooted at with scorn by most right-thinking adults like Skinner and school boards everywhere. So, the wheels were set in motion. Who knew?
Like most schools at the time, Lee High had a dress code that included a special section dealing with hair length...draconian, yes, but rules were made for the edification of our young, impressionable minds.
As it happened, the Van Zant brothers were not ones to accept such rules without question so off to the principal's office they went. Of course, they were not the only rapscallions convicted of this heinous offense, but they are the ones who made Skinner a household name...and gave me the reason to hold him up as an example (albeit of what I did NOT want to be, but, still...)
UYears after the scarring incident over hair that--gasp!--touched their collars, the van Zant boys formed a band, and in something of a sarcastic tribute, named the band...say it with me...Lynyrd Skynyrd, merely substituting the letter "y" for every vowel in their despised gym teacher's name.
I vowed there would NEVER be a Dyrryl Pyttyrsyn, and so far, I haven't heard of one.
Perhaps I succeed where Skinner failed in the classroom we called the gym.
But, I'm still a bit jealous.