The day Johnny Got His Gun and Metallica became ONE

Hello ATS, friends. This is a direct Copy and Paste from a post I made from Facebook. Please accept my apologies in regards to my poor punctuation and grammatical errors. I wanted to capture the essence of the post in its lazy entirety lol. It's not the most interesting story but if you are like me and have nothing better to do, here you go.
_________
I remember in the 11th Grade while in Mr. Salander's English class there were only 7 of us in his class at the beginning of the school year. Mr. Salander off the bat didn't seem to have much faith in us and said," the bare minimum is prefect attendance, that's all you need to do to pass the class. 3 of our 7 never made it past the first week so after week two there was only 4 of us. Joe, Marlene, myself and some Joe Schmoe who only lasted past week 2.. so Basically is was Joe, Marlene and Myself. Our usual routine was Mr. Salander trying to give us a lesson but Joe always putting his head down, me scribbling in my notebooks and daydreaming, while Marlene was the only one paying any attention with her pen to her chin. Some weeks into out first semester Mr. Salander hit a "# It" mode and stopped teaching us as a normal teacher would and brought out a Scrabble board. Joe still had perfect attendance, I was here and there, Marlene always handed her work in. From what I remember of Salander is he was a fair man who always keen on drawing Spiderman pictures on his down time. So, in sworn secrecy between Student and Teacher we all played Scrabble, EVERYDAY for nearly a month. Mr. Salander was subtle in his ways but always managed to find a way to teach us about a new word or phrase while playing scrabble with us... Then he would hit us with a random Quiz and our prize was usually the rest of the classtime to chill in the Library. If we #ed up he would shake his head and give us the quiz again in another format, another wording until we got enough points to pass. He was fair.
Anyway, one day while in class he introduced us to a book randomly and he "EXPECTED" us all to read it because it was one of his favorites, Johnny Got His Gun. At the times I remember Marlene was sick with the Flu so it was just Joe and I who were expected to read this book. Of course Joe just put his head down. I spent every second reading this book and was intrigued. I remember being so interested that I couldn't wait to get to first period just to read this book everyday, On one particular morning I was waiting for the bus to pick me up, it was like 13 degrees and I had just smoked a joint. I got on the bus in my usual spot, midway bus in the back just above the wheel so I could prop my leg up. I was listening to Metallica's One, listening to the music and watching the sun strike my eyes as the trees pass by.. Holy #.. I realize Metallica's one and the book I was reading Johnny Got His Gun were about the same damn thing! My mind was blown and I couldn't wait to get to school to tell everyone I knew about it... except I was kind of stoned and to paranoid to tell anyone lol. I got to class and Mr. Salander was in his usual spot doing some spiderman drawing no doubt. Only sleeping Joe and I showed up to class that day. As Joe slept Mr. Salander looked up at me and suggested, "Scrabble?". I was caught off guard and looked around me like, Me!? He gave me a look as if he was an unconcerned cat and said, "Go to the library". I left without a word. Not long after that our classes shifted and I never did get to tell anyone about the link between Johnny Got His Gun and One by Metallica. Anytime I watch the music video now I think about how visceral the actual book was, how I more of the book comes to mind than the song or video can describe. I wish I had told my old teacher how much that book stuck with me all these years.

a reply to: MadSeason313

Such a sad song.
Love Metallica!

I don't know if it was the book you read or a similar one, but I couldn't read much of it because it was just such an awful thing to have happened to someone. I could feel the guys mental anguish.

a reply to: Night Star

If you felt thwarted by the book more than likely it was Johnny Got His Gun. It was so visceral and real that I couldn't stop reading at the age of sixteen. I agree with you, it was a terrible story but kept me turning the pages. Now when I listen the song I can't help but put myself in that perspective of the book and not the song.

One of my favourite songs, huge Metallica fan.

I have the book, and have had it for around 10-12 years, but have never picked it up (not much of a book reader) but will definitely pick it up now! Great story, thanks for sharing.

Ps. Fun fact, Metallica own the rights to the film. They bought it to use clips from the film in their music video.

One (no pun intended) of the best heavy metal songs ever. Always spectacular live too.

a reply to: Churchhousecreeper

Please* do read it! As a teenager not many books caught my attention but that one definitely stuck with me to this day. I would love to hear your thoughts on the book and song after you've had a chance to compare the two. Thanks for taking the time to read.

a reply to: Night Star

Believe it or not Metallica was one of my favorite bands
at one time.I lost a wee part of my hearing at one of their
concerts when I was 39.