Schooling. I remember it. Many times in my reminiscing school is vivid! I can remember every teacher I’ve ever had, and some events (though often trivial) from every year. Ours was a small town, grades 1 thru 12 school in one, three story building. It had a 2 story L addition added in 1939 which included a gymnasium and four new classrooms, offices and rest rooms. My first Fall of School was 1948, so that part looked new to me.
Two years later (3rd grade) we were included in lunch-time basketball. No shoes, just stocking feet, we played up and down the court like big boys. I remember making a left-handed hook shot. I heard some laughter, but I also heard some applause—basketball, it was, from then on!
(Oddly speaking of this on a day when the song of the day rolling through my mind was “You gotta be a Football Hero, to get along with the beautiful girls” — no, I’m not kidding.)
But, basketball wasn’t all I learned at Trafalgar. I learned everyone was not nice. One of my first grade experiences was watching a boy in my class attempt to push another boy into the side of a moving school bus! The boy barely escaped bad injury or possibly death. Later in life, the pusher died in prison, the one he pushed became a teacher and is alive and well to this day. …and I saw that in the first grade….
I learned some teachers were tough but always fair; and I learned some were easier, but not always fair. Dichotomies which still seem to apply, at least politically. But, politics is for another day.
Every teacher of mine stands out in a particular way. From old retired substitutes with their brief glimpses of history, to our math teacher taking time to help us relate to other parts of the country by his travel stories (many times getting him off subject on purpose to hear another travelogue because we didn’t have our math assignment done), to being lined up and chastened properly (ahem!) for fighting on the playground. Every memory is precious. Hope you have those, too.
Thanks for reading,
the Elder
the Elder's Blog 