The next year

8th grade! Big fish in a little pond!

Started the year with cute haircut, contact lenses, and no braces on my teeth. Life looked good.

I had some good classes that year.

US History with Mr. Jack Rushton, who very recently passed away. Mr. Rushton is really one of the reasons I want to be a teacher. The passion he felt for the subject washed over all of us--imagine a room of 8th graders fighting for the top grade in any class. He made us want to learn and that is a very hard thing indeed.

I also got to take advanced Home Economics which was a really big deal--this teacher had petitioned to teach this class to us because she liked us so much as seventh graders. I remember that Mr. Rushton came to class that day and made us all hush puppies and fried peanut butter and banana sandwiches, all the while telling us stories about Elvis! We made Quillos- a quilt that folded up into a pouch and made a pillow! And that has been the extent of my sewing adventures. I figured I slip out of the  grind of the sewing world gracefully. I might still have that blanket around somewhere, but I probably lost it in a move. But more than anything, I remember a teacher who cared about us enough to give up her free time to take care of us.

And then there was English, not one of the good classes. Mrs. Brown, the teacher who only wanted to teach Drama but was made to teach English as well--or at least that's what her attitude said. I did learn in that class though. I learned the word juxtaposition that year and I still think of her when I read it. I learned that no matter how much I disliked Robert Frost that I could not memorize a Walt Whitman poem instead and expect to get a passing grade. I remember writing a short story where "and then I woke up" was the ending and thinking that I was a creative genius! Mrs. Brown didn't think so. But I did find that there was some kind of writer in me after I got a poem published in an anthology.

And then there were the other little things that made up the year. The not having many friends part. The feeling alone part. The classmate who's father the police officer was killed (I hadn't ever given much thought about parents being mortal). The field trip to the High School where I threw up all over the bus, and I was sitting in the front. Going to church and loving the people there who cared about me. A mother who gave me  more space and freedom than I can find to give my boys. Failing a 6 weeks of Math class cause I didn't do my homework.

And Oh My Stars, and am ever glad that I'm not there again!!