SelahV (Mrs. V if you're a gentleman) invited me to participate in a meme at Karen's blog, Tried and True. The meme simply involved telling five memories from grade school. Karen is a school teacher and so this meme is of particular importance to her. i enjoyed the trip down memory lane so much, I didn't want to leave my responses in the comment thread, but thought I would share them with you all, too. Maybe you would like to participate, too. Drop a comment. My five, in no particular order:
#5--I am indebted to Matt Terrell. In the fifth grade he refused to rat me out. On the playground was a huge, upright slide with three twists in it. It stood a good twenty-five feet tall. You could surreptitiously stop in the first twist on the way down and STEP OUT of the slide and slide down the support beam. Matt got caught; I didn't. When the teacher asked if anyone else did, I stared at the floor--Matt wrote thirty pages and his parents grounded him for a month. I got off scot-free.
#4--I won first place in the egg-in-a-spoon race on field day in fourth grade.
#3--I sent Lisa Snyder a love note in third grade; she said she would be "friends" with me. I was elated! We buddied around for a few days; in eighth grade when I asked her to "go" with me, she told me she could do a lot better than me. :)
#2--In sixth grade, I wrote "I will not talk in Mrs. Smart's class so that I will not disturb the education of others" 750 times for Lisa Malone, who I had a crush on (I must've had a thing for girls named Lisa in grade school). It didn't help.
#1b--I wrote "I will not talk in Mrs. Smart's class so that I will not disturb the education of others" 750 times myself because shutting-up was a virtual impossibility. I wrote it again, 1000 times, a few weeks later. Stayed in every recess until I had it done, too.
#1a--When I was a senior, my sister brought a letter home to me. It was from my fifth grade teacher, Mrs. Hall, who I dearly adored. Mrs. Hall had seen my sister get into my dad's four-wheel drive tow truck, jacked up on monster tires. The truck was named was named "El Bandito". Mrs. Hall recognized the truck and not knowing who my sister was, searched her out and then wrote and gave to her the letter to give to me. I wrote her back, telling her my future plans (though at that time ministry sure wasn't it). I still have her letter tucked away. I had hoped to correspond with her for a while longer, but teachers are a fairly busy lot.
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I have lots of school memories. Since I was a good kid (neener, neener, neener), they really aren't about me getting into trouble or anything, though. Most of what I remember about my childhood is from school; I seemed to have blocked the early homestuff out. :/
2nd grade -- some friends and I decided to have a spelling contest. We each took a sheet of paper and wrote as many words as we could. I got a bit obsessed with this and spent several days on my list, and I think this was my introduction to "list making."
Kindergarten -- I got swatted on the behind my my teacher (who was also my dad's cousin) because I didn't get out of the snack area fast enough. I was mortified. I realized later that it wasn't a "punishment" type thing, but a hurry along type thing.
5th grade -- We were studying the metric system and had a 20 question quiz. For each one we missed, we would have to write 100 times. So, that weekend, I wrote my 19 hundred sentences, and retook the quiz. I only missed 18 the second time. That grading period was my first B.
6th grade -- My teacher did not like me, and the feeling was mutual. After being punished, unfairly, again, for something I didn't do, I was sitting at my desk reading, and she was putting up a bulletin board in the back of the room. I remember thinking, "I wish she'd staple her hand to that board." The thought had just escaped my brain, when I heard a "clu-thunk," a gasp, a dropped stapler, and saw her run to the sink to get the staple out of her finger. That kinda scared me.
8th grade -- We were an obnoxious bunch. Not trouble makers just mischievous. One day, "john" and "dan" decided to do an air raid (they scream "AIR RAID!" and we all hit the ground -- cute). However, after arranging this, they went back through the class and "canceled" it, but they didn't tell "Ben," who was to be the "caller."
At the designated time, Ben jumps up, yells, "AIR RAID," covers his head and throws himself to the ground. We all just looked at him. Our teacher, Mr. Metcalf, turned bright red (I thought at first he was mad, but he was trying not to laugh), and asked to see Ben in the hall. It was the only time I had ever seen that teacher smile.
Teachers (well, most of them) are an awesome bunch. And, I don't say that just because I "are" one. :)
You said that you were from Boiling Springs... where was that huge slide that you're talking about at??
The only thing I can think of worth mentioning is the time that Travis Vanover pulled the fire alarm while the teacher wasn't looking. Noone saw him do it, and I was the one standing next to the thing when Mrs. Johnson turned around.
There was supposed to be a tornado drill that day (in those, you go out into the hallway and sit with a book over your head), so all of the first graders wound up outside with books on their heads.
I got sent to the principal's office, convinced him that I didn't do it, but no one else believed me, not my teacher, not my friends, not my parents...
On the bus one day in 7th grade, I asked Travis Vanover if he did it, and he said yes.
Brandon,
The slide was at Holden Chapel Middle School. I was in fifth grade and the school only housed fifth and sixth grade. It was closed a few years later.
After I posted that, I realized thats probably where it was. I think I remember that playground being there after the school was already closed down... It looked really fun... I went into the building a couple of times after it was condemned or whatever (one time my friend and I snuck into it during his little brother's football practice, the other time we had to move some stuff from the highschool over there)... it was a pretty creepy building... it was actually hard to imagine that only a decade and a half earlier, it had students in it...
I also remember finding a ceiling tile made of asbestus at my grandpa's house that he said came from there... (he did construction work and has random artifacts from various construction projects he worked on throughout the century)
Needless to say, I wasn't sorry to see the place condemned. :)
I haven't been out there in a few years, so I don't know if the building is still there or if the property is being used for another purpose. Boiling Springs has COMPLETELY changed since I grew up there. Man, I remember when the caution light at the intersection of Highway 9 and Old Furnace Road was changed to a bona fide traffic light. (Am I that old???)
I don't remember that one ever not being a traffic light, but I do remember when there were only 2 traffic lights, 2 restaurants, and 2 grocery stores...
They tore the Holden's Chapel building down a few years ago. Before they ever tore it down, though, they updated the ball field there and made it into the girl's softball field...
before I got married, i went back every few weeks or so, but in the past two years, it seems like every couple of months that I've been back, something new has been built... they build a new elementary school every year, it seems like...
and i thought I was small-town
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