School Daze

School was a happy place for many people. A place that is often returned to in memory. The friends, teachers and activities all bring forth recollections of pleasant times. Times to which many people would like to return.

This is not so in my case.

I have very few pleasant memories of school, or really of much of childhood. I am not bitter and would not change anything even if I could because then I would be a different person than I am today and I am quite happy with the “Gerry” of today.

My most memorable school days occurrences are not at all happy or carefree.

My earliest school memory was my first day in school. First grade at Mills elementary in Klamath Falls, Oregon. I remember walking to school with my older sister Delores and then being surrounded by many strange children on the school playground area. Somewhere a bell rang and everyone disappeared. I had no idea what to do or where I was supposed to be. I just walked around a little and wondered where I was supposed to be.

After awhile a lady came out and talked to me for a short time and took me into the school and to the proper classroom. That is all I remember of my first day and I do not look back upon it with any fondness, only with the fright of a small, lost child.

One time in the fourth grade our class was herded outside while our cloaks had to be left behind. When we were brought back in, the teacher pulled me out of class and accused me of stealing someones marbles. I did not do this but the marbles were found in my coat. No matter how hard I protested my innocence, I was not believed and was punished accordingly.

A friend, Bradford Howard, laughingly admitted the next year that he had stashed the marbles he had stolen in the closest pocket he could find to get rid of them before he was caught with them.

Surprisingly, it was several more years before “Butch”, Bradford, and I came to a parting of the ways and I did have some good times with him. His “prank” was tied in my mind to the school, not to him. He did what he did but I always thought that the teachers should have believed me.

More School Daze to be continued.

Filed under: The Early Years

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