I vividly remember learning to write my name in kindergarten. Miss Dolan hand wrote the letters to trace in colored marker, on long, yellowish double-spaced penmanship paper with green lines. I got so excited when my teacher used orange for my letters (not to mention how impressed I was that same year, when I discovered that the pictures on the long magical rows of color TV’s at Sears, even had orange in them!).
We used fat red pencils without erasers, that smudged as the knuckle of my right pinky rubbed across the words I wrote. I can still smell the paper and feel the lead scratching across it, crumbling a bit if the point was too sharp. I was aware of being grateful that my name was short (Ruth D), and not long like E-l-i-z-a-b-e-t-h. And that I didn’t smell of pee, like Elizabeth did; except for that one time in second grade… Penmanship and Spelling became my favorite classes in first and second grade.
In first grade I had a wicked crush on Miss Apostle. Her classroom was across the hall from my class. She was so gorgeous: shimmering golden locks swaying as they slid down her back to her waist. I sat across the hall wishing with all my heart that she was my teacher instead of grumpy old Mrs. Greeno.
In truth, my experience in Mrs Greeno’s class was one of the big turning points in my life. She’s the one who taught me how to read Dick and Jane, in a small circle with the other children in my group. I was completely petrified of being called upon to read aloud. I coveted the flannel board Mrs. Greeno used to demonstrate addition and subtraction, especially swooning over the glorious orange felt pumpkins.
In that class, I shared a love/hate relationship with Wendy von Rosenving, who sat next to me. She was always trying to copy me. There, I also met my best friend Eva Orman. She was the new girl on the block who came in the middle of the year, wearing a white blouse, pleated navy skirt, and knee socks, waves of brown hair falling to her waist. How I wished I had long hair! She seemed shy like me, and I was happy to finally have a real friend in school.
I was Teacher’s Pet in first grade, being always the first-picked to leave class to go home because I was so, so good- quiet and obedient. (I also was the only one in my Kindergarten class of 41 children who never had to sit in the Rude Chair, including my teacher Miss Dolan!). I had the very ugliest hooded, black tweed coat that year, a hand-me-down; and the other kids snickered as I awkwardly left the room before they got to leave.
When I was in 2nd grade, my next door neighbor, Heather Titilah came over one cold, rainy afternoon. We were discussing how beautiful Miss Apostle was (even more gorgeous than Samantha Stevens and I Dream of Jeannie).
We decided to write an Alphabet Book for her. “She can use it for teaching her students how to read!” We were so excited!
Notebook paper in hand, kneeling on the floor and using the piano bench as a table, we painstakingly devised sentence after sentence for each letter. Heather was a year older than me, and she was great at thinking of sentences. But my penmanship was better than hers, so I did the writing.
- Adam Alligator always ate apples and ants.
- Beautiful Betty baked blueberry banana bread.
- Cathy Cat could color, and count candy…
By then, I was thrilled to have graduated to a thin yellow pencil with an eraser on the end, but it was a little bit hard to write small enough to fit the lines on the paper.
We spent long hours working on it. Then, using the exquisite shiny yellow yarn from my Nit Wit Kit, we tied the nine pages together with tiny bows.
Heather and I proudly made delivery of our creation to Miss Apostle after school one day; and never heard another word about it!
RDW 6-12-18