Swirly’s Time Line
Third Grade
When the list was posted again for class assignments the summer before the third grade, I was anxious and excited. Once again a car ride, which was longer than really needed, ended with my grandmother’s fumbling for the parking gear and my leaping out of the car to find my name in the rosters. Every year it had been the same. The same experience of my legs sticking to the car upholstery, the veins left from the fake leather making spider vein impressions that now are real and not simply indentions. The same heat in the car making me torn between sympathy for the Thanksgiving turkeys we devoured each year and desperation for Grandma to roll down a freaking window.
The Verdict
Also, as happened every year until after the fifth grade, Jason Fox was in my class. Luckily, my friend Michelle and the other geek, Eric, were, too. Again, though I would suffer with the perverseness of the Foxster I would have my savant peers to help balance things out.
The teacher listed for our class was Mrs. McLain. Surely not the same Mrs. McLain I had as a mid-season replacement in the second grade. Wait … Shirley. Yup, it was the same lady Grandma assured me. After the news of my new teacher, I was certain that the teacher’s aide would be my only hope for a good year. Her name was Mrs. Walker, the one who was perhaps my saving grace. I hoped she might be another balance, like the nerds were for Jason.
After an extensive wait of sweaty, humid weather and anticipation, summer vacation was over and school started back. I climbed on the school bus and rode off to my first year of cursive handwriting. The third grade – where I would learn more sophisticated math and get to read real books, the type with more words than visual aides.
This class was a 3rd and 4th grade combo class. The class was divided basically in half. The geek group (Eric, Michelle, a few other 3rd graders and me) was introduced to “AG” – the Academically Gifted class. We got to leave regular class and spend time with the AG teacher, Mrs. Hice, and participate in “accelerated reading”. It seemed like a bad idea at first, but it turned out to be the best thing about the year.
Mrs. Walker
Mrs. Walker turned out to be an odd woman. Her hair was below shoulder length and lush and curly, almost too perfectly so. It was a nice change from Mrs. McLain’s wiry rat’s nest. She was a bit on the plump side but dressed smartly, as Mrs. Caviness had always been. I decided to progress with her and to ignore Mrs. McLain as much as possible.
Despite my best efforts to like her, Mrs. Walker became more disagreeable the more the year wore on. By Christmas I was living for AG time and starting to like Mrs. McLain a lot more. I got my only elementary “B” grade from Mrs. Walker in handwriting. She made notations on my report card that I talked too much, too. I got to the point that I would rather draw Jason’s requested naked women pictures than to listen to Mrs. Walker squawk about cursive – which I had so been looking forward to. That lovely curled hair now resembled horns at times, if only to me.
Mrs. Hice
Mrs. Hice was a bit of a peculiar lady. For starters, she had a spider fetish. She wore spider lapel pins, dangling spider earrings and for our Christmas craft project we made a silver spider tree ornament out of pipe cleaners, two bulbous ornament halves and some silver thread. I still have this contraption in my decorations box in the attic and laugh every year that I pull it out. Mrs. Walker’s idea of a Christmas craft project was to take half of a walnut shell, cover the inside with glue and sprinkle glitter in it. That seemed so … second grade. The fourth graders were less than impressed and I remember seeing many of these crappy things littering the bus floor on my ride home just before Christmas break.
Things were the same as always after Christmas. I woke up in the mornings to Grandpa calling out, “Yah-hoo, Mountain Dew!” or “Rise and shine!” My life didn’t seem that magnificent but it was tolerable. I still liked my art classes with Mrs. “Purple Leaf” Brady, I was intrigued by Mrs. Hice’s eccentricities, I had friends in my class and I always knew my memory verses for church. Things were okay, as they always are before a big wave of change.
To be continued … soon.
… previous stories …
2nd || 1st || K pt 2 || K pt 1 || school starts || birth to age 5
Exams are over!
Things look good grade wise!
I don’t have a summer job yet.
