Elementary School

I went to Maeser elementary for kindergarten and part of first grade. I don't have a lot of memories from that period of time, but I do have a few. I remember really liking my kindergarten teacher. I might have had a little crush on her, even. She lived in my ward and sometimes I would just go over to her house and hang out. We used large red pencils for writing and somehow I ended up getting stabbed with one of those pencils and the tip of the lead broke off inside my skin. I can still see it in the palm of my right hand 32 years later, although it has faded a little over the years--probably as more layers of skin have covered it. I remember a day when a girl fell on the playground and hit her head and had to get stitches. But the most traumatic event of my kindergarten year was the day we read the story of the gingerbread man who ran away. My teacher brought a gingerbread man and showed it to us, then read the story and I assumed we would get to eat the gingerbread man after recess. But when we came back she said the gingerbread man had run away. There was another day towards the end of the school year when we were all outside playing with a parachute. When we finished the teacher said we were all done, and I assumed that meant we were done with school - so I walked home. When I got there my mom was surprised to see me (it was much earlier than she expected) and dragged me back to the school :)

When I started first grade I remember my teacher at Maeser having a little clubhouse in the middle of her room. I thought it was really cool, but I was only there for a few weeks before I moved across town and started going to another school, Grandview elementary. My mom took me to the school a few days before I was scheduled to start and showed me where my classroom was, but it was a big building and when I got dropped off I wasn't sure where to go. I was wandering around outside crying when my teacher found me and showed me where to go. That very first day we were playing with blue clay and some of the kids started putting it on their foreheads. I thought it looked fun, so I did the same thing and the teacher noticed me and yelled at me. It was a rough first day. There was an older woman who we called Grandma Payne who lived on Jordan Avenue, which was the road I walked on to get home from school. She volunteered at the school and helped me to get better at reading. I remember being really confused by the word "Saw," and she patiently helped me figure it out. Our principal was Dr. Edenfield, a really nice guy who listened to and respected me. One day I was called to his office because someone had seen a kid wearing green and yellow pull the fire alarm. I was wearing a green and yellow shirt that day, but I told him it wasn't me and he believed me. Eventually they found the kid who did it -- someone wearing a yellow shirt and green pants. In second grade I started in one class but early in the year a new teacher was hired and I ended up in her class. I really liked her and remember her inviting all of the kids in her class to her house for a party on a Saturday. She only taught that year and then moved to Chicago. She wrote me a letter and told me how much she loved living there. That was the first year I participated in the school spelling bee, and I found that I loved and was pretty good at spelling. I won the school spelling bee in 5th grade and went to the district spelling bee, but my nerves conspired against me when I realized I was one of only three students left and there were two huge trophies. At the same time they ran out of the spelling words I had studied and had to start using random words from the dictionary. First I missed the word "seizure," which I had never even heard before, then I missed the word "waffle," spelling in "W-A-F-F-E-L." Stupid nerves :)

I remember watching the movie "Where the Red Fern Grows" in third grade at a read-a-thon. To this day I cannot understand why I had to be subjected to such a sad movie. In 4th grade I had a teacher who acted like she was personally offended every time the class wasn't paying attention to her--as if she expected us to be something other than the kids we were. She would say "excuse me" in this guilt-inducing tone that drove me CRAZY. That was the year I started getting bullied in school. There was a new kid who was really mean -- I remembering him banging my head into the bathroom wall once. I got so frustrated that a friend and I went to his house to see if we could somehow do something mean back to him. When we got there his family were playing kickball in the back yard and they invited us to join them. After that we somehow ended up being friends. That same year I was riding my bike home from school and I was trying to go straight but a truck made a sudden right turn and cut me off. I tried to avoid the truck but couldn't and ended up running into the tire, bouncing off and hitting a nearby address sign pole. The truck just kept driving, but someone else saw me and stopped to help, putting my mangled bike in the trunk and giving me a ride home.

I really loved my fifth grade teacher, Mr. Davis. He was pigeon-toed and all the kids made fun of him when he ran, but I thought it was cool that he wasn't afraid to run with us in spite of the fact that he was a little different. He owned a taco shop near my dad's work called Gordo's, and I used to go there and order cheese quesadillas, because that was the cheapest thing on the menu. I later learned how to make them myself. I remember learning to play the ukulele in 5th grade and having a lot of fun with it. I also remember a day when I stood up from my desk for a moment and then when I went to sit back down my chair wasn't there and I ended up falling on the floor. I looked up and saw a kid behind me and accused him of pulling my chair out (although even if he had the fault was at least partly mine for not looking before I sat). I remember my teacher sitting down with both of us to ask what had happened. I shared my perspective and the other kid shared his, then Mr. Davis sided with me, saying that I'd never given him a reason to doubt me. I had never felt so respected.

5th and 6th grades were a little bit hard because that was when it seemed like everyone divided into "cool kids" and "nerds" based on fashion choices and interests (like sports). I didn't care very much about fashion, and I enjoyed playing sports but wasn't as athletic as some of the kids. I liked being the goalie when we played soccer and I could run pretty fast. I also played "coach pitch" baseball for a few seasons. One year I accidentally got signed up for T-ball, which seemed a little bit too easy. But I struck out once, and I've never forgotten how embarrassing it was to strike out at T-ball :) The fashion at the time was to "peg" your jeans. Some of the kids who were trying to help me be less nerdy showed me how to do it, but I didn't really understand. So I told my mom she wasn't allowed to wash my jeans anymore because otherwise the "peg" that the other kids had helped me put in the cuffs would come out. Like the good mother she was, she just ignored me and washed them anyway :) I joined the orchestra and played cello for a while, but I never really got past "Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star."

Several years ago I heard that my elementary school was going to mostly be torn down and the remaining part was going to be converted into offices for the school district. I decided to visit the school before that happened, and as I walked through I was surprised how small it seemed. When I was a kid the building had seemed so impossibly large, and the stripes painted on the wall near the ceiling had been SO far away. Now they were almost at eye level. A lot of memories came back to me as I walked through those halls, and most of them were good. It made me grateful for all of the teachers and administrators who saw what I would become long before I could, and who cared enough to dedicate their lives to helping me and other kids like me grow and learn.