Memories of a Joyful First
Day
With feelings of great excitement, I anxiously headed off to school. Having an older brother and sister already in school, I had been left home to play with no one but Dwaynie, a younger neighbor. Unless you counted my younger (by ten months) sister, Mary Jo.
With great excitement in my heart, mother got me off to the public school kindergarten class. Today's children's toys and playthings were unimaginable to this youngster. That day, however, I did behold a sight that took my breath away - the largest building blocks I had ever seen. A classmate was building a room, or should I say walls, around another classmate - the former a male, the latter a female.
Having come from a loving family, in the days before television, I had not yet actually seen violence in any fashion. Nor had I been introduced to the realities of conquest, territory and possession. I joyfully entered his yet-uncompleted, walled room, believing that both my new classmates would be friendly and glad to let me play with them before class began. I was anxious to be a part of the great fun. Instead, my male counterpart gave me a scowl and made it very clear that the Not Welcome mat was out. For the first time in my life I experienced hurt feelings. Not knowing how to react, I did what came naturally - I collapsed his walled garden down around him. .
Our kindergarten teacher, wearing her hair in a bun and sporting pinched, wire-framed glasses, appeared to be about a thousand years old. She listened in sympathy about how the mean-spirited kid pushed the walls down around the poor, innocent lad. She looked at me with scorn and announced, "You'll stay after school for this!"
Her words terrified me. I knew from my older brother that only delinquents had to stay after school. I imagined myself hanging upside down on a rack while an ugly, hairy, hunchbacked dirty old man gleefully pulled out my fingernails and twisted ropes around limbs. I fretted all day and finally, after what seemed an eternity, heard the final bell ring! I sped out the door towards home.
To this very day I still hear her voice calling my name. I shouldn't have done it but, just like Lot's wife in the Bible, turned around and looked back at her. In her polka-dotted dress, standing on the outside school steps, she was shaking her fist and shouting, "John Sullivan, you come back here!" I burst into tears and ran.
I don't remember going back to school the next day nor do I remember anything else about kindergarten. I must've finished because I went to grade school, high school and college and you can't do that if you're a kindergarten dropout. The next couple of years though are gone from my consciousness. I only remember Gail, a girl I liked very much. I used to throw stones near her to get her attention. Once, when testing my physical strength, I imagined I could throw a rock over the roof of the project where she lived. Instead, it went through an open window and allegedly hit a baby in the head as it slept peacefully (till then, that is) in its crib. After that, a policewoman was summoned to our home in Berea on more than one occasion and probably explained to my mother and father that I just wasn't right in the head.
Fortunately for me, and others who might cross my path these days, I don't push walls down when my passion is inflamed. Nor do I gain attention by throwing rocks. Instead, I take it out on them by writing!
Copyright
© 2000 J C Sullivan, 9240 Milford Dr, Northfield, OH
44067
Sullivan is an internationally-published Irish-American writer residing in Northeastern Ohio. He is an American correspondent for the Mayo News. jcs@en.com
first day at school by j sullivan
