Teacher, Teacher

My fear of missing the bus can be traced back to an episode in first grade. The class was to copy a page of text from our reader before school got out, and my Virgo perfection complex had me taking my time to get it right.

My sibs and I were bussed from home in those days, to the English speaking school across the Richelieu River and, at six years old, I assumed if I missed the bus home, I’d have to stay at the school overnight and it wasn’t even in the same town. Scary stuff, right? But when the bell rang and I wasn’t finished the assignment, the teacher made me stay behind until it was done.

The bus was waiting and if I wasn’t on it ... all sorts of nightmarish possibilities scampered across my mind, horribly distracting as I struggled to meet my deadline while in a burgeoning panic.

So I hurried. I did the best I could under duress, but it wasn’t good enough because the old bat looked at my work, picked up her red pen, and crossed out the whole page of my exercise book.

I made the bus home, which was my priority objective, but I fought tears the whole time. I think, but don’t recall, that I ripped out the page so my parents wouldn’t see the humiliation—I was hugely upset because I’d done my best in a race against the clock and the teacher had totally negated my effort. Whether or not it was, and forty-nine years later I’m still undecided, it felt unfair.

That particular teacher had a bit of a reputation among the student body (my older sister once did a hilarious impression of her yelling at kids on the playground), but she certainly left an impression on me.

Fast forward to seventh grade, my final year in elementary school after we’d relocated to Victoria. I had gone down the corridor where grades one, two and three were taught, probably to deliver something to one of the teachers. It wasn’t to the old dragon I encountered; that much I remember. I also remember her stopping me in the hall and demanding to know why I wasn’t in my own class. Mostly, I remember wondering why they assigned the most frightening old biddies to the first grade kids!

I seriously doubt this is the case now. From the antics of my co-workers who have school age children, I’m more sorry for the teachers than I ever was for my classmates because I’m pretty sure the sabre-toothed modern day mother would have had her fangs drawn by my first grade teacher.