Jasmine
Doe
Hale
English
1301
September
29, 1994
The
Box
One school morning in the first grade, our studies were interrupted when
Mrs. Melder announced that school had been canceled for the day.
She instructed us to gather our belongings and then wait quietly at our
desks until our parents came for us.
One
by one, the students in my class disappeared as their parents came to take them
home.
When Mrs. Melder and I were the only people left in the classroom, I told
her that there was no one to pick me up.
Daddy
needed our one car for work, I explained, and our family was too new in the
neighborhood to know anyone with an extra car.
She told me we should give Mama a few more minutes.
While we waited, I wondered if her bee hive hair-do would collide with
the desk-top, if she was taller than Daddy, if those beady black eyes were as
small as they looked behind glasses, and if her think pale lips ever smiled.
Finally, Mrs. Melder suggested we call Mama from the school office. We did and Mama said I should begin walking home right away.
My teacher added that the school was about to close and I should hurry.
When I stepped out of the building, I stopped.
The school appeared abandoned and spooky with its outside lights on in
the unusual mid-morning darkness. I
was stunned to see a miniature lake in the sunken breezeway area. I didn’t know that rain could cause so much trouble.
I knew there was no way around the water.
On the other side of the school’s circular drive, however, I could see
patches of green grass. I know what
I had to do Before I began, I
opened my satchel and pushed my reading textbook as far down as I could. As I did, the day I received my first school book flooded my
memory.
Mrs. Melder had made each of us stand by her desk while she prepared
every new book for student acceptance.
I
stood on the tips of my toes to witness my name being inscribed on the first
line of the box reserved for student names.
With both hands, I carried my book back to my desk as if it were a
delicate antique that required special handling.
The book was a beginning reader, sky blue in color with Alice and Jerry
holding hands, running across the front cover.
In between its hardback covers was everything a first grader wanted to
know about Alice, Jerry, and their adventures, one sentence at a time in tall
bold black letters. In a life full
of hand-me-downs, my reader was one of a kind.
That afternoon, I ran all the way home because I couldn’t wait to share
my new book with Mama. She
patiently listened to me rattle on about our newly formed reading groups at
school. We examined the color
pictures, and with her hand on top of
mine,
we pointed to some of the easier words.
She
told me that she was proud my school had entrusted me with such a beautiful
book.
Satisfied my book was safe in my satchel, my attention returned to the
problem at hand. I placed the
satchel on top of my head, Indian style, and started the walk home.
The first couple of steps left my feet heavy and squishy.
Slowly, I felt my way through the muddy water, and careful though I was,
I lost my balance. The satchel
tumbled off my head, through my arms and plunked on to the water’s top.
I reached for my satchel right away, but I saw that it was floating.
Fascinated, I was content to hold the satchel’s see-through plastic
handle loosely so that the gently, swirling ripples of water would curve around
the corners. I allowed the playful
waters to move my satchel ahead of me until it was time to step onto higher
ground. As I pulled it out of the
water, I was almost sorry the fun was over.
Mama was waiting for me at the end of our carport.
In record time, she relieved me of my wet shoes, socks, and satchel.
I stared at my wrinkled toes while Mama placed my saddle oxfords on the
oven door to dry. When she asked me how my satchel had gotten wet, I simply
shrugged my shoulders. Mama reached
into the satchel for the book and once she located it, the look on her face made
me want to run. I didn’t want to
see what made Mama’s Cajun eyes darken.
I almost didn’t recognize my reader.
The book was swollen, and its spine was broken. The pages were warped and
stuck together with Mississippi flood water.
Before a tear could escape, Mama carefully lifted he book and laid it on
a flat surface to dry. Maybe we
could save the book. We would see.
The next morning with bed sheets in tow, I scrambled to the kitchen where
I knew the book was waiting. I
didn’t believe it was possible. The
poor thing looked worse. I lifted
its front cover just enough to peek into the student names box.
Like an aura, blue ink sprawled in all directions from my name.
I felt like my book had died.
The
tears fell easily that time, and I imagined countless excuses for not attending
school that day.
I begged Mama not to make me go to school.
I pleaded with her to write Mrs. Melder a note saying the book had been
lost. Mama wouldn’t hear any of
it. Wasn’t it punishment enough
that I had lost the one thing I cared most about?
Mama walked with me to school that day.
She held my hand all the way to the breezeway area which was now back to
normal. We didn’t say much; we
didn’t need to. Mama gave my tiny
hand a reassuring squeeze and left me there with the dead book to face Mrs.
Melder alone.
Mrs. Melder didn’t say much either.
I stood in front of her desk, head bowed, oblivious to the whispers
behind me while she stared with disgust at the destroyed reader.
From a pile of old readers, she chose one that looked especially tired
and opened its cover. Careless, she
scribbled my name underneath every other student’s name, so far down the list
that my name wasn’t even in the box.
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