Good guidance

My life changed dramatically in September 1964, when I started seventh grade at May A. Gallagher Junior High.  For the first time, I got to shop for school clothes—no more Catholic school uniform!  Girls still had to wear dresses or skirts, of course.  Under them were knee socks or stockings (held up with garter belts, panty hose being a few years off).

I loved having teachers who were not nuns—especially male teachers (who were admirably tolerant as I addressed them as “Sister” for months).  And for the first time, I was surrounded by boys I had not known since third grade. How can you like a boy you knew in third grade? I almost immediately developed a crush on a boy named Bobby who was to become my first boyfriend. Our romance lasted for only a few months and consisted primarily of holding hands at the Plymouth or the Met during Saturday matinees.

Another first—changing classes, a divine innovation for a kid like me with a limited attention span.  The only drawback was that we were required to pass between classes single-file on the right side of the corridor, no talking.  That rule indirectly led me to a career as a writer.

We had a block-rotation schedule, and I found it easy to forget which class was next.  One day, I turned to the kid behind me to ask and was caught by one of the ever-vigilant teachers and given detention.  My punishment for this major infraction was to write an essay about why I should not talk in the halls.

To say I was not pleased by this assignment is to put it mildly; I was incensed and full of righteous indignation, as only a junior-high-aged kid can be.  So I wrote a sarcastic essay that went something like this:

                The subject of this composition is to be why I should not talk in the halls.  The reason is that there is a rule that says I cannot, one made to establish order.  Whether it is a good rule or not is of no bearing, for I, as a mere student, do not have the right to question to school rules.  I broke the rule because I am an inferior being who could not remember where I needed to go for my next class.  Some day when I am perfect, like all the teachers in this school, who seem to do everything right, never faltering, I pledge to help the cause by reprimanding inferiors such as myself who have the audacity to break such important school rules.

A few days later, I was called to the office of the guidance counselor—I think his name was Mr. Chase.  My heart dropped down to my Weejuns when I saw that he had my essay in his hand.  He asked me what I planned to do with my life.  I replied that I wanted to be a vet like my grandfather and great-grandfather had been (never mind that I had no aptitude for science or math).  Mr. Chase asked me if I had ever considered becoming a creative writer.  “No,” I said, “Why do you ask?”

“I saw the composition you wrote for Mr. Novelli,” he replied.  “It sure looked creative to me.”  He went on to say that he thought I had a real gift for writing that I should work to develop.

I had been writing for pleasure since I was old enough to peck out stories on the electric typewriter in my father’s office, and I had always prayed for essay questions on tests because I knew I could ace them.  But up until that point, it had never occurred to me that I had any special gift.

I won’t claim that I became a writer that day, but Mr. Chase’s observation helped me understand that everyone did not find writing as easy and pleasurable as I did, and that the ability to express myself in writing was something to be grateful for--as was a good guidance counselor.