Those Were The Days

Amy, over at Mish Mash, wrote about her hard ass and her first grade experience, so I thought I would tell you about my seventh grade endeavor to be like my older brothers. Back in the 50's Atlanta there were no kindergartens or middle schools. You started the first grade and went through the seventh grade in elementary school. Then you went to high school, starting in the eighth grade (as a sub-freshman.)

My seventh grade teacher, Mrs. Stringfellow, pulled hair if you misbehaved. One day she came down the isle and grabbed me by the hair and shook my head telling me to stop talking in class. That afternoon, when I got home, one of my older brothers (10 and 15 years older) rubbed my head and said, “How’d it go today, squirt?”

I must have flinched, because he asked me what was wrong. I told him Mrs. Stringfellow had pulled my hair. He said something like; you probably deserved it, too. But when I walked out of the room I heard him tell my other brother, “If the bitch did that to me I would knock her teeth out.” That was good enough for me. If my brothers thought that was the thing to do, then it had to be the right thing. I mean, they were older and wiser.

The next day, down the row she came, grabbed a handful of hair and started shaking my head like a dog with an old shoe (guess I really got on her nerves sometimes.) So, I gave her an uppercut that caused her to bit her tongue. My feet didn’t touch the floor until I was in the Principle’s office. Then I was suspended for three days and kick out of school like an old drunk being thrown out of the saloon in a western movie (okay that was an exaggeration.) But I was suspended and my mom beat my butt, my dad beat my butt and my brother beat my butt for telling mom it was his fault. I walked funny for those three days.

But when I went back to school I had a “flat-top” haircut - complete with Butch Hair Wax. Let the bitch try and grab me by the hair now. So she used my ears. That's why, if you look at my head from behind, it looks like a car with the doors open.

Those were the days. I wonder what would happen to Mrs. Stringfellow if she pulled hair today. Maybe a coffeypot wanna-be would pop a cap in her ass. Or the PTA would burn her at the stake. Or the ACLU would sue her for denying the wanna-be their Constitutional Rights of Free Speech. But I do know that my mom and dad would still have beat my butt. That was their favorite pastime.