Children should be seen and not heard... Was one of the adages repeated to us whenever we came rampaging through a room full of adults, or tried to butt-into an adult conversation for ice cream money. A countless number of slaps on the wrist and more spankings than I can recall exactly, finally had us all to the point that when an adult said something to us, we always answered with the appropriate response: Yes ma'am, yes sir, or no ma'am, no sir.
Momma was a former actress and she basked in the praise of other folk telling her that her children were 'well-mannered' young things. We adored her (still do) and when we had the time to think about what we did beforehand, we would never go near anything that would cause her, or my father the surgeon for that matter, to feel embarrassed by the actions of one of their progeny.
So, as I entered the second grade at Amarillo Air Force Base school--just after Daddy finished his residency he was drafted, a Vietnam-era thing, for those who weren't around at the time--I was placed in a class with a bright new and very pretty blond woman named Miz DeGrazzi. Most of the kids, myself included, were from the deep south and our accents did nothing to hide the fact. There were lots of kids whose parents had been stationed at far-away bases around the world: Turkey, Germany, Japan, Korea, England, and they came to school with strange accents--to my ear, at least.
Our bright, young, pretty teacher had been seeing to our vital educations in the 'three Rs' (Reading, Writing, 'Rithmatic--now called Math) and being from someplace far off to the north (Yankee Land, my grandfather would say of it) took great offense to my use of good manners one day...
"Scott? Have you finished with the assignment?" She said, catching me looking out the window, daydreaming about flying in a jet that had just passed over the school.
"Yes, ma'am..."
"Do I look like a little old lady to you, young man?" Her face had taken on a sour expression. I did not know this woman all that well yet, but I knew an angry woman when I saw one. Still, I was not sure what she was alluding to here.
"No, ma'am," I replied, sitting up straight, remembering that posture told adults much about a child's attitude, according to Momma, anyhow.
"Stop calling me that!" She came out of her chair then, her face all red. Every student in the room jumped at the retort. None of us were sure what, exactly, I had done to set her off that way. The only times I had ever gotten Momma, Aunt Janice, or one of my grandmothers that angry had been big trouble times, for sure. I was in dangerous territory here, sure enough. But, why? The whole thing befuddled me.
"I am not an old woman, young man. Do you understand me?" One of her eyebrows looked as if it was going to fly off her face.
Carefully, in the few micro-seconds I had to formulate my answer, I considered the facts: She was a young, beautiful woman. I even had a little crush on her before this episode. But here she was, madder than a wet hornet and aiming all of that at little ole me! I gulped and answered her. "Yes, ma'am?"
Until that point, I would never have believed it was possible for a young, beautiful blond woman to get so red, but she did, a brilliant, vivid scarlet--Momma was also an art teacher and I was one of her experimental students, so I had learned the color wheel quite well by that time, and knew of the varying of color, thus the word 'Scarlet' popped into my head as I identified her exact tint, while sitting there petrified and confused by her outrage. "Didn't I just tell you not to call me that?" She screamed, the windows along the wall vibrated.
"Um...yes, ma'am?"
She came around the desk and grabbed me by one of my skinny shoulders, then yanked me up and dragged me stumbling from the room. Hanging by the door, as she had pointed out to us all on the very first day of school, 1966, was a small paddle, one of those that at one time must have had a rubber band and a little ball attached by staple. Miz DeGrazzi took hold of it as we exited the room. That was when I understood that I was doomed...
When I started school, part of the preparations that my parents spent time going over with me, was that I was to be a good boy in class, and on the playground as well. Although my grandfather 'Les' had spent a lot of time teaching me to box (he used to be a bare-knuckle fighter during the depression, god love the Irish) and I was told not to utilize those skills unless the circumstances were extreme.
One of the big rules and promises Momma and Daddy gave me was: if I got a paddling at school, for any reason, I would get one at home as well.
Now, it stands to reason with any kid, paddling sucks! Up to that point, I had only witnessed other kids dragged and humiliated up from their chairs and out into the hall, where the echo of butt-cheeks being popped ricocheted around the school. I sure as hell did not want that to be me, no sir!
Yet, here I was, abruptly removed and forcibly dragged into the hall, where Miz DeGrazzi, without pausing to explain any of it, turned me around and began to wail on my ass!
Now, Momma could swing a pretty good spank in her day, and Daddy was to be feared, mainly because he was six feet three. In reality, the parental spankings were a stingy affair, where Miz DeGrazzi's efforts were merely a puttering at the rear of my jeans (dungarees, if you listened to my grandmother). Of course, the sudden humiliation was too much for yours truly. I cried a storm of tears; tears I had to suck up before I set foot back in that room, like I had seen so many other kids before me do. I resisted the standard rubbing of the just-busted butt-cheeks and walked stoically, albeit red-faced back to my seat.
Huffing and puffing, Miz DeGrazzi came in behind me, sat in her desk chair and glared at me. "Do you understand why I spanked you just now, Scott?"
I hesitated, unsure of what to do, what to say. Finally, just as the Army or Marine training forces one to rely upon what they've been taught, I answered as politely as I knew how, just as my dear mother had taught me: "Yes, ma'am, I think so."
"What did you say?" She stood up quickly, as if I had just uttered a foul cuss word, which in truth, I did know a couple by then.
"Excuse me, ma'am?" I said, exactly as I had been taught to ask when I was not certain what was being said to me.
The woman's head looked as if it would blow off of her shoulders any second. Around the desk she came again, grabbed me by my hair this time, and yanked me out of my seat, back out into the hall where she began the beating process all over again. Absurdly, I hardly felt a thing the second time, even though her efforts at paddling my little Georgia-born ass certainly seemed to have been redoubled.
The worst aspect of it all, as I figured, was that when I got home, I was going to have to tell my Momma that I had been paddled at school, twice! All the rest of the day, I would sit there wondering if Momma would have at me once, then hand off the belt to Daddy, or...it was too much to think about as I walked back into the room and resumed my seat.
"Class?" Miz DeGrazzi said. "Can anyone here explain why Scott was paddled?"
A little smart-ass, teacher's pet kid in the middle of my row raised his hand. She nodded to him. "Because he gave you a funny look?"
Her anger flared again, but she caught hold of it. I could feel the kid squirm in his seat; all the desks in those days were connected together with nuts and bolts, if one of us turned over, the whole row went. "No, that's not why at all!" She looked at all of us. I could see her frustration. "I spanked him because he called me 'ma'am', and he did it again after I had already punished him for it the first time. It's disrespectful, and I will NOT have it. Now, does everyone understand?"
We all sat there stunned stupid, our mouths hanging open.
"Well! Do you hear me or not?"
Hesitantly, we all answered: "Yes, M-m-miz DeGrazzi."
She smiled and told us to get out our spelling books and turn to page...
~
Base housing was just like that old song from the sixties: "They all lived in Ticky-Tacky, and they all look the same..." Hundreds of little duplexes arranged in row after row with playing fields off to one far side. We rode the bus home and I slowly walked the last block.
I was crying when I walked in the door.
"What's wrong, honey?" Momma said as I came to the table where she was working on some sort of stained glass project.
"I-I-I gotta paddling today..." I stammered and then broke down completely.
Momma looked so disappointed. I was the oldest and she had her hands full with my brother and my sisters; the last thing I wanted to do was to come in with upsetting news, and of course, there was that whole spanking thing that I had to look forward to; it was a lot of pressure for a seven year old. "Well, Scotty, you know what the rule is..."
Hot tears rolled down my cheeks and I sucked back a little snot. "Yes, ma'am."
They were the thin tears that come after one has already boohooed a time or two, salty, watery streaks that leave your eyes feeling as if you've spent the day in a heavily chlorinated community pool, diving for pennies with your eyes open.
"Lets go to your room then." She said standing. I followed her and went back to my room and assumed the position: hands on knees, sort of like a tail-back awaiting a quick-pitch lateral from his quarterback. Momma, bless her heart, knew I was already in some pretty severe distress. She gave me a couple of half-hearted licks with the belt and sat down on my bed with me. "Now, tell me what you did to get that paddling today."
I told her, recounting as much of it as I could either understand, or remember. As I came to the end of my tale, she was staring at my wall. Her face was burning with a fury that caused me to leak out a few more tears. I wondered that she was going to spank me again, just for good measure. "Is that the truth, Scotty?"
"Yes, ma'am." I did not feel indignant by her asking. It is just one of those things a mother can do: look straight at you when you tell her something and know, without a doubt, if you're lying or not. I had already developed some pretty good story-telling skills, at least verbally. But she saw that I was giving her the straight poop here.
"Help me get your brother ready to go while I get the girl's shoes on..." she said getting up briskly and walking out of my room.
"Where we going, Momma?"
"Back to the school. Hurry up, I want to get there before this teacher of yours is gone."
I had not, at this stage in my life, developed the accumulative verbal skills to say: Oh Shit! But, that was the gist of it. Here we were about to got back down to that terrible school where all manner of trouble would ensue. I grabbed my baby brother and stuck him into his carrier: a torturous device designed to entrap babies in place so they could not crawl all over the car. Mom usually set it down beside her in the front seat of the station wagon. None of us were belted in, back in those days. The seat belts always remained crammed down between the seats so we would not have to sit on the uncomfortable buckles and webbing. Johnny, and his car carrier, were always flying off the front seat and landing face-down on the wide, roomy floorboard of the Ford.
That day, we made it to the school without incident. Janice, my five-about-to-turn-six sister was left in the hot car with Lisa and Johnny while Momma took me inside to the principal's office. I sat outside the door and worried about just what was going on in there...
It should be understood here, that my mother was a very good actress, even though Daddy had long ago talked her out of pursuing her early career offerings with 'The Edge of Night', one of the many Soap Operas that were popular back then. The 'Outraged mother of a wronged child' was a role she was as good with as Betty Davis in her prime.
I heard her going off in that office, and after a few minutes, I heard the secretary over behind the counter call for Miz DeGrazzi over the school PA system. A few minutes after that, as I sat dangling my feet in a chair, the pretty young blond teacher walked by me without a word and went right into the office with Momma and the principal.
Moments after that, I heard Momma in there ripping into everyone. Her outrage carried well through the walls... Just who do you think you are, MA'AM? How DARE you punish my child for demonstrating good manners? I don't care how old you are, but MY son will always show respect to an adult. Are YOU an adult? I certainly hope so, because SOMEONE in this school seems to think you're adult enough to teach here. But then that can't possibly be the case, can it? How in the name of all that is holy can an adult teacher punish a child for being courteous?
...and on it went. I cringed as the yelling and screaming went on in there. But, I felt my own pride swell, knowing my Momma was in there going to bat for yours truly.
Earlier that day, I had thought that I had seen Miz DeGrazzi turn as red as humanly possible. But when that door opened up again, she looked like a blond-headed firetruck. She was crying and, with head down, walked by me.
The principal called out as he followed with my mother on his heels: "Miss De Grassie, you will apologize to this boy now."
She turned, but would not look at me. "I'm sorry for the misunderstanding, Scott."
"The what?" Momma said with venom.
Miz DeGrazzi turned and fled the room. I heard her thin high-heeled shoes clicky-clacking down the linoleum.
Had I chosen to, I suppose I could have gotten away with murder the rest of that year. But, I did not make that choice. Like most kids, the incident was forgotten a week later. When school started the next year, I noticed that Miz DeGrazzi was no longer teaching there.
Today, if a teacher dares to perform corporal punishment on a child, lawsuits are sure to follow. The teacher, guilty or innocent of misconduct, is dragged through the media until all hope at a fair chance in life has been utterly destroyed. Children are exposed to so much more than we ever were, and are mostly overwhelmed with information without the maturity to understand how to deal with it.
Despite the Miz DeGrazzi's of the world, I would have back those days when all effort was made to keep our kids not only safe, but well mannered and respectful.
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