OLD SCHOOL

by bartermn

Mrs Carter was the teacher for eight grades and she taught reading, writing, and arithmatic the oldschool way, with a ruler slapped accross knuckles or, as my younger brothers can testify, strapping a misbehaving child to his chair. I loved that old lady and I loved to learn. Maybe that's why I never had to sit in the corner with a pointed hat made of card-board. Mrs Carter took our whole class to Caroga Lake amusment park at the end of each school year, gave away the extra pencils and paper, and did her best to teach the population of Rockwood some manners along with the three R's.

As one of five children at the time, I learned balance while walking to school.We would stand on the guard-rail posts along the highway and salute the miles of army trucks as they headed to or from nearby Fort Johnson. It was always a thrill when we got a return salute.

I learned not to stick my tongue on cold steel during a winter walk home from school. Ricky, the youngest brother at the time, was left attached to our bridge for an hour while Steve and I ran for help. Mom followed us back to the bridge with a cup of warm water and set Ricky free, his tears were frozen to his face.

I learned to fish in the reservoir just up the road a bit from the school house. My oldest brother and I could usually skirt past the bee-hives that lined the dirt trail to the lake but one day the honey bees saw us coming and planned an attack. I think Roger had once stole a piece of honey comb and they got revenge that day. I learned that mud does help take the sting away, Mom sprayed us down then wiped kerosene on our welts. Dad walked back for our cane poles later.

Roger and I once dug a hole in Uncle Frank's woods during summer vacation. We hadn't intended to make it so deep but a boulder was found and we just had to get it out. We enlisted the younger brothers' help and did remove the rock but the crater was discovered and we were forced to fill it back in. Our hopes of trapping a bear were crushed.

That same summer, Dad took us frogging accross the highway to a small pond in the woods. He had a nice frog spear, a five-pointer with clotheline rope wrapped around the center of the shaft. We used Uncle Frank's jon-boat and a kerosene lantern to sneak up on those huge, upstate bull frogs and take them home for Mom to batter and fry. Us kids weren't allowed to cross the highway by ourselves and forbidden to enter the woods, Dad told many stories about hunters getting lost in there for days, some never returning alive.

Mrs Carter's schoolhouse was shut down when summer ended my second grade, I'm not sure if she just retired or the county decided that children could be taught better when crowded onto a bus and hauled to Oppenheim to mingle with their own age group. I was there for only a couple months before we moved to Pennsylvania but the new school changed my view of the world, I think I would have turned out a better man if Mrs Carter had been there for me longer. Of course, there's no telling how I might have been without her guidance during the years I did have her for my favorite teacher.