The Jounrey to the West (2)

For those thousands of readers who were waiting so eagerly for the second installment of "The Journey to the West," my "sort of memoir," that was supposed to have appeared yesterday (Sunday), I apologize. I was called unexpectedly to Seattle to perform a thankless task. We returned just now, within the half hour, with our ancient Dodge pickup ("Big Blue") so overloaded with miscellaneous furniture, computer gear, books, clothing, dishes, desk, bed, and uncounted videotapes, cd's, and miscellaneous, it would have made you believe the Joads actually traveled by limousine. We wanted to celebrate the success of this unpleasant mission with a bottle of champagne, but, alas, not a single bottle was to be found here at Sandhill. In any case:

The Journey to the West (2)

I do not recall being particularly traumatized by starting the first grade. It was only after it began that I suffered from a kind of identify crisis and experienced the full forces of peer pressure and conformity. My mother was a University graduate and somewhat older than most of the other mothers, and she had somewhat higher aspirations for her only child than most. As a result of this she dressed me for school in short pants and made me wear those neckties held on by elastic. As all of the other boys wore long pants, and neckties were unheard of for the sons of mostly miners and laborers, I was immediately perceived as someone even more sissified than Little Lord Fauntleroy. I was not helped much by my name either, Lewis LeRoy Langness. Being a reasonably bright little tyke I removed my necktie upon entering the school, left it in my desk, and soon had a large collection. And I pressured my mother about the short pants, pointing out that no one else wore such things. Of course I eventually prevailed, conformity was achieved, and I began to take my place in the schoolyard as well as our little town.
I do not have very strong memories of most of my life. But I remember well, even to this day, elementary school. I think this is because your humiliations may be etched more deeply into your memory than your occasional successes. One such mishap occurred when I was drafted into our first grade play. I have no idea what it was all about. But I remember being dressed up in some ridiculous costume, given a small toy tin trumpet, and instructed on delivering my one and only line. I was to come on stage, blow a blast on my trumpet, and announce, “Her majesty, the queen.” During rehearsals this went very well. But on the night of the first performance, when I emerged on the stage, although I blew mightily, no sound emerged from the trumpet. Undaunted, I returned to the wings, made a new entrance, blew a mighty blast, and announce, “Her queen, the majesty.” The audience, composed almost exclusively of parents, thought this was very funny. I did not. In the second grade I played a man with a hoe so enthusiastically I was castigated for damaging the hardwood floor. Then, in the third grade, I was dressed up in an absolutely absurd medieval fluffy costume and made to sit behind a open picture frame, pretending to be some famous painting (I know not which). I was made to do this while one of my least favorite girls, Sarah Jean, dressed in baggy long stockings, played some awful screechy tune on her violin. By some clever mugging I managed to upstage her, much to the chagrin of the director. By the fourth grade I had endured all the humiliation I could stand from our attempts at thespianism. I rebelled, completely, stubbornly, forcefully, absolutely, and thus ended my career as an actor forever.
Also, I recall, on the very first day of the second grade, the teacher went around the room and asked every child to sing. I guess she wanted to start some kind of choir or something. Anyway, having never sung much of anything, I tried, but was a dismal failure. She said to me with disdain, “you can’t sing.” Again, I was humiliated, to say nothing of angry, as I had never claimed to be able to sing, didn’t want to sing, and couldn’t understand why in the world she wanted me to sing in the first place. I determined, then and there, that adults, even teachers and parents, have little or no respect for children.
Although I was very young when I began school, five just turning six, I found myself attracted to the opposite sex. At least to one member of that universe. Her name was Eline, and I think I was drawn to her because she was somewhat more dark complexioned than the other girls. She wasn’t an ethnic of any kind, just slightly darker than the sea of white faces that surrounded me on all sides. I thought she was pretty (she did not grow up to be pretty). I sat several desks behind her and watched her sort of worshipfully from a distance. It took my mind off Velma, who sat across the aisle from me, and wet her pants faithfully almost every day. Velma was very poor, lived on the wrong side of the tracks, and soon disappeared from my life. I have no idea what happened to her, but I did not miss her.
We were a pretty happy bunch in elementary school, especially during recesses. We scrapped and played games and giggled and tried hard to please our teachers and parents. It was our world and we thought about nothing else except the reality of everyday life in a small town and small school. Thinking back on it now, it was sort of an idyllic time. Things became more and more serious as we grew older and older. One final note here on humiliation: I was the only child in my fourth grade class to fail to win a Rice Penmanship Award. Sigh.