 What you see to the left is
part
of a large class picture that was taken one spring night in my
first grade year. The curly headed little blond
"indian" at the bottom holding the "papoose"
is me. What can I say? It was before there was such a thing as
"political correctness."
As best I remember, we were celebrating the "rites of spring" or something like that. Anyway, there was a school play and, in my class, we were "Indians." We spend days beading our necklaces and making headbands from construction paper. Our "papoose holders" and "tomtoms" were made from oatmeal boxes. We supplied our own oatmeal boxes and "papooses." Our mothers made our dresses and whatever it was the boys used to cover themselves down there. We got to wear "makeup" - lipstick to be exact. Back then, lipstick, usually bright red, was about the only makeup that most women used except for maybe a little face power. It wasn't until the Beatles and "Twiggy" with her big eyes and the whole "mod" scene that eye makeup became common. Of our school play itself, I vaguely remember sitting crosslegged on the auditorium stage and doing a little "pattycake" number with my hands; then, running around in a circle and off the stage. It was the second school play I had been in. The first had been that Christmas. That Christmas the partner I had marched with had been the boy right behind me in this photo. His name was Nicky; and, I had a bad crush on him! but, I was over it by the second grade! The girl standing at the top with the feather in her headband is Barbara. She lived on Lem Turner Road too; and, our families sort of knew each other. Barbara was my best friend all through first and second grade. Then Sara entered my life!
Sara was a little over two years older than I was so we were never in the same classes together. Still we became best friends. My mother called us "The Goldust Twins." It was a relationship that lasted for over 15 years before we finally drifted apart. The year I was in the fourth grade, and Sara in the sixth, the school did a play based on popular storybook characters. My class did "Robin Hood" and that really suited me because, at that time, I was really into the "Robin Hood" television series which starred Richard Green. We danced and sang to the title song of the series: "Robin Hood, Robin Hood, riding through the
glen Once again, my mother made the outfit I wore. It was a long light blue dress with a pink vest and shiny gold trim. My mother threw in the shiny gold trim. I was the only one in the play with shiny gold trim. We girls also had these pointy hats with cloth which draped from the back. My hat was pink. It was supposed to be a medieval costume; and did, in fact, look like some pictures I have since seen. Sara's class did "Robinson Crusoe" and Sara was a native. Only back then, we did not say native. We said "cannibal." Political correctness still had a way to go! Sara's skin was all blackened with charcoal and her hair had a bone in it! |
She and her family moved in
to the next house to the north of us.