My parents raised me to be a good kid.
Nothing's absolute.
My first visit to the Principal's office involved a fire drill and a paper airplane. Third grade? At McDonough #7, we would walk down a set of back and forth winding, steel, external fire escape steps that led to the play yard. Adults would call it the school grounds. To me, a play yard. Inside, outside, I was ready to play. The fascination of flying planes made from a single sheet of 8.5 x 11, ruled, writing paper was unbound. The almost infinite ways to fold the paper. Fold for speed. Fold for climbing. Fold for acrobatics. Infinite. Of course infinite to a seven year old is anything greater than five, on a slow day.
So.
I had one designed for long, steady flying. Snub nose. Slight rear flaps for sustained lift. A minor indent in the base fuselage at back. Poor for speed. Great for sustained flight. Now. Think about launching it with a high, slow push. Watch it glide. On and on.
Then.
Think about beginning that long, slow flight from three stories high on an external steel launching pad, otherwise known as a fire escape.
I prepared. I waited.
The bell that rang to change classes took off. It started, loud as usual but then went on and on and on. A Klaxon of warning. Fire!
We rose. Lined up in orderly fashion. Marched slowly and calmly down the hall to the exterior doors leading to the escape. Teach held it open. We streamed, single file out, and then, down. When I cleared the door and as I took the first step down, I launched. Gently. As straight as possible, given the circumstances.
What I learned.
Fire drills are serious business.
In my defense, we periodically crouched under our desks and put our heads down by our knees to withstand a thermo nuclear blast. Duck and cover. We practiced this monthly. They showed what an A bomb blast looked like on TV. We got a TV about this time. "Gunsmoke." "Have Gun, Will Travel." "Roy Rogers." Nuclear holocaust. "A" bomb drills were serious too. The first few? The next several? What about the child that cried wolf parable? It got old. We giggled. Stop that. This is serious. So was a fire, right?
Can I say I couldn't wrap my mind around it?
So I got in trouble. I was contrite. This was "children should be seen and not heard times". Punishment fit the crime. Spare the rod, spoil the child. If they loved you, they punished you. How you learned. Positive reinforcement came later. Much, much later. Meantime, eyes down. Mouth shut. Take it like a man.
The second time, we moved to Ruston, Louisiana. My parents were house parents at the Methodist Children's Home. Whited Miller Cottage. One of three cottages. LMO (Louisiana Methodist Orphanage), Vaughn and Whited Miller, A dozen orphans in each cottage. All boys. Separated by age. Elementary, Junior, High School. Whited Miller was Junior High. I was elementary. The kids varied. The good, the bad and the ugly. My Mom was "Matron." I was "Matron's boy." The kids were a bit older than me. A couple, my age. Often families were kept together even though they were not the same age, which accounted for the discrepancy. We had three sets of three brothers. Anyway, I was fresh meat. They set me up on my first day at Ruston Elementary, sixth grade. I was trying to find my way around when I was backed against a wall and punched senseless by a big thuggy kid. I didn't see it coming and he womped me over and over. I cried. My beater and I got called into the office. I learned the solution for my recalcitrance was punishment. For fighting. I got detention for fighting. I learned a lot. Punishment does teach you things. I ate it. Swallowed it whole. I came home to a lot of questions from the older boys who wanted to see how I took my beating. "How was your first day?" I won't say I said anything clever. I put one foot in front of the other. It makes you hard. You learn you have to be hard to survive. Fairness is for fairy tales.
That's how I got in trouble. Flying a plane and getting beat-up.
I prepared. I waited.
The bell that rang to change classes took off. It started, loud as usual but then went on and on and on. A Klaxon of warning. Fire!
We rose. Lined up in orderly fashion. Marched slowly and calmly down the hall to the exterior doors leading to the escape. Teach held it open. We streamed, single file out, and then, down. When I cleared the door and as I took the first step down, I launched. Gently. As straight as possible, given the circumstances.
What I learned.
Fire drills are serious business.
In my defense, we periodically crouched under our desks and put our heads down by our knees to withstand a thermo nuclear blast. Duck and cover. We practiced this monthly. They showed what an A bomb blast looked like on TV. We got a TV about this time. "Gunsmoke." "Have Gun, Will Travel." "Roy Rogers." Nuclear holocaust. "A" bomb drills were serious too. The first few? The next several? What about the child that cried wolf parable? It got old. We giggled. Stop that. This is serious. So was a fire, right?
Can I say I couldn't wrap my mind around it?
So I got in trouble. I was contrite. This was "children should be seen and not heard times". Punishment fit the crime. Spare the rod, spoil the child. If they loved you, they punished you. How you learned. Positive reinforcement came later. Much, much later. Meantime, eyes down. Mouth shut. Take it like a man.
The second time, we moved to Ruston, Louisiana. My parents were house parents at the Methodist Children's Home. Whited Miller Cottage. One of three cottages. LMO (Louisiana Methodist Orphanage), Vaughn and Whited Miller, A dozen orphans in each cottage. All boys. Separated by age. Elementary, Junior, High School. Whited Miller was Junior High. I was elementary. The kids varied. The good, the bad and the ugly. My Mom was "Matron." I was "Matron's boy." The kids were a bit older than me. A couple, my age. Often families were kept together even though they were not the same age, which accounted for the discrepancy. We had three sets of three brothers. Anyway, I was fresh meat. They set me up on my first day at Ruston Elementary, sixth grade. I was trying to find my way around when I was backed against a wall and punched senseless by a big thuggy kid. I didn't see it coming and he womped me over and over. I cried. My beater and I got called into the office. I learned the solution for my recalcitrance was punishment. For fighting. I got detention for fighting. I learned a lot. Punishment does teach you things. I ate it. Swallowed it whole. I came home to a lot of questions from the older boys who wanted to see how I took my beating. "How was your first day?" I won't say I said anything clever. I put one foot in front of the other. It makes you hard. You learn you have to be hard to survive. Fairness is for fairy tales.
That's how I got in trouble. Flying a plane and getting beat-up.
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