No Man Is An Island

I have no idea what bonded us together. I know it was for real, and forever.

Maybe it was the inoculations. I had never heard that word before. Miss Carolyn Blades was smiling when she said we’d all have to march down to the nurses’ station next to the principal’s office to get ours. I was hoping it meant every first grader was going to receive a free pony….

Not a one of us was smiling on the return trip. We were rubbing our arms and complaining about the big square needles, the unfair treatment, and our collective soreness. We all noticed that nobody got skipped. Whatever this school stuff had in store for us, we all seemed to be equally involved.

Maybe it was the after-lunch nap. The last thing on earth any six-year-old wants to do is lay their head down on a hard wooden desk and do nothing for 20 minutes. We didn’t usually sleep. We laid our heads down alright, and then made sideway faces at whoever was sitting across the aisle.

But again, it was a group activity. And we all obediently complied.

Maybe it was the ad infinitum class spelling bees. Or the teacher mandated Valentine cards we handed to each other. Or the group presidential “head cutting out” every February. Or maybe it was surviving the Blue Bird, Red Bird, and Yellow Bird reading classes together.

We even shared equal turns “going out” to dust the erasers.

The routine didn’t change much in those early years. But I believe we did. Between the spelling bees and math tests, we talked to each other about who we were, what we liked and disliked, how our siblings could make us so mad, what time we went to bed, how our parents managed us, and anything else we could think of.

Nothing was off limits. If we could think it up, we could talk about it.

And believe me, we did!

Jane would complement the shirt I was wearing, and I figured I could conquer the world. At recess, Vicki would run past me like I was sitting still to keep me humble. Bobby, Ricky, or Buddy would invite me over to their house, and I felt included.

As our elementary career wound down, we discussed, with a fair amount of trepidation, the pitfalls of junior high, changing classes, moving to a new school, etc. I don’t remember saying it out loud, but I thought if Skip, Pat, Beverly, Phil, and Benny can do it, then so could the rest of us.

We discovered the wonders of the teenage world side by side.

Charlotte kissed me as we were walking home from school. I’m not sure I kissed her back. A little while later, her big sister, Derinda, put us in the back seat of the family car and took us to the drive in theater. I think I kissed her back that night.

It might not have been everlasting love, but it sure wasn’t the worst thing that ever happened to me.

We moved seamlessly into the high school years. We studied Chaucer, played football and basketball, worked on homecoming floats, blew up a few things in chemistry, slipped donuts into class via the fire escape, boycotted lunch one day, had spitball wars in Latin class, lived through “M Club” initiation, stood in shock together the day John F. Kennedy was shot, and cheered for each other every chance we got….

Maybe the closeness of this class was forged by the fire we walked through together.

And oh, don’t discount the good times. We laughed our way through a great portion of the 12 years we were together. We spent our after-school time at Frank’s Dairy Bar, the bowling alley, out at the claypits, or the Park Theatre.

We complained about the slow pace of small-town life, the restrictions our parents put on us, the “stuff” the teachers made us do, the hard work the coaches demanded. But our protests were pretty shallow. It was obvious to all; we were living large!

As graduation approached, our conversations turned toward the future, and the changes that lay ahead for all of us. We allowed that it might send us in different directions, but we somehow understood that it could never separate us.

We got together again, just last week, 60 years after leaving McKenzie High School. We hugged each other like it had only been a month or so. And, we realized all over again that we grew up at a wonderful time, in a special place, alongside the best friends on earth.

Ruth Ann reminded us that most of us did not remember life without the other classmates in it. David, our senior class president, has maintained for years that we share a unique closeness for sure. Anne prayed a beautiful prayer for members that are no longer physically with us.

As she did so I couldn’t help but believe that as long as one of us lives…we all live! I will go to my grave sharing stories about James, Squeaky, Pam, Charlotte….

Speaking of Charlotte, I was wrong about her earlier. It was everlasting love! For her and every other member in the extraordinary Class of ’65….

Respectfully,
Kes
kesley45@aol.com