A recent cedar chest lid-lift exposed some school papers of years gone by. I noticed a third grade report card from Charles L. Manners School, (East St. Louis), IL. Wow...I was some kind of mediocre. I've stated many times that I have slightly above average intelligence and I have documentation from 1948 to prove my claim.
In the teacher's comment section of the report card this notation...'needs to use time to good advantage.'
My third grade recall is vivid. That was the year that my teacher, Miss Spayheart gave me three swats with a wooden paddle because I punched some class mate. I cannot remember why I hit the kid but I do remember why the teacher hit me...three times. The story doesn't end there. Nope! As luck would have it, I had screwed-up parents. Miss Spayheart gave me a note to take home explaining my paddling and I was to have a parent sign the note and return it to the teacher.
Actually, I had this figured out pretty good. Timing is everything...right? I got home from school at 3:30PM and my father did not get home from work until 5:00 PM. I would have mother sign the note as soon as I got home, put the note back in my book bag and it's all GOOD. Ah, hell no, mom and dad had some kind of crazy parenting notion about 'sharing,' which was news to me. I said sweetly,"Mom, would you sign this note, please?" She replied, "Oh, your dad will want to do that."
Immediately, I thought, this ain't gunna go well.
Dad read the note and signed it without a word spoken; I'm thinking, this is good. Then he spoke, "Go to the back bedroom." In the back bedroom, I got three belt whacks across the seat of my pants and he spoke again, "Don't bring anymore notes home from school."
Later, looking in the mirror at my bare butt I realized just how belts leave welts! Where was DCFS ?
Anyway, I never got into school trouble again. I suppose that was the pivotal point of 'using time to good advantage.'
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