When my youngest brother went away to university last fall he let us borrow his Wii for a while and Dave and I immediately fell in love with it. We were bummed when my brother came home for Christmas and took his Wii back so he could play it with his girlfriend…parting is such sweet sorrow, especially when there’s a Wii involved. Over the holidays I told Dave if he could find a used one for under two hundred bucks I’d let him buy it, and because my husband was born with a horseshoe wedged firmly in his ass he found one this past weekend complete with controllers, nunchucks, a wireless sensor, several games and extra batteries for the controllers for two hundred smackers.
Naturally, we’ve been Wii’ing ever since.
Last night we bowled (which I am surprisingly good at, considering how all I’m capable of on the real lanes is granny bowling), and while I was kicking Dave’s ass I got thinking about volleyball, which reminded me about a dream I had a few nights ago that I was back in my high school gymnasium playing volleyball. That got me thinking about playing volleyball back in elementary school…two things I haven’t thought about in a while, volleyball and elementary school.
Suddenly I was flooded with elementary school memories. For the first time in like, twenty years, I thought about my phys-ed teacher, a man whose chest hair was always visible and who took the term Italian Stallion to a whole new level. I pictured his thin lips, the way he trailed freshly smoked cigarettes and cheap cologne behind him and the way he said house leagues like house leeeeeegs.
My grade two teacher’s style was one of a kind; she was all bright red lipstick, shiny blue eye shadow and platinum blonde hair. I thought she was totally cool. She used to sit in a chair at the front of the classroom, lay the boys over her knees and spank them when they were bad (imagine that happening in a grade two classroom nowadays, eh?).
My grade three teacher was tall and bony with a reputation for being the meanest in the school. I was terrified of her. When our class pictures came in that year we all sat on the square of shag carpet in the front left corner of the classroom and watched as she held up each portrait for the whole class to see. When she got to mine she commented on my crooked smile before handing over my pictures. I was self-conscious of my smile for years after that.
One day that year I knocked myself out when I leaned too far back in my chair and lost my balance, hitting my head on the heat register behind me as I went down. I remember everything going black and seeing what looked like my own chalk outline while I was out. As I came to I could hear my teacher calling my name from her desk. My body was numb and my head throbbed but I scrambled back to my seat, afraid I’d get in trouble; my teacher never left her spot to see if I was alright.
The lunchroom was in the basement, down the hall from the gym, and one day a week the grade four (or five? I can’t remember now…) teacher – a huge, burly man with dark hair, an unruly beard and a booming voice – would collect our scraps to take home to his pigs. He’d stand at the front of the lunchroom to ensure each student dumped the remains of their lunch into a big plastic container. When it was full, he’d snap a lid on it and carry it out to his truck to take home to his farm. He also terrified me.
When I was in fourth grade I shot a staple into my thumb by accident and I think it was fifth grade that a seagull shit on my leg. I locked myself in a bathroom stall and sobbed uncontrollably both times.
In my mind I can still clearly see my elementary school, inside and out, from the bathrooms to the playground to the principal’s office. I remember the tiny, stuffy library, the old-school pedal sinks and the way the place always smelled like a blend pencil shavings, chalkboard dust and stale cigarette smoke. Standing there in the middle of the den with a video game controller strapped to my wrist I shot back in time, saw all of those images like there was a slideshow going on in my brain.
All thanks to the Wii.
What do you remember about your elementary school?
39 Comments, Comment or Ping
Wow, I didn’t know there was a flashback module with the Wii! ;) Oh, elementary school. I was such an odd little kid – buckteeth, weird little glasses, needing a bra in 4th grade, hitting 5′9″ in 5th grade. *shudders*
January 17th, 2008
Okay, first of all, I too love my kids’ Wii and could play it for hours on end.
I don’t have many elementary school memories, but one of my most vivid memories is peeing in my pants in 1st grade, while sitting in one of those slatted chairs, so the pee made a nice big puddle on the floor. Then, I denied to the teacher that I had done it and she looked at me like I was on crack.
January 17th, 2008
I remember being the bossy one! And the chatty one. I rememebr getting cuffed up the side of the head for talking to much, ironically by the teacher I (and everyone) always adored the most – an tiny, old spitfire who didn’t take any guff.
January 17th, 2008
Actually, getting spanked by a blonde with red lipstick is something some men pay a lot of money for nowadays….
As for my elementary school memories…
Kindergarten – my younger sister (younger, therefore not in school since I was in KG) came into the schoolyard at recess (we lived across the street from my school) and I yelled at her because she would get in trouble if she “got caught”
Grade 1 – my first fight, with the son of my Grade 1 teacher (he was also in the class); it was the day Reagan got shot (I remember the Gr2 teacher coming in and gesturing a hand-symbol for gun, saying “Reagan. Bang bang.”)
Grade 4 – a boy peed on the floor because the teacher wouldn’t let him leave the classroom
Grade 5 – took on an entire grade of kids at another school (I was sent there once a week for “gifted” school) in the yard (and won)
Grade 6 – we spent from first bell (8:30am) until just before afternoon recess (2:30pm) sitting with our heads down because someone put 3 lines on the chalkboard and wouldn’t admit to it.
Good enough? ;) I’ve got a scary memory for detail… I could go on for hours.
January 17th, 2008
I remember not being able to do situps. My equally hairy gym teacher, her name was Mrs. Price. She spotted me cheating with my elbow one day and made me and another cheater do sit ups in front of all the other kids while they watched. She counted aloud and after the first two, the kids all started screaming “CHEATER!!!!”
I blame that embarrassment on why I was such a ball of hate years later playing ice hockey in Junior B. I was like a Tie Domi with a Jersey accent.
January 17th, 2008
I remember the school library. That should tell you where I was on the social food chain in elementary school.
I remember the smell of the books, I remember Mrs. Radford, the librarian, who let me help her decorate the bulletin board. I remember her reading “The Most Dangerous Game” to us one library period. I remember the books she suggested that I read. I *lived* to go to the library.
The rest of elementary school, not so much. I was a bit of an outcast.
January 17th, 2008
i had three elementary schools, one middle school, one junior high and one high school…too many freakin’ schools
January 17th, 2008
I was the chatty kid. I started out quiet and at the beginning of the year, the teachers always told my parents that I never talked. My parents always told the teachers to give me time, and by the end of the year the teachers couldn’t get me to shut up.
I remember my elementary school like yesterday. But, then again, my husband and I live in the same neighborhood I grew up in, around many of the same people I knew as children, and we’ll send our kids to the same elementary school I went to. So I guess that aids the memories a little bit.
January 17th, 2008
I was actually homeschooled up until the fifth grade and attended the elementary school until the seventh grade before I moved on to the high school. I hated elementary school! Because I didn’t attend up until fifth, all the other students knew each other and had already established who they were friends with. School turned out to be one embarassing or painful memory after another. Ugh.
January 17th, 2008
Hi! Fellow Wii-er here.
Is it wrong that I went straight to ebay to see if I could buy Volleyball for the Wii for you? I’ve been meaning to make you a CD for so long and this would have been perfect. Alas, there is no such beast. :(
January 17th, 2008
We had a principal – Miss Covert – who ruled that school with an iron fist. Every morning the entire student body had to file into the gym and sit cross-legged in lines by grade. No kneeling, no sitting with your legs straight out. Then all 300 of us had to chant in this weird sing-songy dirge “good morn-ing Miss Cov-ert. Good morn-ing teach-ers.” And the teachers would have to grunt back “good morning” in this beaten-down murmer that I can still hear clear as day in my head.
Miss Covert had a leather strap hanging on the wall above her desk, and used it whenever anyone was sent to the principal’s office for extra discipline.
She always wore shapeless grey skirts with matching jackets – with shoulder pads of course, this was the early 80s – and everyone walked in terror of her. She retired when I was in third grade and was replaced by this young guy who started morning announcements by cheerfully yelling “good morning dudes!” over the PA system.
Fuck. Total sensory overload flashback there. Must go have chocolate now, to clear head.
January 17th, 2008
so funny! interestingly enough, i also had the meanest teacher in school for 3rd grade… and i shot a staple into my thumb too, but i think that was first grade where i ALSO had the meanest teacher in school (two different schools)
yeah grade school… i can picture it like theres a video camera rolling in my head!
January 17th, 2008
I went to three different elementary schools. I remember in the first, Olive, there was a sign in my classroom of a mouse holding an olive that said “Olive You!” I remember our teacher pulling us each into the hall to test that we could say our ABCs and count up to 100. We got to put a marble in the class “point” jar if we could. When the jar filled up, we had a pizza party.
January 17th, 2008
Hmm…I’ve been playing the Wii a lot and I haven’t had any flashbacks. Are you sure there aren’t any substance abuse involved in these flashbacks?
Wink, wink.
In grade three I caught an injured field mouse only to have it bite me and it wouldn’t let go. Picture me, jumping up and down, screaming and crying while a rodent hung on to my finger for dear life. Good times. And ya, the circle of kids around me thought it was pretty cool. Blood thirsty sickos. LOL.
In grade six I was bending over to get something buried in the bottom of my locker and some dude decided it would be a good time to poke me in the ribs…I shot up straight and impaled myself on the back of the lock holder midway up the locker. Six stitches and hair caught in the lock. Good times.
Grade eight, I was trying to act cool and I was going up stairs and I missed the step and landed nose first in front of my boy crush. My nose bled. I can still taste the acidy taste of the blood and dirt I managed to lick and the texture of the floor.
Fun.
I could keep going with this. I was a first class dork.
January 17th, 2008
Hmm! I was really tall, really skinny and wore glasses. I think elementary school was so tramatic I’ve blocked out any memory!
January 17th, 2008
I remember we had a pool in the basement. And the cafeteria was in the same corridor. At lunch time when you would go down the stairs to that level the smell of macaroni and cheese and hot dogs intermingled with chlorine would hit you and the sheer stuffy weight of the chlorine would hang over you but the irresistible aroma of lunch would beckon you forward!
I remember pulling out my loose tooth in they gym washroom and nearly fainting…
I remember the sound our shoes made squeeking along the freshly waxed floors of the hallways, and the feel of the cold metal knob of the water fountain after recess… exhausted from skipping on the concrete.
Wow, what a rush.
I cant leave that Wii tennis alone.
January 17th, 2008
That part about your hitting your head and your teacher not even leaving her seat? That just broke my heart.
I’ve spent my life trying to forget elementary school, LOL!
January 17th, 2008
I had the strange experience of going back to my primary school to teach for a day. It was weird. I didn’t realise I had such clear memories of how things used to be. Some things were the same, others were totally different. I don’t see how they were able to make everything smaller when they did the major renovations.
Even the gum tree outside my grade 4 classroom where the koala was one day was smaller. Bizarre.
January 17th, 2008
I remember the scary, scary nuns.
Did I mention that they were scary?
January 17th, 2008
Wanna hear something scary? My daughter is now attending the same elementary school I did. My 6th grade teacher is now her principal. She has the same art and music teachers I did. Even scarier – it’s not like I’m a 20-something where that would almost sound reasonable. I’m 40. I last attended that school 29 years ago.
I really need to get out of my small hometown.
January 17th, 2008
Oh god…so many, so many. Strangely, many of mine are similar to yours. I remember the huge pedal sinks too. I’m going to save my most vivid ones for a post of my own. Will you be pissed if I steal your idea? It’s such a poignant thing to write about…I’m inspired.
January 17th, 2008
I went to seventeen different schools before sixth grade. I only remember bits of some of them, and I always have to really think to remember what grade a memory must have been… But some teachers really stand out. The ones who were really good to me, and the ones who sucked.
I love your memories. How cool.
;)
January 17th, 2008
Congrats on finding a Wii. Last year they were impossible to find. My boys wanted one and I went to so many stores and got turned down that they finally gave up on the idea.
January 17th, 2008
Oh wow. LOVED your memories.
Mine? Two words. “Crabby nuns.”
Oh wait… two more. “Mean girls.”
(Shudder)
January 18th, 2008
Christopher Layton threw up his tuna fish sandwich on the desk behind me in second grade. The teacher didn’t notice. I dutifully raised my hand and said and said, “Miss Gargano, Chris threw up.”
We had more than 40 kids in our classroom! Catholic schools–gotta love em.
I was hassled by a snotty girl named Carol Ann. One day at lunch, I kept all the seeds from my orange in my mouth, making them warm and slimey. When Carol Ann came up to me to deliver yet another insult, I spit the seeds on her chest and they slid down her v-neck.
Sweet. I was a good Catholic grrrl.
January 18th, 2008
I’ve repressed all those memories from Catholic school.
*go to my safe place*
I loved the transition from the Wii to the terrors of elementary school. Somehow they fit hand-in-hand. I’ve gotta get going before the memories come flooding back.
January 18th, 2008
I try not to think about my elementary school days. I went to four different schools, and was more of an outcast in each subsequent one. Thank god it only lasts for 10 years, and I’m still having a hard time with the idea of living it over again by proxy with the boys.
Now the Wii — nothing but good times there. We love the bowling, too, but my fave so far is something that I think is called “Marble Madness”. I may just need to acquire my own copy of that one!
January 18th, 2008
Honey, you made me get all weird feeling with your visceral descriptions. Feeling a tad freaked right now.
Gonna go hold my head under cold water and shake it out. Man. weird.
January 18th, 2008
When I was in elementary school, they still used the strap. The boys used to get a wack across the hand with it. And, I am not old. I am talking Ontario, Canada, circa 1982!
January 18th, 2008
-being forced to write lines for not listening (i was falsely accused)
-in kindergarten, inventing a game called kissing machines where the girls chase the boys for a kiss, but not really knowing what to do once i had a victim
-first time i said “fuck!’ (grade 4, someone took the soccer ball from me) and realizing that saying it didn’t feel as bad as i thought it would)
-pining over mark g in my snow fort (feeling hopelessly lovesick)
-tryng to convince everyone that the paperclip in my mouth was really a retainer
thanks for the nudge to remember these silly memories! you’ve inspired me to blog about one particular memory that is worthy of a post in itself :)
January 18th, 2008
I remember that we did this auction thing in class for the pretend money we had earned with our behavior. Somehow I ended up giving almost all of my money away to the “bad boys” who didn’t have much of their own so I felt bad for them. I remember that I only ended up winning the used horseshoe auction but a cute boy I had given some of my money to gave me some gum from his win.
My wii never makes me have any flashbacks though. I think you got some kind of magic wii.
January 18th, 2008
My best friend from childhood is now a teacher at that school so I do get occasional updates.
I remember grade 6 when we first started learning French with Mme Fry and I remember the mimiograph machine that I got to run copies off on every now and then, getting high from the alcohol based ink. Like you, I remember it all from the hallways down to the Principal’s office.
Unlike you, I have never even seen a Wii.
January 18th, 2008
Oh my. I remeber a grade two teacher who brought in a sari and wrapped it around a few of us to try out. I remember a long-term supply teacher who was a dip and we would be able to write our homework in cursive if we had a “writing license” he would accord based on penmanship. I remember one of my pair of teachers for grade 4-5-6 had a slot in her ear where her son had pulled her large hoop earring as a baby, while the other was a larger woman with polyester pants and beady eyes, who I thought hated me, but my parents told me later loved me and offered to babysit. She would have us do “bargello” crafts each Christmas, but laso open advent calendars for us to eat the chocolates from, and read the world’s most hilarious book – The Best Christmas Pageant Ever. I really to this day don’t know how she read it aloud, because it’s so funny I can’t breathe when I’m reading it. She found chicken pox on me one day in grade five – can you imagine a teacher now taking a child into a separate room alone and lifting her shirt to check out her belly? Yikes.
January 18th, 2008
My second grade teacher had bright blond hair in big buns on the side of her head and we secretly called her “the water buffalo” for them. She also wore bright red lipstick and made us put our heads down on our desks so she could put it on.
I went to the same school grades 1 through 8 and my memories of the place are endless. My son is now going to the same school. SO WEIRD!
January 18th, 2008
Too many memories to leave in your comments. I’m going to steal this post idea too.
January 18th, 2008
I like the baseball myself. (Though it didn’t make me remember hitting my head on any radiators.)
January 19th, 2008
(why do I feel like I did way more drugs then you did????)
Um…I remember my 4th grade teacher. Mr. Fields. Yep. There you go.
LOL
;)
January 21st, 2008
I loved this idea so much, I just posted on my own elementary school memories. I could have gone on much longer – it was surprising to me how much I really DID remember!
January 27th, 2008
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