Nazi War Nuns and Ninja Nuns Do Not Tolerate Crying

      Right from the first day, I remember that first grade was very oppressive.

It was set up like a penal institution. During recess St. Frances was segregated like a prison yard, with the girls to one side of the schoolyard and the boys on the other side. The only exception to this rule of segregation was before the first bell rang. The first bell ringing was the signal for boy and girls alike to enter the school buildings.

      It was in first grade that it came to the nun’s attention that I was not learning at a pace that was expected. They thought that perhaps I was retarded as well as quiet. But Sister Grace Beatrice realized that I was blind as a rodent burrowing up a pervert’s ass; which was the reason that I could not see what was written on the black board.

      An optometrist determined that my months of spending time in an over oxygenated incubator ruined my eyes. I was extremely far-sighted with a severe astigmatism. My “Mr. Potato” head was promptly fitted with my own special Hubble telescope lenses. These lenses made my beady squinty eyes appear to be as large as saucers – practically filling up the entire lenses with an image of my eyes so large as to make most people uncomfortable to make eye contact with me. The side benefit of my new glasses was that I could magnify the sun to burn paper, leaves and dry twigs, making them a handy survival tool for my woodland treks.

      After I was fitted with the glasses, my performance in school improved dramatically: despite not being a Jonah Salk, I got straight A’s throughout my time at St. Francis.

      The only pleasant memory that I remember about Catholic school was the soft pretzels sold by vendors about the perimeter of the schoolyard. If you got to school early enough you could enjoy those big soft hot pretzels encrusted with large grains of salt and at your request, mustard would be put on for you by the pretzel vendor, -- all for just a nickel apiece! Most mornings, my mission was to wolf down all the pretzels that I would buy before the first bell rang.

This was the bell signaled for all of the boys and girls to separate and then march into homeroom prison.                                       

      At the end of the day Monday thru Friday, I could go home and of course the weekends were free. Being away from the school was sort of like being on the work release program.

      At the end of first grade we got our year-end report cards. It would be these cards that would determine if we were going to remake first grade or go on to second grade.

      My cards notation looked a hellva lot like a one. I was terrified because this meant I was doomed to repeat first grade. Thank God this was not the case. Instead the notation was really a deformed two. Only one person in my grade flunked that year, and I remember that his name was Shawn. Shawn was a big kid that people would politely call husky.

       The truth was, Shawn was fat as hell. He was the only very obese kid in our school. Throughout the year he had been ridiculed and treated with contempt by both the kids and the nuns.

      Shawn looked at his report card and he let out a high keening wail and then he was blubbering and crying pathetically. He was terrified of what his parents would do to him. The Nun in charge of the class was not one to tolerate crying.

She started to scream at him to shut the hell up.

      When he did not shut up immediately, she started to slap his face back and forth several times while she kept repeating her original demand for him to shut up.

      As she slapped him viciously she snarled in a high pitch voice that reminded me of the witch on the wizard of OZ, “Shut up! Shut up!  Shut up! And so on.

 The pain of the slaps coupled with the public humiliation and the fear of the Nun made poor Shawn cry harder and louder.

      This spurred the Nun to slapped and scream with greater intensity. This increased intensity caused Shawn to howl even more – like a terrified animal, until he started to throw up all over his desk. Shawn empting his stomach from his fear and nausea caused the Nun to go absolutely berserk. She picked him up and flung his body across several desks.

      She was like a banshee screaming, “Look at what you did, look at what you did you little fat bastard!!”

      She was frothing at the mouth with spittle spraying out in a messy pattern and she screamed again, “You have better clean up your filthy mess right now, or you’ll really be sorry!” (As if he was not already sorry).

I was sorry and I prayed for my deliverance from this hell, and then memory fades.