Tuesday, June 25, 2013

CATERPILLAR LADY

    Spending part of my childhood in the humid climate of southern Louisiana, exposed me to so many different bugs.   Between cicadas, red ants and crane flies (Oh, My!), I was surrounded.  No, really, once while playing right field at a softball game, I could barely see home plate through the fog of crane flies.  I could feel them in my shirt and on my face.  I spent most of the game swatting.

    Being the introvert loner that I was, I looked to animals and stuffed toys for friendship.  One spring I found the most elaborate caterpillar I had ever seen – The Live Oak Tussock Moth.

    It reminded me of a groomed poodle with its short tufts of hair and tail-like poof.   I decided to take him in and ensure his evolution into moth-hood.   For this I needed a nest, which I made out of a Danish cookie tin, soil from my backyard and ripped leaves from local bushes. Ta-Da, Caterpillar Palace.

    I started reading all the library books I could get my hands on to ensure I was knowledgeable and ready.  This only made me more interested in other caterpillars and since most of them were wormy, spiky and gross, I decided to take in the cutest and furriest of caterpillars – The Salt Marsh.


    After putting these two together in the Caterpillar Palace and confirming they would not harm each other, I started a collection.  After a week, I had about 10 caterpillars, one for every human hair color from platinum blond to red heads to brunettes.

    I decided to take the Caterpillar Palace to school.  It was a big hit with half the class. The other half thought I was a creep for making pets out of the creatures they stomped on for fun while running laps during P.E.   I dreaded P.E. since I spent the hour doing laps with tears running down my face while I tried to avoid the live caterpillars as well as the endless squished bodies and guts of the stomped ones.  I was a bit of a sentimental and compassionate kid.

    From the day of the caterpillar tin, I was known by my 4th grade class as “The Caterpillar Lady”. I’m not sure if that’s good or not, but I took my ‘pillars’ home and soon they all disappeared into the dirt.  Within days almost all my caterpillars were gone, grown and flown.  All but one, my poodle, who was eaten by red ants while he slept.

Wednesday, May 22, 2013

4TH GRADE - 4 Leaf Clovers and Garage Sales

     Right before 4th grade, I moved from Miami Beach to Harahan, LA.   Several things changed.  My classmates changed from mostly Cuban children of working class parents to middle class, suburban white kids with southern accents.  Instead of walking with my mom to school, I had to get on a bus with strangers and bullies.

     I was very shy and I had a hard time fitting in.  I would especially dread moments of forced socialization like recess.  Recess was basically letting half the school out into a large field to form groups and make up games to play. 

     I hadn’t made any friends and wouldn’t dare try.  Instead I made it my mission to look busy with important things such as locating as many four leaf clovers as possible. 

     I’d find several 4 leaf clovers a day and I’d bring them in to Mrs. Fulton’s class to lay them out in the back of the room to dry right before class started.  I even miraculously found a 5 leaf clover once.  Four leaf clover duty did not gain me any street cred with the other 4th graders, but Mrs. Fulton, the science teacher gave me two thumbs up.  After a few weeks of this, I could tell even she thought I was a weirdo.

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     Another difference between me and the other school kids was where we got our clothes.  My parents did not buy new things. Everything we owned except for food, socks, and underwear came from other people’s houses – garage sales.  We wore things that other people were discarding.  These garments included a really awesome cougar jacket.  It was a jean jacket with an iron-on embroidered cougar patch going across the shoulder blades. 

     I wore it to school for about a week and got a number of compliments about it.  I had a feeling this would be my ticket to friends.  One girl, Betsy, finally asked me where I had gotten it.  Unfortunately I made the mistake of bragging about what a find it was at a garage sale.  I thought she’d be impressed, but instead, Betsy let out a “Ewwww!” loud enough to get the whole class’s attention.

     She announced to everyone that 'Susana wore other people gross used clothes'.  She made such a scene that I felt myself slumping lower and lower in my seat as everyone laughed at me and made comments on how dirty I was.  That was the last day I wore my cool cougar jacket to school.