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.

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