I posted this awesome class picture on my Facebook page for ‘throwback Thursday’ last week.

Isn’t it awesome?  I thought it was.  I don’t really remember that much about 2nd grade, but here are a few things.

1.  I remember that I had a “Six Million Dollar Man” coloring book.  I couldn’t color at all.  I never have had any kind of fine arts abilities, but I really, really liked the Bionic Man and the Bionic Woman.  Steve Austin and Jamie Sommers rule!

2.  I remember the teeter-totters.  I was so fat that it took two kids on the other end to balance me out.  Sometimes three.

3.  I remember that second grade was the first time I was aware of the sting of injustice.  It was a typical hot, dusty, summer day.  We’d played outside, hard.  All of us were thirsty and sweaty.  There was one drinking fountain, for which we all stood in line to get a drink.  I was near the back of the line, as were most of the boys.  The line was about half way through getting a drink, and some boy did something that made our teacher mad.  He probably said a dirty word or cut in line or something.  Whatever it was, it caused the teacher to declare, “That’s it, drinking time is over. Everyone back in the room.”  So, some kids got a drink, some of us (ME!) didn’t, and it was all because of the actions of one person.  Injustice bites.

4.  I remember being afraid of the girls.  I still am.

5.  It was in second grade that I saw the movie Jaws for the first time.  This was a time before movies on demand, cable, and DVDs.  It was even before VHS.  I was too young for the theatrical version, but that year they showed it on network television, as one of those “Movie of the Week” things.  Some of you might remember those.  I was dumbfounded.  I had seen Star Wars, of course, but I had never seen a live action movie like that before.  The effect on me was profound.  Every day I sat at my little wooden desk and drew pictures.  I must have gone through a whole ream of notebook paper that year depicting various scenes of the gigantic shark eating away at the boat, swimming, eating swimmers, exploding, and just about every action scene in the movie.  I even made a few up of my own.

6.  I remember I had a green and white shirt, mesh type (very popular back then) material, that had the word “Kawasaki” in white script.  It was a hand-me-down from a friend of my mother’s who had boys a little older than me.  Some older boys, boys from the unattainable world of fourth and fifth grade, asked me if I liked Kawasakis.  I said yes.  They asked me what kind I had.  Busted!  Not only did I not have a Kawasaki, I didn’t even know what a Kawasaki was.  I remember feeling like it was something that I should have know about, but didn’t.  I remember their mocking.  It is, I think, the first time I ever felt inadequate and inferior.  It was not the last.

desk image from allaboutprops.com