What the everlovin’….

In truth, I witnessed plenty of bad  behavior when I was in first grade. 99.9999% of it was, of course, at the hands or lips of Sister Marie Leo. Over the course of that long and brutal slog of a school year, I witnessed the following Sister M.L-related incidents in which the good sister made:

Ginny B, one of the few kids who brought her lunch to school, eat the now nearly day old lettuce that she had removed from her ham sandwich because the lettuce had wilted on a brutally hot September day. (This was, needless to say, well before there was any such thing as a cold pack to tuck in your kid’s lunch box.) This was about five-of-three, and we all had to sit there, stomachs churning, while poor Ginny gagged down the lettuce.

Bradley D. lick the milk he’d spilled out of his carton off the ancient wooden floor of the cloakroom. I’m not sure whether it’s worth mentioning that Bradley was a little slow, and, thus, was the frequent target of sta’s wrath and “humor.”

All the boys who’d gotten their pants soaked sliding on the slushy hill in the schoolyard take off their pants, place them on the radiator registers, and spend the rest of the days sitting around in their undies. Sort of. The boys had to put on girls’ coats. The real genius here was Sister ML’s ability to humiliate the boys (undies + girls’ coats) and ick-out the girls (boys undies + our coats). And, yes, I do remember that my red and green plaid winter coat was worn by Michael C. Yuck!

Any kid who’d forgotten to bring in the signed permission card for the new-fangled polio shot trudge home, alone, in the middle of a howling snowstorm to fetch the signed slip. Note that all of those who were sent home would have gone home for lunch a couple of hours later anyway…I raced up the hill and back down to school in record time. I beat everyone back, including kids who lived closer. My friend Kathy S was last in. Her mother had made her stay for a cup of cocoa.

Oh, there was plenty more.

Turn around in class to see who just threw up? You would just have to sit there until your hair turned green.

Step on the “holy grass” outside the church? Mortal sin! And a one-way ticket to hell.

Sister Marie Leo told us that if we ever talked to strangers we would “end up chopped in pieces, floating in a barrel in Lake Michigan.” Nothing wrong with a warning about strangers, but, seriously folks. This one was especially vivid and scary to me, as I had actually been to Chicago’s Oak Street Beach a number of times – my mother was from Chicago – so I’d been in Lake Michigan. (Never did spot any floating barrels…)

And my personal favorite: We always sat in girls rows/boys rows. One day, when Philip N. was coming back from the blackboard, the boy in his row all reached their arms out, touching the desk opposite, to impede Philip’s passage. Well, that was the end of the world. Sister Marie Leo was going to call Monsignor Lynch, and he’d send the paddy wagon to haul these miscreants off to reform school. “If you brought your lunch, that will be the last meal you’re ever going to eat. If not, it was breakfast. And I hope you kissed your mother goodbye, because you’re never going to see her again.”

Seems about right.

I only recall two kind gestures during the entire year.

My friend Bernadette L. had an older sister who had Down Syndrome. She was mainstreamed in our school, and was in fourth grade while we were in first. Every couple of months, Sister Marie Leo would invite Mary Margaret L. in to read to us. (I thought Mary Margaret was a genius, she was such a good reader.)

In their downtime, the nuns made valentines and sold them to us to make money for the missions. Most of them were a heart cut out of construction paper (2 cents), or a heart cut out of construction paper with a holy card or sticker of angel plastered on it (a nickel). But they also made elaborate valentines out of the covers of heart-shaped candy boxes. These went for $.50 or a buck. Stephen W. was a very sweet boy, the youngest kid in our class (and, as a late December baby, one of the few kids younger than me). He was also from a very large family. He wanted to buy one of those candy-boxers for his mother, but didn’t have the money. So he started to cry. And Sister Marie Leo took him into her lap and comforted him.

These small acts of kindness aside, Sister Marie Leo shouldn’t have been in any classroom, let alone in a first grade one.

But if she were still alive and kicking, she might be able to secure a spot in the Lucious and Emma Nixon Academy in Orlando, Florida, where she’d fit right in.

Here’s what happened there:

First grade Kaia Rolle was having a meltdown. Not surprising. This happens. After all, she’s only six (and in the case of this little one, they’re dealing with a child with a sleep disorder who gets overtired). The teacher sent Kaia to the office. Again, no surprise there. Kids act up. They get sent to the office. A parent might be called.

While in the office, Kais’s tantrum continued. A “staff member grabbed her wrists to calm her down”, and Kaia kicked here.

Well that was apparently too much for the coping skills of the grownups at the Lucious and Emma Nixon Academy in Orlando, Florida.

They called the cops, and Kaia was cuffed, put in the back of the car, and driven to juvie. Where she was finger printed and had her mug shot taken, which was followed up by her being booked on an assault charge. Kaia (along with her grandmother, who was caled by the school) will have to appear in court to answer the charge.

There was another child – this one an 8 year old – who was arrested by the same officer that day. Officers are supposed to get permission from their watch commander if they’re going to arrest a kid under 12 years of age. This cop failed to do so. A mere technicality, I’m sure.

Kaia Rolle is African-American. What do you want to bet that the 8 year old arrestee is, too.

I know that even small children can be out of control, terrible, violent. But surely schools should have policies and procedures in place for handling really young children who need to be calmed down. Surely arrest – cuffs, fingerprints, mug shots – shouldn’t be among those policies and procedures.

I read this story and just shook my head.

What the everlovin’ f…

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Source for story about Kaia Rolle’s arrest: Click Orlando. Source for stories about Sister Marie Leo: my brain.