Seventh Grade
by Rosalie Wayne

xxxxThe school was extremely regimented and obsessed with rules. Bells rang throughout the day telling us when to move. They told us when to enter the building, when to be in our seats, when to go to the next class, and when to go home. Sometimes we welcomed them because they released us from a class that we were dying to get out of. Or they told us that the recess and lunch period that we loved had come to an end. During 2nd period we listened silently to the authoritative voice of Mr. Hunt on the P.A. system as he revealed new rules, reminded us of old ones - in case we had forgotten - and announced any special activities that might occur in a given day.

xxxxGym was the ultimate degradation. We girls had to strip naked in the cement locker room and then attempt to cover our developing bodies with a towel that was the size of a dish cloth. What had happened to the virtue of female modesty? As we marched into the shower room to take our mandatory showers, the teachers would sit on their chairs holding clipboards, and observe us. I don't know if they were timing us or checking our toenails or trying to determine if we had used soap. It was pure torture and we knew that if we failed to comply we would get an unsatisfactory grade.

xxxxBut it was our season to be humble. As B7's, they told us we were "scrubs." We were the lowest of the low, the initiates. This place that we remember so fondly was pure boot camp for pre-teens. I looked at the older girls and boys. Self-assured and sophisticated, the size of grown-ups, they made it look easy. Would I ever be like them?

xxxxOne day toward the end of that first year I went to the home of a female classmate after school to work on a class project. Summer vacation would soon be here, and I was looking forward to reverting to my old carefree childhood one last time. For the moment however, my main concern was making a salt and flour map of the Netherlands for Mr. Avery's A7 Social Studies class. I had stopped at home to change into play clothes. Hair pulled straight back in a pony tail, pedal pushers, greasy and sweaty, I didn't care how I looked. As we were finishing the project, the phone rang. My friend came back into the kitchen and told me that "boys" were coming over. I knew exactly what to do. I panicked and called my mother, "Come pick me up," I said.

xxxxThe boys arrived. They were in the B9. A 6 foot 1 inch Adonis I had never seen before asked me if I would like to go for a walk. He reached out his big warm hand to help me up from the step where I sat in front of the house. He led me into the back yard and pushed me gently against a wall. He rubbed his incredibly soft cheek against the side of my face and said, "What do you want to do?".

xxxx"I don't know," I replied," what do you want to do?" We repeated those same words a few times. A car horn sounded from the direction of the street. "I have to go." I said. He asked me why. "That's my mother," I replied.

xxxxI left him in the yard and walked down the driveway to the waiting car. I don't know if I said good-bye. I rode all the way home rubbing my cheek, still feeling his skin against mine. There was silence in the car. I didn't tell my mother what had happened; why there was the sudden rush to be picked up. Life had gained a new dimension - privacy. Something in me had shifted. Over night I had become a different person. My parents never knew why I was suddenly so interested in clothes; or why I set my hair and slept on rollers every night, and woke up at 5:30 in the morning to shower, dress, and "rat" and spray my hair. I would leave the house when the street lamps were still on and walk to Rams at Wilshire and Fairfax to meet my friends for breakfast. Thirty seven cents for hot chocolate and toast. No meal ever tasted better. We kids gave the waitresses a hard time. We chipped in and bought packs of cigarettes from the vending machine. We smoked them in the restaurant's bathroom. Other restaurant patrons knocked on the locked door wanting to use the facilities. We were rude and self righteous, we were having our morning rebellion. Then we got on the bus that took us to school.

xxxxWas it the dispensing of adult wisdom and stringent school rules that made me want to become an adult woman, or was it emerging adolescent hormones and the baby-like softness of a young boy's cheek? The year of initiation into JB had ended. Life was filled with new possibilities. The John Burroughs that I had been afraid of, had become the best place in the world. Wherever life was taking me, I was ready to go.

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