1959: Report Card

1959,my first real report card.I was graded, rated, appraised and elevated. On to the Second Grade! Mrs. Lozier would sum up my First Grade year: "I have enjoyed working with Jimmy. It has been a pleasure to have him in our group." Businesslike and uninspired.
I received four A's in the really important stuff: Reading, Language/Spelling, Handwriting and Numbers. B's in Social Studies and Science, Appreciation and Physical Education. Above average growth in my work and social habits, average in my health habits.
But what did all that really mean? What had I really learned that year? The A in numbers didn't say that I struggled hard to understand at first, especially telling time. It took me the longest while understanding those hands and numbers and the little lines in between, and how embarrassed I felt when it all finally "dawned" on me.
Reading and writing and spelling came easily to me, but my grades did not reflect the joy and exhilaration I felt being able to understand words.
Social Studies and Science would come to me in time, and so would the A's.
But Appreciation? Music was always flying around my brain. I could hear Fats Domino and Hank Williams and the Firehouse Five, and Spike Jones and the Ballad of Davy Crockett! Why didn't we sing that kind of music instead of the kiddie crap they fed us? And why did they push me up close to the microphone when we sang carols during the school Christmas pageant?
A "B" in Physical Education? We're talking dodge ball and kickball and musical chairs here! How did I mess up that?
Average growth in Health habits. I guess I was as clean as could be expected.
What had we learned of our classmates? Did any of them still feel the need to go to bed with the hall light on, and was there something hiding in their bedroom closets at night? "If I should die before I wake?", did any of us pick up on that?
Did anybody really buy that "duck and cover stuff" they told us, or did everybody know we were all going to be vaporized in an instant as the world was blown to pieces?
What of my friend Richie Hearn, who struggled to overcome that embarrassing stutter. How did he feel inside? How awful did that make his life?
Were the girls in my class any more confident than the boys? Did any of them endure teasing and taunting or the fear of being bullied?
Mrs. Marvin came to visit us once and our hopes began to rise, but no, she would not be coming back and we would never really know why.
We'd receive our report cards and we'd beam with pride at our A's and B's.
We knew how to read and write, how to spell and cipher.
We were the best and the brightest set loose for the summer to come back in the fall.
Our school year was over, our lessons we learned.
So much more we never even knew.