P.S. 54

I remember P.S. 54. I remember the the smell of tomato soup emanating from the basement lunchroom. I remember the smell of bigotry. I remember my  5th grade teacher. i remember her saying, “You Jews never knew you had so many holidays until Hitler came.” 

I remember the tedium of the afternoons in this 5th grade class. I can hear the scraping of the pencils as we copy the 25 sentences from the grammar book. My heart is beating slowly but I feel bored and angry. I am writing, writing and writing the grammar questions in my lined notebook. Fill in the correct word in all 25 sentences, then turn the page, and do the next 25 sentences, and the next 25, and the next 25. 

Miss A O’Connor has bleached red hair, wears heavy make-up and strong perfume . Every afternoon, she sits on a very high chair and rests while we copy the sentences. I remember her saying, “You Jews never knew you had so many holidays until Hitler came.” I remember the smell of chalk, dusty old textbooks, the smell of bad teaching. I am gritting my teeth. Every afternoon in this class we copy 25 sentences, 25 more and 25 more from 1:00 o’clock until the 3:00 o’clock bell rings. “you Jews never knew…..” I remember the smell of bigotry. I remember how much I hated her and her sinister words. I remember the tedium of those afternoons. I have to hold on to my desk when she says, “You Jews.” I look up at the large glass bowls  surrounding the lights that are hanging from a chain. I would like to swing on that chain and fly out of that hateful scene. 

I hear the teachers who are all sisters, Miss A. O’Connor, C. O’Connor, M. O’Connor and Sullivan snickering in the hallway. Today I want to tell Miss A. O’Connor what a horrible teacher  she is. Today I want to tell Miss A. O”Connor to give me  back my pink paper mache rabbit that she chose to display as the best in the class. I want to grab my pink rabbit and say, “It’s mine and you can’t have it.”

 

Ethyl H.