This came up yesterday when she was telling me about the covers she used to put on her little reports she did in elementary school. (She still has some of them.)
And I joked: "I would have hated you then."
Which I wouldn't have. But I was not exactly the most assiduous of students Back in the Day, and kids who put covers on their assignments? Not my favorite.
Though I do remember one that makes me smile. When I was in junior high, the 7th and 8th graders in Hiram shared a homeroom--with Mrs. Rood. I was in the last row of 7th graders, and right behind me sat an 8th grade kid I was afraid of. But one day he showed me the cover of his term paper (it was about metal alloys--probably, like most reports in those days, copied directly from The World Book ... well, mine were). He had used an orange crayon (to suggest copper? brass?), and his main title was TURN PAPER.
I didn't dare laugh. He would have beaten the hell out of me--with ease--at lunch.
Sometimes Joyce and I consider our school pictures. Below is Joyce in fourth grade.
Below is Yours Truly in fourth grade.
Let's not discuss my shirt.
Or my face.
Or my hair.
Or ears.
Cute smile, though, eh?
I just noticed, too, that I have my head cocked a little bit. My grandmother used to do that in pictures; I still do it. It's a sign, I've read, of superior intelligence.
(Actually, I've never read a thing about it.)
PAUSE while I check Google ...
I typed "cocked head in photographs" and got more than 9 million hits. That's right--NINE MILLION!
One online wag suggests it's a thing girls do--a sign of submission.
Idiot.
Another site says it makes men who do it look more feminine.
Stupid Internet.
It makes boys and men look more like superheroes or Hall-of-Fame athletes--that's my take on it.
Anyway, Joyce and I generally agree that if we'd met in elementary school, things might not have ... worked out. She was a devoted, careful, respectful, industrious student.
And I ...
Never mind.
Good thing we met in grad school--that's all I can say.
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