6. Second-Grade Lesson (cont.)

I never knew why. As an adult, looking back, it has occurred to me that she might have had some quarrel I knew nothing about with my mother. At the time I knew only that she, like my mother, had simply liked me better when I was little. My mother loved babies, and I had understood from the time I was three or four years old that I could never again be little enough to please her.

My evidence that Miss Simpson shared this preference came from once having been sent to her classroom with a note when I was kindergartener. Walking into that room with those big second graders, all of them strangers, terrified me, but I gathered my courage and did it. The moment was softened somewhat by Miss Simpson’s saying to the class, “Aw! Isn’t she cute?” But the terror was renewed instantly when I discovered, upon making my way back to the hall, that Miss Simpson had followed me, was running after me even.

I started to run, too, but her legs were longer than mine and she quickly caught me up...only to pluck me off the floor, plant a kiss on my cheek and set me down to go my way again! I returned to my kindergarten classroom amazed beyond speech.

If I was “cute” in kindergarten, however, I was something else entirely when I entered the second grade. On the first day, Miss Simpson made a great point, in front of the entire class, of announcing that I was a desk carver and warning me of the dire consequences that would befall if I so much as touched any desk in her room. I had already made my resolution, as I’ve said, but I willingly, meekly, made it again to Miss Simpson.