Well, at the start of the 7th grade, I was about the same height as Robert Y. We were nearly tied as the shortest guys in the 7th grade. Somewhere between then and the end of the ninth grade, I grew at least a foot. By the end of the ninth grade, I was tied with two other guys as the tallest ones. The sad part was that all that growth did not make me more coordinated, only taller. It was not because I didn't do a lot of things, it was just that those darned cracks in the gym floor were enough to trip me up.
School in Junior high was a lot like High School in that most of the teachers were specialized and didn't cross the lanes or lines in what they taught. There was one teacher that taught English and Latin but I didn't cross that line for many reasons. For the most part, the Science teacher taught science, biology and chemistry. The Math teacher also taught Algebra and Geometry and the music teacher taught choral and band. I would say that most of the teachers were competent at what they did and there were only a few that should have moved on into retirement.
When we started the 7th grade, our Gym/Health teacher had been there for a few years. After on year of the baby Boomers, he moved on to other places unknown to the student body. None of his teams had a really strong winning record and it seemed to me that he went through the motions but was not inspired to help us achieve anything above mediocrity. The 8th grade year opened with a new coach and he was a retired Marine. He had a great big ring that looked like the taillights on his Lincoln and he tried to make us into a boot camp Marine. I am not sure where he failed the worst or if he just moved on to more money and less hassle. Finally in the 9th grade, a new coach seemed to genuinely liked us and we didn't hate him. He was a tall thin guy with a pleasant manner. When we moved on, he was still there so he must have been doing something right. For the last 9 weeks of the 9th grade, I had a broken bone in my right foot and didn't suit up for PE. I would have expected to get a C for that semester because all I did was hand out towels. About a week from the end of the year, the coach showed us the President's standards for Physical Fitness. He said that anyone that could do 112 sit ups would get an A for the semester. I was one of a few that did it. I did have to stay in bed most of the next day because my muscles hurt so much.
One class that the majority of us took was Shop or Industrial Arts. Each year, we were taught different skills and I am pretty sure that the beginning drafting class was the basis for a lot of what I was able to do later on. We started by drawing patterns of shapes and then cutting them out for a grade. It was how well the looked that was important. For some reason I could visualize them better than I could draw them. My patterns fitted together for the most part but they were kind of sloppy so it all amounted to a C. Minneha was only a few blocks from the Beech Aircraft Plant and they donated a lot of supplies to our school. Our section on plastics was a lot of fun and there are probably a letter opener and pie server still around from those classes. Leather was another part of the class that was a lot of fun but just how many key protectors can you make? Somewhere in the middle of all that, we were given the Tandy Catalog and we could buy kits to make things like wallets and notebooks. The basic kit was a wallet and the only difference in the finish projects was the tooling and the stitching around the edge. I know I made at least one because I carried it for several years. It never had a lot of money in it but it was good enough to get me through Junior High.
Every day in Junior High, the kids that rode the bus played volleyball in the gym. If you were on the first run in the morning, you got to play about 30 minutes until the second run busses arrived, Those kids went home as soon as they could load the busses and the second run kids played volleyball for 20 minutes or so. The kids that lived in my neighborhood were not allowed to stay after school but most if us managed to slip in and play a little volleyball in the morning. One year, I think it was in the 8th grade, the coach picked out a team to play in a tournament. That team was mostly the kids that rode the busses and played a lot of volleyball. The first night of three nights, the team went off on the bus after school. The next morning, we were told that the volleyball team was in a heap of trouble. It seems that after their first game, they were told to stay in the gym and they went next door to a DQ. The coach fired that entire team and in our gym class that day he had us play volleyball and picked out a new team. I went on that team and we won two games that evening. I guess that playing volleyball some was better than the other schools. That next night, we went to the tournament and won. It was pretty clear that the second team from Minneha could whip anybody else's first team.
In and amongst all those unwashed masses, the testosterone showed up like facial hair and pimples. In the showers, the appearance of body hair in the 8th grade was another sign of the impending aging process. I'll bet there was no young boy who daydreamed of some girl that wasn't embarrassed by a stray erection as he had to go from one class to another. The guys stood around and watched and t seemed the girls all clumped together and giggled. I wonder If their health class prepared them for more than ours did. If there was anything that came close to Sex Ed in Junior High it was innuendo wrapped in a mystery and told like fairy tales. Guess what I saw was the start of more stories. Actual experience in the area of sex was probably more like an accidental walking in the bathroom as your sister got out of the shower. Back then, there was some titillation in the magazines one of our friends father had but no true nudity. There were a couple of the girls that I had minor crushed on. One was dating a friend of mine and one of the older boys kept threatening him with bodily harm if he didn't break up with her. You know the type, a guy who was held back at least once and was 6 foot tall and over 200 lbs. in the 9th grade. He was one of the guys that went to Wichita Heights and tried to play football. He could run straight ahead for three yards a cloud of dust. Once the other teams found out that he could be tripped up but not tackled, he reverted back into a lineman.
Somewhere in all that mess, I thought I had a real crush on Sheila. I will use her name here because she passed away a couple of years back and nothing here would embarrass her or her remaining family. Sheila and I went to the same church and she was a fun person to be around. I'm sure that I was way too rowdy for her but who knows at that age. One day I was talking to her sister and she said that her mother was the best fried chicken cook in Wichita. I managed to get an invitation to lunch the next Sunday. True to the word of her sister, Sheila's mother turned out to have the best fried chicken in the whole wide world. I'm sure she used lard not that fancy smancy Crisco. I remember that at the end of that lunch, her parents invited us to sit and talk in the living room. Man did I ever need a nap. The conversation started out OK but Bonnie told Sheila that we were too young to get serious. Sheila then told her mother that she was six months older than Bonnie had been when she had Sheila. What, What? I was there for the chicken dinner and these people were talking marriage and children? I think I has to let that whole thing cool off. I do love chicken to this day but not the idea of getting married at 14. Somewhere shortly after that marriage scare, Sheila and Dwayne started dating and they did finally wind up married. It was for me another close call with the call of the wild but like most encounters, went for naught.
I am not sure when or why, but by the time I got to the ninth grade my parents had fairly given up all hope of controlling where or why I went places. Once I got a car, they pretty much told me that if I got put in Jail don't call them because they weren't going to come down to bail me out. I started to work in gas stations after I gave up my paper route in the 9th grade and I spent my own money. I know my Dad went through some hard times due to his manic depression. I thin Mom just didn't keep track of me because she had Dad to worry about. Trust me when I say I didn't mind. I probably wasn't the best influence of he group of guys I hung out with. The good news for them was the fact that I had a car to keep in gas and a girl fiend.
The first girl I ever kissed was Connie. Man was she ever cute and smart. The problem was we were so young that there was just no way we could ever reach the age of getting married. We did date the summer of my 9th grade year but pretty much we were limited to double dates with people that had a license. I am pretty sure that she married a guy right out of High School and is still married for what has to be their 50th anniversary this year.
I will start tomorrow with the selection of a High School and the years that could have but did not get me put in Jail or married.
LUKE
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