Those were the days.

Today’s topic is my high school days. Not a whole lot comes to me. I went to St. Joseph High, a very small catholic high school. My freshman class had 65 kids to start out. By our sophomore year we were down to 60. A couple got expelled and some just didn’t come back in the fall. I always figured it was either they didn’t like the rules, nuns were strict, or they couldn’t afford the tuition. I realized years later what a hardship it was for my parents to let me go to St. Joe’s. I didn’t want to go to the public high school. It was so large. Class size was 300 plus students. Besides my three best friends were going to St. Joe’s.

It was a great school. Good variety of classes. We had an hour for lunch which gave us time for mini sock hops every day. We didn’t have a football team, too small. But we did have a pretty decent basketball team. We had a 6 lane bowling alley; open to the public on weekends. We bowled during P.E. That was fun unless it was your turn to set the pins. It was an old bowling alley and didn’t have automatic pin setters. I tell you, that was a scary job. Especially when a guy was bowling. You had to pay attention so that you could duck those pins.

A couple of favorite teachers come to mind, Mr. Lawrence and Sr. Rosalie. Mr. Lawrence taught history.  Sister Rosalie taught English, Literature and Bookkeeping.

I am sure Mr. Lawrence taught other subjects too but I don’t remember what they were. Must have been classes I didn’t take. Mr. Lawrence had first period study hall and so did I. I remember one morning I had nothing to do in study hall so I was making paper balls and tossing them in the wastebasket. For some reason I had to sit in the front in most of my classes. Anyway, at first he didn’t say anything. But then he said, “Mona

(my maiden name) throw one more and you have a detention”.  Well, I was sort of his “favorite” so I didn’t figure he meant it and tossed another one. Boy was I wrong. He did mean it. Long story short. It became a game. I was up to a week of detentions. When you got a week of detentions, you had to come to school on Saturdays and help the janitor. My mother was going to kill me. I must have looked scared because he said he had a deal for me, double or nothing. If I made it, no detentions at all, If not 10 detentions. I had to take the chance. And I made it. Whew. I can tell you, I never got into that kind of situation again.

Sister Rosalie was my very favorite teacher. She was young and fun. We all wondered why she became a nun. Boy, were we young and naïve. She was the one who started calling me Rose. Before that it was always Rosemary. To this day, if I hear someone say “Rosemary” nine out of ten times it is a relative. Most of them never did call me Rose. One day, Jerry K found a cat on the school grounds during lunch hour. First period after lunch was Freshmen Lit with Sr. Rosalie and she always went to the top drawer of her file cabinet to start class. Jerry decided it would be fun to put the cat in that drawer. We all sat there so very quiet (out of character for us) when Sr. Rosalie came in. I remember she looked at us a bit confused because of our behavior. She walked to the file cabinet, opened that drawer and out jumped one mad cat. No one said a word. I don’t think any of us thought the cat would come out yelping like it did. We figured we were in detention for sure, the whole class. She sat down at her desk, looked out at us and started laughing. Yes laughing. All she said “Was don’t do that again”. No detention. She was great.

How do you tell about four years of school in one short blog post? Okay, maybe not so short. They were fun years that seemed to go on and on till graduation day. Then you wonder where the years went.

What do you remember about your high school years? Fun to reminisce.

Hope you all had a great weekend and hope you all have a great week.

Rose