As an “only” for about five years to my parents and both sets of grandparents, I may have been a bit spoiled. At any rate, I was an outgoing child. Then along came a sibling and cousins, and I became shy. In grade school, although I had friends, I was not as gregarious and talkative when I started first grade.
My generation spent seven years at the old BerryhillElementary School on Berryhill Street before transferring to eighth grade at the original high school on Canal Street. When I hit eighth grade at MiltonHigh School, I had an epiphany as I somewhat recovered my voice and outgoing personality even though I still felt extremely shy.
However, excelling academically and writing as a regular for the student newspaper, The Student’s Voice, I soon found I did not need to be quite so shy. Although, in school and as an adult, I still could feel my knees tremble when I stood in front of a crowd to speak. That did not happen when I stood before a classroom to speak to teenagers, nor to teach in Bible classes.
Throughout my high school years, my English teacher, who taught me at each grade level, was my hero, mentor and champion. I shared her classes with two competitive, outspoken girls, Martha and Betty, who were my friends. One of them, Betty, and I vied for grades. They were best friends and talked a lot in class. Not realizing how much I also talked, I guess, because I was taken aback one day when Martha blurted out that Doris Melvin used not to talk in class but now talked as much as she and Betty talked. That gave me pause to think that perhaps I did talk too much. Yet, I think I suffered from what many feel when presenting memorization to a group. When I stand in front of a group to recite memorization, to this day, my brain sits down.
I have been happy, however, to retrieve some of my childhood outgoing traits.
This article originally appeared on Santa Rosa Press Gazette: Classroom disturbance