After The First Run-Through

I must have looked like the cat who swallowed the canary as I approached my cousin and her best friend (both seventh-graders) with a juicy bit of gossip about Rudy--little knowing that they were about to tell me some news that I would never forget. . .but I'm getting ahead of myself a little, so let me start at the beginning. . .

"We've a goose for Christmas,
So why should we care
If our house is small
And our clothes threadbare.

We're the happy family of Robert C--
And that's enough for you and me!

. . ."


This was one of my favorite times of the year at Fall Creek Heights Elementary: the time when Mrs. Helm would come to our different classrooms--but not for just the regular twice-a-week music class but to introduce us to the music we'd be singing during our Christmas pageant.

From then on until after the pageant, we wouldn't be simply singing and/or listening to/discussing music in our classrooms, and it wouldn't be just twice-a-week but every day when the entire school (grades 1-8) would be gathering in the gym to rehearse our pageant, which consisted of a play and lots of songs, some related to the play and some not.

This year, the play was going to be an operetta based on A Christmas Carol, and most of it would be sung instead of spoken.

But those acting out the play wouldn't be singing solos.

Instead, different classes would sing different parts.

For instance, the first-graders sang the part of Tiny Tim (played by Larry McAllister, who was also a first-grader). And the rest of us in grades 2-8 sang at different times to represent other cast members.

Then, we had other songs related to the play to sing that weren't actually speaking parts--as well as extra songs we sang "just because."

But, again, I'm getting ahead of myself, because this was just the day when Mrs. Helm went to different classrooms to introduce us to the music.

In order to save time, she decided to double-up and have those in fourth and fifth grade to meet together.

So all of the fourth-graders came to our room--including Rudy, who would have already been with us, had it not been recommended the school year before that another year in fourth grade would, hopefully, do him a lot of good.

Rudy was a tease and a cut-up.

While I liked Rudy okay as a person--even if we did both think the other one had cooties--I found that there was one particular advantage to having him a grade behind me:

I would never have to sit with him at lunch again--specifically, on those days when we had beans and ham.

Although I love them now, I detested most beans back then (with the exceptions to the rule being French-style green beans, those very wide kind of green beans, kidney beans in chili, beans in a bean salad, regular--but unheated--green beans, and jelly beans), and navy beans were the kind I hated the most, because I thought they smelled like an old outhouse.

I brought my lunch to school on days when ham and beans was the main course--and prayed that I wouldn't end up seated next to Rudy!

If I did, I knew what would happen.

First, he would take his cornbread and crumble it over his beans, after which he stirred them around.

Then, he'd holler for, "Cat soup! Cat soup!"

He would pour at least half a bottle of ketchup over the mess and then further stir it.

The result looked like pig-slop in its best light--and, in its worst light, as if it had already been eaten (either by a pig or Rudy) and, then, upchucked.

I tried not to look, but my side vision was just too good to be able to escape the sight completely, unless I either closed my eyes or else turned completely around--but, if I did either, how could I eat my own lunch!?!

So I just avoided the sight of it as much as I could--and, especially, of seeing Rudy shovel it into his mouth but not get all of it in so that the surplus would splatter back down onto his plate.

And, typical of boys, when it came to singing, he focused on being loud rather than good.

I knew this to be true from sitting one desk ahead of him the previous year.

So, here we were getting introduced to the music for our pageant.

One of the songs we sang "just because" was the poem A Visit From St. Nicholas (a.k.a. 'Twas The Night Before Christmas) set to music.

Rudy insisted on singing reindeer as reindeers, for which Mrs. Helm corrected him--only to have him sing it the next time around as reinDEERS, defiantly braying out the last syllable just to be annoying.

Mrs. Helm went over to him and told him that he'd better quit cutting up, if he knew what was good for him, because she was just about to get enough of it.

The rest of us were having just too much fun with this drama playing out--so Mrs. Helm told us that we'd also better be quiet or else she'd have our teachers keep us all in during the upcoming recess (capital punishment, in our eyes!).

When music class had ended, Mrs. Helm had the fourth-graders to line up before leaving the class.

Suddenly, she addressed Rudy, "I've had just about enough of you! You can't even stand in line without teasing the girl in front of you, so I'm telling Mrs. Moore to keep you in at recess--and she might decide to do even more than that, if you know what I mean!"

Just about that time, the recess bell rang--and Mrs. Helm told the class that they weren't to go running out to recess but were to first keep in line and return to their classroom.

When Mrs. Farthing returned to our room to dismiss us for recess, several of us girls headed for the restroom to stand around and brush our hair while gossiping and giggling about Rudy.

We hadn't been there long when my cousin and one of her best friends rushed into the restroom.

I couldn't wait to tell them about Rudy--but they had something to tell everybody first, and that something would make up a moment we always would remember.

"President Kennedy has been shot!!!"

Surely, this was some kind of joke, and I was expecting a punchline.

After all, things like this didn't happen in our modern and civilized society.

Sure, it had happened to Abraham Lincoln, but that was back in the days when people seemed to shoot each other more.

It was history from a long time ago, and it didn't really relate to the way we lived in 1963--or so I thought (and I'm sure that I wasn't the only one).

Yet, it didn't take me long to realize that they weren't kidding.

"Was he crucified?" I asked.

"You mean "assassinated," don't you," my cousin's friend asked.

I affirmed that this was what I was asking--whether he had been actually shot dead or just injured.

She and my cousin told me that they thought he was still alive, and I was relieved.

The bell ending recess rang, and we headed back to our classrooms. As we passed by Mr. Creason's eighth-grade class, we heard his television going.

When I returned to my room, Mrs. Farthing had the radio going.

The whole class sat there quietly waiting to hear news about the President--and, shortly after, heard the news we didn't want to hear and couldn't believe that we were hearing: President Kennedy had died.

I felt really "strange" when I heard the news--and when I thought about it over the next few days.

I realize now that this "strange" feeling was a sort of numbness brought on by disbelief--disbelief that a man (and not just ANY man but the cutest and youngest President Of The United States who had ever served in office!) just a few months older than my own dad with a pretty wife and two adorable pre-school kids living in the age of space flights, automobiles, airplanes, TV, and rock-and-roll could end up shot dead just as President Lincoln had almost an entire century before.

It was very windy that night, and I remember lying in my bedroom listening to the wind hammering on the house and thinking that I'd never heard such a wind.

It added to the eerieness of a day that had changed so quickly. . .


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ID: 571031   (Rated: 13+) Memories Of November 22, 1963  Share your personal memories of November 22, 1963 and/or the days that followed. by Peace & Love From AJ