Memories of memorizing
The year is 1959. I am in first grade, but I am in my sister's classroom, standing in front of Mrs. Crase's class. My sister, a 6th grader had to memorize the poem "The Midnight ride of Paul Revere" and she taught it to me. Mrs. Crase thought that was a big deal and asked me to recite it for her class.
I am nervous and looking at the floor. I clasp my hands behind my back and twist my right foot back and forth . I am wearing a red plaid dress from the Jewel Tea man. Two other girls in my class are wearing the same one. The Jewel Tea man, a traveling salesman who sold many items including clothing, was popular with the mothers of that time. I don't know if he even sold tea.
"Listen my children and you shall hear
Of the midnight ride of Paul Revere...." I begin.
Suddenly I don't remember the next line. My right foot twists even more rapidly. My left foot grounds me, holding steady. I clasp and unclasp my sweaty hands behind my back.
I looked up from the floor at my sister in the front row.
"It's the 18th of April in '75..." She whispers
She is one of the smart kids and Mrs. Crase always put the smart kids in the front. Five years later I would be one of the smart kids in that front row. I would sit in the same desk my mother did in that classroom. I knew because she had carved her name in the wooden desktop.
"It's the 18th of April in '75" I repeat.
"And hardly a man is now alive, who remembers that famous day and year", I continue softly. I resume looking at the floor. It is a light sandy colored hardwood and beautiful. Sometimes kids would get sick and vomit and the janitor would come and dump sawdust on it and clean up the chunks after the sawdust absorbed the liquid. That floor was also great for playing jacks as the ball bounced nicely.
I look up to see the big kids looking at me, waiting to see if I would remember more and maybe hoping I would mess up.
"He said to his friend, if the British march
By land or sea from the town tonight
Hang a lantern aloft in the belfry arch
Of the North Church tower as a signal light
One if by land and two if by sea
And I on the opposite shore will be...."
I complete the poem without any other mistakes. Mrs Crase praises me, but I cringe when she criticizes a few other student by name for not doing it as well as a little first grader. I learn when she is my teacher that this is typical of her. It almost makes me not want to be a good student because her praises of me would result in criticism for someone else. It was a time when teachers could slap you or discipline you in other ways and parents would always stick up for the teacher.
I still have this poem and many others taking some of the files in the hard drive of my brain 60 some years later. My dad helped me memorize a poem called "The village blacksmith". We had to learn it for the same 5th and 6th grade teacher. My dad especially liked this poem because he had a forge and anvil in the garage and I think he related to that blacksmith.
the village smithy stands
the smith a mighty man is he
with large and sinewy hands
and the muscles on his brawny arms
are strong as iron bands"
We all laughed when someone recited "and the muscles of his brawny arms are strong as rubber bands".
The memorization didn't stop in grade school; it continued through junior high and high school.
"Yon Cassius has a lean and hungry look. He thinks too much, such men are dangerous" - from Shakespeare's Julius Caesar.
And lines from other classic novels:
"It was the best of times, it was the worst of times" From Charles Dickens and the Tale of Two cities.
Portia's speech on Mercy in "The Merchant of Venice" by Shakespeare
The quality of Mercy is not strained
It droppeth as a gentle rain from heaven
On the place beneath...."
Memorizing was not as important in college, but probably because I didn't take as many liberal ed or literature classes. Because I was a nursing major, I memorized things like the bones in the wrist or the 12 cranial nerves or the symptoms of congestive heart failure. I have forgotten many of the 12 cranial nerves already, but I can recite various less useful things, like old Oreo cookie commercials:
Well to do it, you unscrew it, very fast
Cause the kid will eat the middle of an oreo first
And save the chocolate cookie outside for last.
This isn't exactly true. Two of my grandsons eat the chocolate cookie outside first.
And yet, sometimes I can't remember, the name of someone I have known a long while or why I opened the refrigerator. But while I am waiting to remember, I find myself singing:
My bologna has a first name
It's O-s-c-a-r
My bologna has a second name
It's M-e-y-e-r
Kool aid Kool aid
Tastes great
Wish we had some
Can't wait
When wash my face I think of a Noxema commercial:
Only a smile can make you lovelier
New lotion to wash with daily
Not sure memorization benefited me in any ways other than being entertaining (or irritating) on long runs or at parties or in some trivia games. I know it didn't hurt me though.
Maybe the above sentence was a good place to end this. Somehow it seemed unsatisfying, so I went back to my notes from a writing class I took. My notes on "writing an ending" suggested not necessarily summarizing what you said nor making conclusions that the reader should be able to make themselves without you spelling it out. My notes suggested "ask yourself what your purpose was in writing it.
What was my purpose? Maybe just sharing a random memory? Or stressing the importance (or wasted time) of memorization? Or just maybe it was a memory of Mrs. Crase who was a mean teacher who by the time she was my teacher, must have been in her late 70's. I wonder why she picked on certain students. She was physically abusive too, slapping one of my friends across the face for turning a page on a standardized test without being told to. She told other students they smelled bad. Those of us who were good students felt guilty because she was openly nice to us and praised our work in front of others and often compared it to other students who didn't do as well. I often wondered if her meanness had a lasting effect on those students who were victims of her ridicule.
Years later, I found out that Mrs. Crase's husband died at a young age. Her daughter died of leukemia in her 20's and her son was paralyzed in a car accident. Not that there was any excuse for her meanness and abuse and it wouldn't be tolerated now. Maybe she was just a sad woman who took out her anger and grief on her students.
There's no rhyme or reason for why certain things remain in our memory while others disappear. And we will never know exactl what lives people live that make them who they are.
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