Winter Makes Me Think
of Sixth Grade
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I hated sixth grade.
This is what I remember from sixth
grade.
Two elementary schools combined into
one junior high and there were all these new people. Science was my first class
of the day. Colleen was there with me—I knew her since she rode the same bus to
school. Sarah was a new girl, Amy from the other elementary. There were other
kids too, but they don't register. I sat with these four; they began my day, and
every day was awful. In early March, I think, we had to dissect hearts. Colleen
and Sarah worked together which meant Amy and I had to be partners. Amy and I
did not get along.
I blame this for my dislike of science.
We had an all-school assembly and,
because I was in sixth grade, I sat on the floor the whole time. My foot fell
asleep. When we were dismissed I stood, I fell, and my brown-bagged lunch flew
ten feet away from me. Laughter.
I started wearing a bra but
absolutely hated it. One time after gym I just didn't put it on. Left it in my
bag with my gym clothes—including my favorite sweatshirt of all time, this soft,
worn, rust-colored piece—and then forgot it in the lunchroom. The next day, a
seventh-grade boy found it before I realized it was even gone. He took it up to
the front of the cafeteria, where the teachers who begrudgingly had duty sit,
carrying the plastic grocery bag while holding the small, white bra over his
head. Even though no one knew it was mine, it was the most embarrassing moment
of my life. I never did claim my bag of gym clothes, my favorite sweatshirt, my
first bra.
Sixth-grade camp was the week before
my birthday, a two-night sleepover in cabins with parent chaperones. There were
twelve of us in a cabin. One of the girls, Amanda, we did not get along. I think
it was because Katrina, a semi-friend, was enemies with Amanda, and I had sided
with Katrina despite not really giving a shit either way. I called her a slut in
the halls one time (Katrina next to me, repeating it) and she pulled my hair.
The closest I ever got to anything resembling a fight. So she was in my cabin
with these other girls I only vaguely knew. Did they even vaguely know me? One
girl was another Sarah. Her mother was in our cabin that night. Amanda was in
the bunk next to me, and we argued as eleven-year-olds do, we probably used the
word bitch, I don't know; I recall nothing but that it happened and the next day
I was named winner. Why did that mother do nothing to stop us? Why were we
allowed to taunt and tease each other right in front of her? Amanda surely had a
worse sixth-grade than I.
Our family friends lived less than a
half mile away; the daughter was my best friend, the son my crush. They made
exotic foods, like tabouli and crab. I got a jewelry-making bead set for
Christmas, and we made necklaces and earrings.
I do not hate winter, even though it
makes me think of sixth grade.
It also makes me think of them.
When we played, it was simply the
creating of elaborate narratives, story-telling while walking, the presence of
ancient bards rising up from deep within. In mid-January of sixth grade we went
outside to play. Cold and snowing, as it is in Michigan, the snow fell sideways
because of the wind. Why winter represents sadness or death I did not yet
understand. It was still the time right before sleep when you are safely in bed,
the weight of a quilt and blanket on top; the comfort of your whole body being
held up, which you no longer know since having outgrown your parents' arms; the
safety of pulling your knees to your chest, curling your hands under your chin,
feeling the warmth of the dog's body, heavily sleeping at the foot of your bed.
So we went outside, where it was dark
and drowned in stars, a full moon visible. My best friend and my crush and I.
Wandering down the dirt-gravel road, next to us the lake, ice now and bearing
the marks of our attempts at skating. The moonlight and the snow falling and all
of it frozen—a coating of glitter on everything. Light reflecting and refracting
back to us from almost every object: we were entranced. It is beautiful. We say
it looks like gems all over. And we know the various gems because I have the
Reader's Digest Book of Facts at home. I spent too much time going through this
book, reading about the various flags of countries, the presents appropriate to
each anniversary, the gems of the world and their corresponding birth months.
Maybe I shared this book with them, maybe they simply knew precious stones on
their own, but the three of us have a shared knowledge of the color and value
and texture of gems. Together we agree that the air outside and the dim light
and the snow are magical. We know that we are in something special. This world,
this winter snow globe that focuses on us alone, it is gemland. No, Gemland: a
proper country. Its cities are the names of various gems. It has coastlines and
mountains, bays and valleys, a legitimate government—we studied geography pretty
thoroughly in our school district—and we bequeath names to reflect the
country's: Emerald Isle, Diamond Desert, Sapphire City and Garnet Glen, all
connected by Ruby Road. We were taken with the beauty of such grown-up objects,
for they stood for all that was not adolescent and painful: confidence,
stability, happiness, love, wealth.
We reach the turn in the road, where
it curves around the little country store and meets up with the busy, paved
road. There is a mounted flood light there, showing that milk and gas and fish
bait are sold (during the summer only). It must be 100 feet high. We stand in
the circle it makes as snowflakes twirl in the air straight down. The wind has
subsided, and each flake is lazily moving in its own path, making whatever
decisions it wants, not worried about the other flakes who are on their own
paths, lazily and beautifully and shockingly floating in the air, no purpose
other than to simply be as they are. We quietly agree that this, this, is the
capital of Gemland. And then we stand looking up. It must be three hours. I
stand in this make-believe capital of a land that I would move to in a
heartbeat. And I feel them, each one, like the base drum of a marching band
grounding me. My best friend and my crush are with me. I am eleven years old and
in the sixth grade and oh, I am so happy to be alive. I feel powerful and
beautiful and as if anything is possible.
I am eleven years old and happy.
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Winter Checklist
Kim Serafin
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Sonnet
Steven Fox
Yasukawa