Viola's Picture Day
this entry brought to you by beck, "where it's at"
When you get lice in the fourth grade, it's almost a fact that you'll probably never live it down for the rest of ur school life. Perhaps you would if you were popular-- perhaps-- but Viola, a girl that I shared classes with between the fourth and sixth grade, was not popular. For one, she was chunky. I don't remember her being that much fatter than other kids, but I distinctively remember she had these fat little chubby fingers-- funny the little details that you put to memory. Now, being chubby isn't automatic doom for a grade schooler, but it sure brings them close enough that any other flaws on top of that certainly will. Perhaps what was worse than being a little chunky was that she must've scraped by being put in remedial classes by the skin of her teeth because, bless her heart, she wasn't very smart. I remember one day the teacher asked her what the difference between a solid, liquid, and a gas was, and her response, after a pause, was "To put in your car?"
It was because of this last factor especially, I think, the reason why Viola mostly kept to herself, stayed quiet, alone, in the back of the class, in her own little world. Truth be told, we used to completely forget she existed except for the occasional times the teacher pityingly called on her to answer questions she knew Viola didn't know the answers to. We would ignore her, at least, until the lice incident.
It was now picture day in the sixth grade, and us boys towards the end of the alphabet-- my last name starts with W, in case you don't know-- giggled and cruelly joked that viola, she being the ugliest girl in school-- would break the camera. For the record, Viola was not the ugliest girl in school. But she'd gotten our senseless derision because of the lice thing, which had happened two years prior. Viola certainly wasn't the first girl in the history of grade school that was said was going to break the camera. It was mean as hell, but it didn't go to badly out of playground bullshit.
Viola sat down. "Say cheeseburgers!" the photographer enthused, and clicked. Nothing. Clicked again. Nothing. A brief inspection. "I dont understand," muttered the cameraman.
By now the four or five or us in the back of the line were hot- cheeked from holding back the laughter. She broke the damn camera! She actually did it! Now obviously, we knew it was a coincidence, that she didn't actually break the camera, but oh, of all the coincidences.
Perhaps willing more strength than any other girl her age could muster, she laughed it off and in a short moment the photographer fixed his camera and took her picture, beet-red cheeks and all.
It wasn't but a few minutes later that I sat down in front of the photographer myself. I took my glasses off; I always did. I hated the way I looked in them. I hated getting up there, my picture being taken, the whole class looking at me, look at that dork, I knew they were saying things about me but I never could hear them. I wondered what it would be like if the camera broke on me now. I would blame it on Viola, I told myself, since she'd gone just but a few people before me.
My eyes were blinded by the flash and before I could even see I was being stood up and made to go where the other students were waiting. And as I put back on my glasses, I saw Viola, alone. Her face was missing color, flush, as if she'd just successfully held back crying. I felt terrible. Imagine if I had gotten lice, a condition at least one kid in every school in every year catches, a condition that's known to happen to kids, they teach you how to prevent getting lice so it doesn't spread because somebody will get it, poor or rich, no matter what. What if it had been me, the kid that already had the goofy hair, and now, two years later, a few idiot boys had wanted, waited gleefully for the moment that I broke the camera?
I wondered how many of the other boys saw her next-to tears, wondered if they were thinking the same thing I was, feeling the same guilt.
When we all got back together when picture day was over, it didn't matter if any of us felt bad, because any feelings of self-disgust were washed away by the sinking dagger of telling the rest of the class what had happened with Viola in case they missed it. Guilt is never a good thing on a 6th grader's mind, I guess, maybe not on anybody's mind, and the urge to forget it was ever there by worsening the matter is just too strong. This is how bullies are created, I suppose.
Sometimes I think about Viola and wonder where she went from there. Not how she is today, because there are too many variables that could've happened by now to cause her to have turned out. Most of them probably negative. No, what I wonder about is her life past grade school up through her high school years. I never saw her in junior high and she would've gone to a different high school. Did she live down the lice incident? It's entirely possible that time completely forgot she'd ever had lice, but then, I've known people with nicknames their whole lives they'd gotten in grade school that they detested. Or worse, did the broken camera incident come back to haunt her at all? Did she have a happy high school life, or at least get ignored in the back of the class as she had been before the lice? Or did something else traumatic come up that she would've had to live through?
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with love from CRS @ 6:01 PM
Thursday, June 16, 2005
When you get lice in the fourth grade, it's almost a fact that you'll probably never live it down for the rest of ur school life. Perhaps you would if you were popular-- perhaps-- but Viola, a girl that I shared classes with between the fourth and sixth grade, was not popular. For one, she was chunky. I don't remember her being that much fatter than other kids, but I distinctively remember she had these fat little chubby fingers-- funny the little details that you put to memory. Now, being chubby isn't automatic doom for a grade schooler, but it sure brings them close enough that any other flaws on top of that certainly will. Perhaps what was worse than being a little chunky was that she must've scraped by being put in remedial classes by the skin of her teeth because, bless her heart, she wasn't very smart. I remember one day the teacher asked her what the difference between a solid, liquid, and a gas was, and her response, after a pause, was "To put in your car?"
It was because of this last factor especially, I think, the reason why Viola mostly kept to herself, stayed quiet, alone, in the back of the class, in her own little world. Truth be told, we used to completely forget she existed except for the occasional times the teacher pityingly called on her to answer questions she knew Viola didn't know the answers to. We would ignore her, at least, until the lice incident.
It was now picture day in the sixth grade, and us boys towards the end of the alphabet-- my last name starts with W, in case you don't know-- giggled and cruelly joked that viola, she being the ugliest girl in school-- would break the camera. For the record, Viola was not the ugliest girl in school. But she'd gotten our senseless derision because of the lice thing, which had happened two years prior. Viola certainly wasn't the first girl in the history of grade school that was said was going to break the camera. It was mean as hell, but it didn't go to badly out of playground bullshit.
Viola sat down. "Say cheeseburgers!" the photographer enthused, and clicked. Nothing. Clicked again. Nothing. A brief inspection. "I dont understand," muttered the cameraman.
By now the four or five or us in the back of the line were hot- cheeked from holding back the laughter. She broke the damn camera! She actually did it! Now obviously, we knew it was a coincidence, that she didn't actually break the camera, but oh, of all the coincidences.
Perhaps willing more strength than any other girl her age could muster, she laughed it off and in a short moment the photographer fixed his camera and took her picture, beet-red cheeks and all.
It wasn't but a few minutes later that I sat down in front of the photographer myself. I took my glasses off; I always did. I hated the way I looked in them. I hated getting up there, my picture being taken, the whole class looking at me, look at that dork, I knew they were saying things about me but I never could hear them. I wondered what it would be like if the camera broke on me now. I would blame it on Viola, I told myself, since she'd gone just but a few people before me.
My eyes were blinded by the flash and before I could even see I was being stood up and made to go where the other students were waiting. And as I put back on my glasses, I saw Viola, alone. Her face was missing color, flush, as if she'd just successfully held back crying. I felt terrible. Imagine if I had gotten lice, a condition at least one kid in every school in every year catches, a condition that's known to happen to kids, they teach you how to prevent getting lice so it doesn't spread because somebody will get it, poor or rich, no matter what. What if it had been me, the kid that already had the goofy hair, and now, two years later, a few idiot boys had wanted, waited gleefully for the moment that I broke the camera?
I wondered how many of the other boys saw her next-to tears, wondered if they were thinking the same thing I was, feeling the same guilt.
When we all got back together when picture day was over, it didn't matter if any of us felt bad, because any feelings of self-disgust were washed away by the sinking dagger of telling the rest of the class what had happened with Viola in case they missed it. Guilt is never a good thing on a 6th grader's mind, I guess, maybe not on anybody's mind, and the urge to forget it was ever there by worsening the matter is just too strong. This is how bullies are created, I suppose.
Sometimes I think about Viola and wonder where she went from there. Not how she is today, because there are too many variables that could've happened by now to cause her to have turned out. Most of them probably negative. No, what I wonder about is her life past grade school up through her high school years. I never saw her in junior high and she would've gone to a different high school. Did she live down the lice incident? It's entirely possible that time completely forgot she'd ever had lice, but then, I've known people with nicknames their whole lives they'd gotten in grade school that they detested. Or worse, did the broken camera incident come back to haunt her at all? Did she have a happy high school life, or at least get ignored in the back of the class as she had been before the lice? Or did something else traumatic come up that she would've had to live through?
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