Foreshadowing - Taking a hint - or not

Starting in second grade, the author should have learned - and didn't

Editor’s Note: I wrote this back in June, just a few weeks after I’d dipped my toe in the cool waters of Substack about my early days growing up (more or less) in a small New Hampshire town in an ancient little schoolhouse with a couple of teachers that matched the drapes, so to speak. And I was educated about women. (Notice I didn’t say ‘Learned.’ That would be lying)

The wooden floor in our little two-room schoolhouse in Brookline, New Hampshire creaked when she walked. Mildred Montrone was my second-grade teacher, a tall, matronly, heavy-set woman with long dark hair, silver-rimmed glasses and arms bigger than Mike Tyson. There might not have been a more intimidating second grade teacher in all of New Hampshire. I would not have wanted to find out.

In my own days in the classroom, which came many years later, one literary device I was always fond of teaching was foreshadowing. Explaining that mysterious and often unexplained element in stories where the writer, consciously or often unconsciously, gives the reader a hint about what’s going to happen at the conclusion of the story, was always something I looked forward to.

Unwittingly or not, Mrs. Montrone - never found out if she was actually married but if she was, I pity the poor bastard - foreshadowed my own relations with the opposite sex in ways I can only barely talk about now - some 63 years later.

That’s me, to the left, in my 5th grade classroom at Daniels Academy. Front seat is teacher’s pet Gary Young, you can see why. Behind him, Vanessa, Lindsay, Snooky and Wayne.

We were doing a math problem - even more foreshadowing there. Being the studious type, my seat was in the front row, in the middle. Seated directly behind me, at 8 years old, a year older and obviously more experienced, was a blonde, blue-eyed vixen, Michelle Manning. Apparently, the math problem on the green chalkboard puzzled her, too. For while Mrs. Montrone had turned her substantial backside to the class, Michelle thought that was a good opportunity for her to poke me. So she did.

Bravely, boldly, somehow I found the courage to ignore it. She did it again. And, then again. HARDER. As I felt I had no choice but to respond, I happened to have my right hand folded on the front edge of the wooden desk. I turned and used a four-letter word - one of my first.

“WHAT?”

It was an error in judgment. For Mrs. Montrone favored using those long wooden pointers with the pointed rubber tip. And as the sound of my voice echoed off the small walls of the tiny classroom, Mrs. Montrone brought the full force of that hard wooden pointer down on my innocent fingers extended over the edge of the desk.

SLAM!

The pain was excruciating. I could hear Michelle Manning and the other girls in the class snickering. This was my unflinching introduction to the charms of the opposite sex. And, sadly, this also indicated my inability to anticipate what lie ahead in relations with that gender, even with the hints provided by foreshadowing, a concept I did not yet understand.

Understandably, I swore off girls for the next two grades. Didn’t speak to a one that I can recall. I was wiser then, I think. For once fifth grade arrived, the inevitable confluence of boys, girls, puberty, and the arrival of two new female students, one boasting a pair of notable protuberances, only complicated matters.

First, her name was Anne Marie Hammer. She was short, had brown hair in a page boy cut, a delightful row of freckles sprinkled across the top of her cheeks, mesmerizing brown eyes and was charmingly shy. She lived on top of Meetinghouse Hill, which was perfect, since I had to walk by her house on my way to school. For some reason, destiny perhaps, I almost immediately silently declared my affection for her. I didn’t tell her or anyone else, of course, it just seemed obvious to me. She was new, unvarnished. All the other girls in the class, of course, I’d known since first grade so, as B.B. King would later sing, “The Thrill Is Gone.” (Probably for them, too - to be fair.)

There was a problem that arose almost immediately. At recess, during an enlightened discussion between me and an older classmate, Jimbo Searles, who had the advantage of having been exposed to 5th grade materials for a couple of school years preceding my arrival (he was held back), we almost came to blows. Jimbo, apparently, had also noticed the arrival of Ms. Hammer. And bluntly - as I said, he’d been in 5th grade already a couple times so he knew the ropes - Jimbo came right out and said he liked her, which I thought was horning in on my territory.

Fortunately, the bell rang and no punches were thrown. But the sentiments hardened and at the end of the school day, both Jimbo and I determined to walk Ms. Hammer to her home. She seemed to smile in a sinister way as she walked slightly ahead of us, hearing Jimbo and I vigorously discuss our sentiments towards her, shoving each other, noting one another’s physical flaws - Jimbo had a head shaped like a water jug - and the two of us were carrying on all the way up Meetinghouse Hill.

Near the top, though, our passions waned. Whether we were tired from walking up a steep hill, more or less fighting or in a flashing instant, we each saw the disappointments that lay ahead in our respective romantic futures, we both stopped. Anne Marie took a couple more steps, then stopped and looked back.

Jimbo and I looked at each other, then her and decided this was a fruitless move. He turned and walked back down the hill and I turned off onto Springvale Avenue. Anne Marie Hammer, for several hours, had two boys almost fighting for her. She ended up with none. She later moved. That might have been the reason why.

Several weeks later, two other incidents that shaped my female worldview occurred in quick succession. First, Diane “Snooky” Safford - nobody knew why she was called “Snooky” - was, pretty much by acclimation, the prettiest girl in our class. There was never a vote or anything but every class has to have a prettiest girl and “Snooky” was it. She was also quite aware of that, it’s fair to say. So any boy that she might say ‘Hello” to or ask to borrow a pencil was seen in a flattering light, envied by all.

Given my history, I was understandably cautious when it seemed to be my turn to be in “Snooky’s” favored light. That others had preceded me in that area mattered not. Finally, it seemed, it was my turn. One morning, she wrote something in a workbook, handed it to me, whispered that I should read it, then erase it.

I quickly opened the book. It read “I really love you. But don’t tell anyone.” My heart, as yours would have, soared. She then turned, pointed at the workbook and whispered “Erase it.” Which I did, bringing an end to my first long-term relationship. By the end of the day, “Snooky” had moved on.

I was able, however, to get over her more quickly than I anticipated when a new female who’d just moved to town, Elaine Hiltz, a cute, brown-haired, fair-skinned maiden, sporting developments that so far, had not occurred on the upper half of any other girls in the class.

For the boys in the class, this was an uplifting and much celebrated spectacle and for several days, even weeks, Ms. Hiltz was treated with the adoration and attention those developments, we felt, deserved.

“Snooky” and the other girls in the class, whom, of course, we’d all known since first grade, was unimpressed. And envious over some other girl sort of unseating her, we should have expected some rebuttal. Sure enough, one afternoon, it came.

Noting several of us boys standing around at recess staring at Ms. Hiltz in a loving, tender, dreamy way, “Snooky” walked up to our pack and uttered two bitter words that have echoed in my ears ever since.

“She stuffs.”