Everything Happened In Sixth Grade
By: Jean Compton
Tags: Kids, Growing Up, Teachers, Coming Of Age

Photo: Johnny McClung/Unsplash

Everything happened in Sixth Grade.

Or, so it seemed. I had a great teacher for sixth grade — Mr. Browning. I had a great art teacher — Mrs. Flower. And, that was such a great name for an art teacher, n’est ce pas? Mrs. Flower.

Mrs. Flower brought in a photo one day off the cover of an issue of Time Magazine. On it’s cover, which she must have ripped off just to show me (and which she gave me) was a photo of Venus de Milo by the Renaissance Italian painter Botticelli. But the coolest part of that experience was what she said. She told me, this looked like me. That it reminded her of me. I was thrilled. Because I thought she was beautiful, the Venus. And, Venus, the Goddess of Love. Who better to be likened to. Right? Especially to a girl who didn’t think much at all about her looks. Who surely didn’t think she was very attractive at all, especially not attractive like that. To be compared to a goddess.

I needed that. I also needed Mr. Browning. Mr. Browning, my sixth grade teacher, wouldn’t let me spend too much time hanging out with my friend Gail. “She’s a bad influence on you, Jean.” Gail, who I looked up to as the coolest, most desireable girl in our grade (most of the boys would have agreed with me) was a distraction. The kind of distraction that boys were distracted by. The kind of girl that sixth grade boys probably went home and wacked off to. As Gail had breasts. Well developed breasts for a sixth grade girl. She had them in fourth grade, even. Whereas, I had none. I was waiting for them to come in. They hadn’t yet arrived at the station. They were late. They were overdue.

My mother told me I might have to wait until I had children to see them. What?! That’s a long time from now? Mom? And, what if I never have children. What then?

That’s when I started stuffing my bra with cloth handkerchiefs. To make myself look bigger. I even did this in 7th grade, after I left elementary school and started junior high. In junior high, I had to get undressed for gym and the pool and I had to discreetly remove the padding from my teen bra to get into a one piece swimsuit for swim class. You’d think it would probably be pretty obvious that me with clothes and without clothes were two, totally different female, human animals. No one ever said they noticed anything different. Thank God!

Anyway, this story isn’t about that. This story is about how some pretty cool things happened to me in sixth grade — which, I deem were instrumental in my direction henceforth.

I had Mrs. Flower, who, along with being an excellent art teacher, thought — and told me I was beautiful. Which was a big deal, because I don’t recall anyone up until that point in my 11–12 years ever said that to me. That I was beautiful. Or pretty. Not even my parents. Although, I knew they loved me.

And, I had Mr. Browning. Who saw potential in me and let me know when I was fucking off and to get back to it as I had more important things to do. Mr. Browning was also the first teacher/person to ever put me in a play. Well, I guess the whole class was in the play. Were they? I’m not sure there were enough parts. What play was it? Don’t remember. Doesn’t matter.

The point is, I had one line, I was in a costume, and I made the audience laugh, and as soon as I came off the stage, Mr. B. (a lot of people called him that) hugged me close and told me, “Good job, Jean!” He was so happy. Which made me so happy. Because I was scared to go on stage. Even though I had been on stage for dance recitals. But, I never had to talk. Just with my body. Body talk. When, he told me, “Good job!” I knew he meant it. And, I had made the audience laugh. I nailed it!

I could make people laugh? Who knew? I was sure I would flop, freeze on the spot, or totally fail in my job of delivering one line loud enough for the audience of other students and teachers to hear.

I was noticed. So, my point is, sixth grade for me was the start of me getting noticed. Or me noticing that I was noticed. I knew this was my last year of grade school and I would be entering a whole other world after summer’s end.

Before that happened, our family of six would go on a cross-country camping trip all the way to California to see my California cousins with many stops in between in a pop-up camper with a few stays in hotels. But, that’s another story.