Chapter 6

I just found my Marine City sixth grade report card. It has only the first two sessions because we moved after that. My teacher was Mr. Ferrett; he liked me best of all the kids. I got all A’s. And some of the categories we were judged in were in ‘Citizenship’; yes of course I got all ‘Satisfactory’ in these important, life-long, future-determining habits, such as keeps hands away from face, uses handkerchief, works and plays well with others, and controls speech habits. I can remember my mother often telling me to ‘modulate your voice, dear’ but I never did understand what the frick that meant. If she’d said I should be a little quieter? Or not sound snotty and angry? Yeah, that probably wouldn’t have worked either, because I think even then, I was too deep in denial and control to understand much of anything, let alone thinking I had any control of my body or future. Being nice, now, that I could do.