MORE ELEMENTARY SCHOOL

MORE ELEMENTARY SCHOOL

When you went to a catholic elementary school in the 1950's, there were a couple of things that were hard to avoid. The main one was going to church. I can't remember how often we went but it seems like it was every day. I know that we had bakery rolls and white and chocolate milk in class in the mornings after mass. In those days, you weren't allowed to eat or drink anything before going to communion.

The second was the church school choir. I joined in the fifth grade like everyone else. We had choir practice one or two evenings per week leading up to Christmas and Easter. I hated that I was a soprano and stayed a soprano all four years. Most of the sopranos were girls. In the fifth grade after choir practice was when I first smoked cigarettes. The eighth grade boys brought them and encouraged the younger boys to try. You had to be cool.

The third was serving at mass. This also started in the fifth grade. The mass was in Latin and we had to go to classes in the evening to learn the Latin responses. A women from the parish taught the Latin classes in her home. It took quite a while and you couldn't graduate until you could say all of the responses correctly by heart. It didn't matter if you knew what you were saying. I continued serving through my first two years of high school. Most of the kids quit by the eighth grade. A lot of people thought I would become a priest.