I am going to be posting several installments over the weeks which tell the story I myself have lived. There will be other posts between installments of various contents I feel are worth sharing with you. This first installment I uncover the beginnings of the cornerstones of my life; my soccer career, my sense of humour and my 19 years of educational warfare. I hope you have as good a time reading it as I have writing it.
Enjoy.
There once was a blonde haired blue eyed little boy. In the earliest years of his life he knew nothing but the love of his family. With each day that passed he learned something new, things like walking, talking, counting to one hundred, being able to recite the alphabet and determining that green was in fact his favourite of all colours were just a few of the major developments in his first 3 years.
Honourable Mentions
Secreting bodily waste into something other than his pants.
Climbing the counter to retrieve his own sippy cup.
Finding his first and longest lasting love, soccer.
Before even being enrolled in school he would frequently visit St. Edith Stein Elementary School, the school his two older sisters attended, with his mother. He would spend most of his time in the main office, making small talk with the secretaries and indulging in more lengthy talks with the school’s principal. As kids are often seen by adults when they aren't crying, whining or making a mess, he was adored and thought to be a wonderful child who had an incredible ability to converse with adults. The principal would sit him down across from her at her desk and ask him if he would like a cookie, and what kid would say no to that! Of course, as smart as he was, he was still no match for the smarts of a senior principal, and from her jar of cookies she would hand a piece of Melba Toast. Always taught not to be rude he ate the cookie assuming that these were the types of cookies important adults ate on a regular basis.
He would visit the classrooms of teachers he could potentially be instructed by the following year, and just as they did in the office, they adored his charm and budding intelligence and were looking forward to the opportunity to teach him. Now these teacher's had no adult-cookies to offer him but they would let him sit in and listen to them teach the class or draw pictures on what then seemed like humongous pieces of paper. He liked the environment there. It was friendly, welcoming and most importantly seemed like a lot of fun.
Weeks went on and summer vacation began. There were no more visits to the school to eat dried up crackers or sit in on lessons, now it was time for his first soccer season. He had been kicking a ball around the house from the time he was able to walk, it was an easy decision for his parents to sign him up and see what happened. His jersey number was eight, his team name, The Mr. Magoos, and he took to the sport like a Scotsmen to whiskey, or a moth to a flame, neither metaphor is particularly cheery but you get the point. He was good, and as the staff in the school had done, his coaches and the parents of his team mates couldn't help but notice and comment on how talented he was with a ball at his feet. He didn't know it at the time, but that summer was the beginning of something special and truly life changing.
The summer had ended and it was time for the young boy to attend school for the very first time as a student. It was the beginning of an entirely different life changing regime which again he could not possibly have foreseen. Building blocks, paint brushes and mountains of toys were all there for the bright young minds to explore. Lessons in sharing and playing fair seemed to make up most of the curriculum. Raising hands to speak in turn and remaining quiet while the teacher spoke seemed to be heavily emphasized as well and understandably so, the poor teachers didn't stand a chance.
It became apparent to his teacher that not only was he good with numbers and speaking proper, though childish, English but he was a very creative individual with a perhaps over developed sense of humour for child of his age. The example his teacher used to bring this to his parents attention (as if they didn't already know) was a drawing he had done in class that would be posted on the wall outside the classroom for all to see. Students were asked to draw a picture of their parents doing an everyday activity. Most students drew stick figures of their parents driving a car or simply just standing there holding each other’s hand in the sunshine. There was no originality, no creative thoughts in any of these, nothing that provoked a response from whoever looked at them.
There was however one drawing that stood out amongst all
the drawings on the wall. It was of a man, wearing a green sweater and blue
pants that didn’t quite seem to meet at the waist line. The image was a profile
shot, not a full frontal of a stick figure but rather a side view. In front of
the man seemed to be what was originally perceived by the teacher to be a
basket, a tall white basket to be exact. The man appeared to be tossing bright
yellow eggs into the basket, prompting the teacher to think it was an Easter
themed portrait. Too wrong she was. She approached the young boy at the time he
was nearly finished his masterpiece and commented, "Nicely done, did your
father give you lots of chocolate eggs for Easter?" to which the young boy
replied, "That's the Easter Bunny's job. This is my dad going pee into a
toilet." Not knowing how to respond, the teacher accepted the drawing and
explained to anyone who asked that it was what she had originally thought, a
candid Easter moment. Though the artist himself knew what it was and shared the
truth with his classmates. The laughter of his peers made him feel just as good
as he did when he was kicking a soccer ball. The thirst for this reaction only
grew as time went on and again was something that would take him places in the
future that he could never have imagined.
The next installment of this story will deal with the progression of this child's academic trials and tribulations throughout grade school. So until next time, please remember that anything and everything in this life is subject to change. Respect that.
Donald Mackenzie Love
