Freshman-Senior Friendship Day

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It’s traditional for the seniors to “enslave” and dress up the freshmen in what today is called “Friendship Day” (it used to be called initiation).

I decided to stick to Indian themes, dressing my dear friend Anshuman as the Indian god Krishna.

First prize for the best costume – the prize was a lot of chocolate, which went to the undersigned and her blue victim.

MomComm: Freshman initiation was a fairly new (or revived) idea when we were freshmen. We, too, had dress-up day, a matter for concern among the administration because in previous years some seniors had dressed their freshmen inappropriately (read: too sexy). We were all in 9th grade science class when Mr. Kibblewhite came to inspect our outfits.

Although it would involve another gruelling trip down and up the hill again, I longed to be sent back to the dorm to change. A couple of sadistic senior girls had dressed me in striped long johns and a denim skirt, with big freckles painted on my face and my hair in pigtails stuck out with wire.

Mr. Kibblewhite had us all stand up, and worked his way down the rows of students, ordering a shirt buttoned here, and one or two people to go change. He got to me, looked me up and down, and pronounced: “You look cute.” Augh!

It could have been worse. I still have photos of Nathan Scott dressed as a gigantic baby, standing in a garbage can, singing.

Adventures in Colorado and New Mexico

Aug 13, Monday – Though still tired and sore from our strenuous hike the day before, I went to the Sun gym to do the physical part of my fitness assessment. Even more tired after that!

Aug 17, Friday – Took a 6 pm flight from Denver to Albuquerque, where Steve Ediger, a long-time Woodstock friend, picked me up and drove two hours to where he and Sharon Seto and their son Robin live. Steve and Sharon work at the United World College in Montezuma, New Mexico. The school year was just starting, so Sharon had to be at her dorm to welcome the kids (she supervises a dorm of 45 girls, and also runs the school’s outdoor program).

The hummingbird feeder on the porch is refilled daily, attracting dozens of birds from several species. Heard close to, hummingbirds sound disturbingly like very large insects.

Saturday we visited the local flea market.

Sunday Sharon and I went to Santa Fe, then Steve drove me back to the airport in Albuquerque.

Another busy week at Sun ensued. I was intensely disappointed to learn that the fitness assessment had been a mistake – as a contractor, I’m not allowed to use the gym! (I hope the nice guy who did it for me didn’t get in trouble for having done the assessment – he was supposed to have checked my badge, apparently.) All my motivation to start getting into shape had to be postponed. I do have his detailed assessment and recommendations to work from, at least.

Aug 26, Sunday – I survived a scary (for me) drive to Conifer, Colorado, to the mountain home of my colleague Charles. He and his wife Elaine had invited me and a long-time friend of theirs, Marj, who graduated from Woodstock in 1978 (she was a lofty senior when I was a lowly freshman, so we hadn’t really known each other in our schooldays). Marj and Elaine had met years before when both were teaching in El Salvador.

It always seems to happen with Woodstockers that we find plenty to talk about even if we didn’t know each other well (or at all) while at school. Marj had brought albums of fascinating photos from a trip she and her husband had made to the far corners of the world – fuel for conversation. Charles and Elaine are no slouches in the travel department, either – they’ve even lived in Antarctica!

Silly Costumes

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10 minutes.

Always the longest in my life!

10 minutes between the end of the lesson before the lunch break and the lunch break!

10 minutes from 4:00 to 4:10 when the schoolday ends.

10 minutes between the end of the schoolday and the after-school snack.

10 minutes from 8:50 to 9:00 when mandatory study hall ends (you have to stay in your room, quiet, possibly studying, for an hour and a half).

I begin to dose out my life in minutes! 40 or 80 of lessons, depending on the day.

5 or 2 minutes before lights-out.

“ All right girls! You have 25 minutes before lights out!”

“All right girls! You have exactly 30 minutes to hand in your clothes to be washed!”

“All right girls! You have 30 seconds left to pick up your clean clothes before I lock the laundry and you’ll be cold and naked for ten months!”

Exaggerations apart.

“Ok girls!” It’s time for my favorite announcement: “The hour and a half of study hall is over and they’re selling food downstairs.”

I go.

I wasn’t waiting for anything else.

Aug 24, 2007

MomComm: Midlands, the girls’ dorm, has a loudspeaker system now, so announcements can be made at the touch of a button. I’m not sure I’d like this particular manifestation of modernity. I suppose there’s an electric wakeup bell or announcement as well. In our day, we were woken up by Dham Singh walking the halls, swinging a large, bronze handbell. This was, perhaps, kinder – the bell would reach you from far away, gradually growing louder as you swam into consciousness, arriving to clang right outside your door, and then fading away again as Dham Singh proceeded down the hall.

The bell for meals, instead, was a piece of railroad track hanging from a balustrade, which was whacked vigorously with a crowbar. It would start out slow, gather into a rapid crescendo, and then fade away again. I don’t know whether this musical approach was devised by the man who banged it every evening.

Once, for a prank, Jenny Rudolph and friends stole both bells and hid them. The next morning Dham Singh walked the halls with a tinny-sounding decorative brass bell that the supervisor kept on her desk, which woke us up by its sheer novelty.

Mrs. Silver got her revenge – she locked the doors and wouldn’t let anyone leave for school until the bells were returned (being late for school would have incurred penalties).

Every Picture Tells a Story – Rossella’s India Diary

Rossella’s diary of her year at Woodstock School on the SAGE Program.

diary

2007 Feb 25

Jul 27, 30

Aug 7, 10, b, c, d,
e
, 13, 16, b, 17, b,
c, 21, 22, 24, b,
27
, b, 28, 31, b, c

Sep 3, b, 6, b, 7, 10, b, c,14, b, 17, b, 18, 19, b, 21,b, c, 24, 25, 26, 27, b

Oct 3, 5, 9, 11, 12, 15, 16,30, 31

Nov 1, 2, 5, 6, 7, 10, 16, a,b, 17, 18, TOS gallery, 20,24, 25, 29

Dec 1, 2, b, 3, 8, 10, b, 13,18, 22, 25, 26

2008 Jan 18, 24, 29, 31

Feb 5, 11, 15, 20

Mar 9, 20, 26

Apr 2, 9, 21, 22, 24, 30

May 12, 13, 16, 17

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Deirdré Straughan on Italy, India, the Internet, the world, and now Australia