REMEMBERING CHAUNCEY STREET 14. School by Patricia Jones [Pat Aronica]

Me, Mary (my cousin), and Freddy c. 1944.

I guess it is time to mention education. I started elementary school when I was four, and apparently, I was not mature enough to leave my mother. On the second or third day of school, it rained. According to tradition at P.S. 137, the children were to line up in the basement of the school. The basement was more like a cellar, and a very scary place. At least, I thought so. I objected to lining up as I was told. Push came to shove, and I kicked the teacher. My sister, Mary, was summoned to the scene. Very embarrassed, she took me home. Boy, did I get it from my mother for embarrassing Mary.

The following September, I started school again at P.S. 137, and I still didn’t do well. The result was that I was enrolled in St. Benedict’s school located at Fulton St. and Ralph Ave. The good sisters did their best, and I did graduate with a Regents diploma in 1959. Although I went to high school on a scholarship, I told Sr. Thomas Angela, I wanted to become a Nun. I said that I would have to enter the convent as a domestic since I was not smart enough to teach. She agreed with me. I never did become a Nun. I became a wife and mother instead.

© 2013, Patricia Jones