“Oh, well,… we were tired
of sleeping in and
enjoying life anyway.” 
Jessica Booth

First grade. It was the 1960-61 academic year. At Saint Gabriel School in San Francisco, there were three classes of each grade level, with fifty students per class. Teacher’s aides? Heck, no. We had nuns (Sisters of Mercy)! They didn’t need anyone to help them control a classroom full of kids. We instinctively knew that they meant business and that we’d better toe the line. When I was in first grade, when I got in trouble at school, my parents would meet with the teacher and reprimand me for my poor behavior. Things are quite different today. Parents of unruly kids still meet with the teacher, but to discuss what the teacher is doing wrong to entice their child to behave inappropriately.

The three classes of each grade were labeled A, B, and C. I was assigned to 1-B. My teacher’s name was Sister James Mary. It’s sad, but I have only one memory of first grade. One of my classmates, Kim Hugo, rolled up her large sheet of art paper and put it on her head to look like a chef’s hat. For some reason, I thought that was funny, so I did the same thing. For doing so, I had to stand in the corner of the classroom, facing the walls, for the remainder of the day.

In second grade, my teacher was Sister Mary Sharon. The highlight of second grade was our reception of First Communion in late April. For me, this was a stressful time, because we were told that if we did not memorize three prayers (the Acts of Faith, Hope, and Love), we would not be allowed to participate in the First Communion celebration. My total lack of academic maturity at that time convinced me that I would never be able to memorize the three prayers, and would therefore be (probably) the only kid in the class to be excluded from the sacramental celebration. I never did successfully memorize the prayers, but I was allowed to receive First Communion.

My third grade teacher was the best educator I had in elementary school. Sister Mary Roberta was born in 1889! Not only did she teach me in 1963 and my younger sister in 1966, she also lived long enough to hold two of my three children (Tom and Steve) in her arms at the Mercy Sisters’ Retirement Home in Burlingame. She passed away just a couple of months after her 100th birthday.

I won’t bore you with the details of my other elementary school experiences. Some were good and some were… not so good. But I survived. The diploma I received at the graduation ceremony on Saturday, June 8, 1968 at Saint Gabriel Church indicated that I had “completed the Course of Study prescribed for the Elementary School.” A couple of months before graduation, I had received my letter of acceptance to Saint Ignatius High School. I was ready to move on.

What I didn’t realize on my graduation day is that 1968 would go down in history as one of the most transformative years in the history of the United States. It has been described as a year of  profound and turbulent change, marked by political unrest and social upheaval. It was a year of assassinations (Martin Luther King, Jr. and Robert F. Kennedy), war protests, and a nation grappling with deep divisions. It was 1968!

Most of us in the Saint Gabriel School Class of ’68 were unaware of exactly what was happening in The City and country at that time. We were just kids. Some of us had our first summer jobs, some hung out at either South Sunset Playground or West Sunset Playground, and a few may have attended summer school. It was many years later when we finally understood the significance of what was happening around us that summer. When I think about it, I’m grateful for the opportunity to have enjoyed one last summer of innocence.

Yesterday, I got together with a small group of classmates at a park in Pleasanton for our quarterly lunch. It was a brown-bag affair. The weather was perfect and the three hours spent with these women and men was priceless.