This led directly to the idea of including a hygiene or health lesson in each day’s curriculum. I sent to Asheville for several hygiene textbooks. These gave me lots of material.
One day we would talk about the skin, how the body got rid of waste through the pores and the necessity of washing perspiration and sloughed-off cells off the skin. But then we had to get down to practical points about how to bathe, since most of my pupils had only a granite tub or pan to use in front of the open fire, and even that was not easy with a large family in a one or two-room cabin.
Another day the lesson would be about pure drinking water, the dangers of typhoid and hookworm, and how to keep a spring clean. It was then I discovered how often the children would go to the bathroom in a mountain stream and I realized that I had to forget prudishness and speak candidly.
In addition, as I saw how closely the children watched “Teacher,” how much they wanted to be like me and in how many ways they were copying me, I tried to be more meticulous about grooming than I had ever been, wearing freshly starched and ironed shirtwaists, always keeping my hair clean and shining. I hoped that some of this effort would rub off on my pupils—and it did. Soon Lizette Holcombe, Bessie Coburn, Ruby Mae and Clara Spencer were asking me if they could take a bath or wash and iron clothes in the mission house. Since Miss Ida did not take too kindly to this, my room had to be the scene for most of this activity. And when the girls would comment wistfully, “Teacher, you smell so good,” I furthered my crusade by keeping a can of violet-scented talc on hand just for them.
Then as time went on, I made an amazing discovery: the odors (“funks” as my children said, using a sturdy Shakespearean word) were no longer so much of a problem for me. It was not that my hygiene lessons had yet made that much difference, nor that I had grown accustomed to the smells because in other situations my crazy nose bothered me as much as always. It was rather that as I came to know the children and to think of them as persons rather than names in my grade book, I forgot my reactions and began to love them. I suppose the principle was that the higher affection will always expel the lower whenever we give the higher affection sway. For me, it was letting love for the mountain children come in the front door while my preoccupation with bad smells crept out the rathole.
A problem of a different sort was the plight of those pupils who were far behind their age group in everything. It was not fair that a big boy like Lundy Taylor should have to recite in the primer class with the six-year-olds just because he had never before been in school.
But I felt equally sorry about a child like Mountie O’Teale whose real problem was the O’Teale family home. The picture of the epileptic boy in his pen in the corner would rise before me. When Mountie tried to speak, she showed a serious speech defect—halted gruntings and croaking like an animal—more like a three- or four-year-old than a ten-year-old.
Also Mountie wore hand-me-down clothes and her hair was rarely combed. And the little girl never smiled or laughed or showed any emotion whatever. She seemed so dead inside that I could not be sure there was any possibility of helping her.
Then one afternoon I caught Creed Allen and her own brother Smith teasing her. On the playground they bent a sycamore sapling into a bow, lured her by, then released the branch to hit her in the face. It hurt, and when she started crying, they chanted in unison . . .
Mush-mouthed Millie,
Can’t even speak,
Jabber jabber jaybird
Marbles in the beak.
“Look at her blubber, bawlin’ her eyes out. Dare you t’ blab to Teacher,” I heard them stage-whisper to taunt her. “Only Teacher couldn’t understand you if’n you did blab. Cottonmouth!”
Since I was trying not to interfere too often on the playground, I waited to see what would happen. No, Mountie did not tell on the boys, but I looked at her and saw misery staring out of her eyes. So she was able to feel, feel deeply. Suddenly, I glimpsed real intelligence buried behind the wall she had put up to ward off more hurt. There was just a chance that Mountie might turn out to be the white lamb of the O’Teale family. But what to do for her? How to begin?
It may be that my wondering and pondering, and the fact that now I really wanted to help Mountie, constituted a sort of prayer. Prayer—that is, the kind that asks for idea-help with some particular problem life hands you—was still new to me.
However that may be, later on that day, as I was standing before my front bedroom window letting my eyes drink in “my view,” the clear thought came to me: Watch for an opportunity to do something special for Mountie O’Teale, something that will please her.
The chance came the next day. For the first time, I noticed that the shabby coat the little girl always wore to school had no buttons. So during recess I dashed over to the mission house, selected some large buttons from Miss Ida’s button-box along with needle and thread. As I ate my lunch, I sewed on the buttons, then carefully hung Mountie’s coat back on the peg at the back of the room where I had found it.
After school was dismissed, while I was straightening my desk, suddenly I heard a giggle at the back of the room. I looked up and saw that it was Mountie.
“Mountie, what’s funny?”
She came bouncing up to my desk, pointing to the buttons, stood there, gleeful and excited. “Look at my buttons! Look at my buttons!”
“Mountie, what did you say?”
“Teacher, look! Look at my buttons! See my pretty buttons!” I could scarcely believe what I was hearing. In spite of the chortling, the giggles up and down the scale, the child was speaking plainly for the first time. It was like watching something open up inside her. I felt triumphant for her and left school so excited that I wanted to tell everyone about it. That night as I pondered this breakthrough, the thought came that Mountie’s speech defect just might have an emotional base. Perhaps what she needed most of all was to be sure that she was a real person, that someone loved her for herself. For two days I wondered how best to demonstrate that to her. Finally I decided to give her a gift—that bright red scarf which my mother had knitted for me. This had to be presented privately after school the next day so that the other girls would not be envious. The scarf was meant to tell Mountie that she was a very special person to me. It conveyed the message all right. This time she not only delightedly laughed but hugged and hugged me, did an impromptu dance up and down the schoolroom, waving the scarf. Then we practiced over and over, “See my buttons” . . . “I like the scarf” . . . “Pretty scarf” . . . “Oh, pretty red scarf.” And the child’s heart and mind opened up some more.
With every bit of encouragement Mountie received, each time I could tell her that she was doing better, she would try even harder. Teacher cared about her. Teacher loved her. Did she not have the buttons and the scarf to prove it?
Now that the little girl’s mind was released, it could function. Mountie O’Teale’s reading ability grew astonishingly fast. Later on that year, I gave all of my pupils reading tests. I could scarcely believe my own grades when the results showed that through the twelve-year-old group, Mountie had come out highest of all.
Of course, the speech defect was by no means over—the emotional blocks went too deep—but astonishing progress was being made. And this little girl was teaching me such a lot about what an adventure schoolteaching is, and more, that what these children needed most was love instead of lives governed by fear and hate. The adults, hanging onto hatred in the name of virtue, were reaping a bitter harvest in their children.
Part of the harvest was a morbid preoccupation with the negatives of life; sickness, death and dying. For example, one day in the middle of the arithmetic lesson Creed Allen began to cry. I stopped the lesson to look at him inquiringly. “My dog Bud-boy’s dead.” Tears were making two clean channels through the grime on his face. “Teacher, where’s Bud-boy now?”
I cast around for what to say. Probably if I assured Creed that animals are immortal, I was going to be on shaky ground. But one thought did c
ome to me.
“I’m sorry, Creed.” I patted his shoulder. “When a boy and a dog have tramped the mountains together, it’s hard for them to be parted.”
He nodded—and gulped.
“Creed, did you ever wonder how it is that good hounds have such wonderful noses? How they can track a possum or a fox or a bear for miles and miles just by the scent? And when a hunting dog has found his quarry, what makes him stand still, pointing? Or a dog like Bud-boy stand, baying his hound-music? Scientists call it ‘instinct.’ But what’s instinct? Must be that God had put a bit of His wisdom, a little of Himself inside every living creature.”
Creed lifted his head and looked hard at me, his eyes still glittering with tears. Hastily he brushed the tears away with one fist. “Uh—got something in my eye. Ain’t cryin’ water though.”
But now he was intent on what I was saying. “Well, Creed, if God cared enough to think up hound-dogs in the first place—with their pleading eyes and their floppy ears and their built-in sense of smell and their devotion to their masters—don’t you think you could trust Him to take care of one hound-dog like Bud-boy?”
Still his eyes searched mine while he chewed on my idea. Finally, his tear-streaked face crinkled into a half-grin. “Why, Teacher, I reckon so, Teacher. Why shorely, Teacher.” And the tears stopped.
But a week later the crying about the dog started all over again. I was puzzled. “Creed, you told us last week that your dog had died. Is this the same dog?”
“Yes-s,” his voice rose to a wail, “but Bud-boy didn’t go to hea-ea-ven.”
I made my voice soft and gentle, trying to soothe him. “Creed, why do you say that Bud-boy didn’t go to heaven?”
“Because when I put my dog in the bury-hole, I buried him with the tail stickin’ up out’n the ground, so I’d know if you was a-foolin’ me. And the tail’s still there. So Teacher, ye told me wrong and Bud-boy didn’t go to hea-ven-en—” and he plopped his head into his arms on the desk, shoulders shaking with sobs.
School was no sooner out that afternoon than I sent an urgent message by Ruby Mae to be delivered orally and secretly either to Mary or Bob Allen: “Please see to it that after you’re certain Creed is asleep tonight, Bud-boy is properly buried—tail and all.”
I soon saw, however, that Creed’s obsession with death was typical of most of the children. This came out in their play.
“Let’s play funeral” was a favorite game at recess. To me, it seemed bizarre and mawkish play. All that saved it was the spontaneous creativity of the children and the fact that, unerringly, they caught the incongruities and absurdities of their elders.
One child would be elected to be “dead” and would lay himself out on the ground, eyes closed, hands dutifully crossed across his chest. Another would be chosen to be the “preacher,” all the rest, “mourners.” I remember one day when Sam Houston Holcombe was the “corpse” and Creed Allen, always the clown of the group, was elected “preacher.” Creed, already at ten an accomplished mimic, was turning in an outstanding performance. I stood watching, half-hidden in the shadow of the doorway.
Creed (bellowing in stentorian tones): “You-all had better stop your meanness and I’ll tell you for why. Praise the Lord! If you’uns don’t stop being so derned ornery, you ain’t never goin’ to git to see Brother Holcombe on them streets paved with rubies and such-like, to give him the time of day, ’cause you’uns are goin’ to be laid out on the coolin’ board and then roasted in hellfire.”
The “congregation” shivered with delight, as if they were hearing a deliciously scary ghost story. The corpse opened one eye to see how his mourners were taking this blast; he sighed contentedly at their palpitations; wriggled right leg where a fly was tickling; adjusted grubby hands more comfortably across chest.
Creed then grasped his right ear with his right hand and spat. Only there wasn’t enough to make the stream impressive. So preacher paused, working his mouth vigorously, trying to collect more spit. Another pucker and heave. Ah! Better!
Sermon now resumed: “Friends and neighbors, we air lookin’ on Brother Holcombe’s face for the last time.” (Impressive pause.) “Praise the Lord! We ain’t never goin’ see him again in this life.” (Another pause.) “Praise the Lord!”
Small preacher was now really getting warmed up. He remembered something he must have heard at the last real funeral. Hefty spit first, more pulling of ear: “You air enjoyin’ life now, folks. Me, I used to git pleasured and enjoy life too. But now that I’ve got religion, I don’t enjoy life no more.” At this point I retreated behind the door lest I betray my presence by laughing aloud.
“And now let us all sing our departed brother’s favorite song:
‘I’m as free a little bird as I can be,
I’ll build a nest in a weeping willow tree . . .’
All together now!” Creed waved his arms in wide sweeps to lead the singing.
And then later: “Now all of you’uns gather round and see how nateral Brother Holcombe looks.”
Now it was the “mourners” chance for action, mostly the girls. Much screeching, groaning and moaning followed; they pantomimed throwing themselves sobbing on the coffin and talking to the dead person. “Ah, Lordy, he be a sweet bouquet in heaven,” someone shouted.
Suddenly from somewhere in the middle of the huddle the corpse’s booming voice was heard, “Stop it, yer ticklin’ me. Ground’s too hard anyway. Lemme go. I ain’t no sweet bouquet in heaven yit. I’m a-gettin’ out of here.”
After I had been teaching for a while, I began to realize how hungry my pupils were for love expressed in physical contact. They were forever reaching for me, touching me, squeezing me—like Little Burl, on my first day of teaching, coming up again and again to my desk to crowd his little body close to mine and trace the embroidery on my shirtwaist with a stubby forefinger.
I noticed too how all but the older boys acted with David, either in or out of the classroom: often clutching his arm and making excuses to walk along beside him.
At first I had not realized the significance of this yearning for touch, even as I had not known how far into childhood the need for physical contact is carried. But then I stumbled on the link between the need for touch and a child’s ability to learn. Three of my beginners, Jake and Larmie Holt and Mary O’Teale were having a great deal of trouble learning to read. When I would take them one by one on my lap and give them a lesson, they learned twice as fast. Loving them up seemed to remove blocks, just as it had with Mountie.
Naturally with sixty-seven pupils in all grades to teach, it was hard to find time for such individual attention. Nor did it seem right to give most of my time to the dull, slow children rather than to the bright ones. Part of this I solved by appointing Junior Teachers to help me. These were my oldest and best pupils like Bob Allen, John Spencer, Lizette and John Holcombe. They in turn profited from the experience of teaching the younger ones. In no time at all, being appointed a Junior Teacher became the most coveted honor in school. So much so that I had to design a special badge for these children to wear: a piece of heavy cloth cut in the shape of a shield, each one trimmed differently with bits of fancy braids or beading or shiny buttons or sequins off the dresses in the mission barrels.
Recess provided me with another way of trying to appease this hunger for touch with several children at once. Whenever I would go out on the playground, my littlest ones would swarm to me, each wanting to hold onto a finger. Gradually the “Finger Game” evolved. Ten children could play, five on each side of me, each holding onto one finger. But in order not to get tangled in one another’s legs, fall down and break one of Teacher’s fingers in the process, we had to march close together with me at the center of the flying wedge, each child with one hand on the child in front, in a lock-step with perfect rhythm and coordination. If one of the ten got out of step, then all of us fell in a heap. But whether we marched perfectly or whether we tumbled, always there would be gales of laughter. Miss Ida, hearing us,
must surely have thought we had lost our senses.
The Finger Game proved to be perfect for teaching a first lesson in working together in order to live together happily. I was at that time still too new to the Cove to realize how desperately the lesson was needed by the parents of the children along with them. For cooperation beyond the immediate family unit came hard to the highlanders. It was at that point that they showed rather more of their highland Scottish heritage than the typical American frontier pattern. For I had always supposed that in frontier days a high degree of neighborliness and cooperation had been necessary for survival: the “Workings” for building cabins or barns, or for clearing land or harvesting crops; the drawing together into stockades for protection and to resist Indian attacks; the relay system in pushing westward.
But in the mountains, though there were still a few Workings, many factors, including the terrain itself, the isolated coves and the difficulty of travel (a surprising number of these people lived and died without going more than a few miles from home) bred a self-contained individualism. Set down on its own hollow, each household had to depend on itself—and did. The Cove people were suspicious about joining any group effort or organization. Sometimes I wondered if they yet considered themselves to have joined the United States of America.
I could get impatient with this attitude, as David often did too: “Let Tennessee man-power its own roads. Hit disconfits me t’work” . . . “Naw, let preachin’ take up fer the rest, I hain’t comin’. Don’t want nobody to think I treat my religion too familiar-like.”
Trying to get work done for the school or the mission was often like trying to move mountains by shoving against the mountain with one’s shoulder. As I struggled to like, much less love some of the worst of these individualists who wanted no part of accepting anyone’s ideas or leadership, I comforted myself with the thought that, “Oh well, it’s certainly my privilege not to like everyone.”
Christy Page 17