Scarlet Stone

This Valentine’s Day arrives under such angry and uncertain times in our country, and it’s hard to maintain emotional balance through the blaring media and private conversations that we encounter. It is simply numbing to the senses and spirit, so I continue to climb back up on the visual riverbank, remove myself from the flow, shut off the TV, and turn my back as I take a few deep breaths. I feel empathy for the citizens in Minneapolis and elsewhere who don’t live in rural areas and have difficulty tuning out the destructive forces.
Holidays can definitely be a positive reprieve, and as I look back on all the Valentine’s Days of my past, I think about expressions of love, affection, gratitude to and from special persons or family and friends in general. This is the holiday about red trimmings, big boxes of chocolates, fresh bouquets of flowers, jewelry, lingerie, and affectionate Hallmark cards with foil accents or glitter to adorn the messages of love. When I was growing up in Hoyt Lakes during the 60s, I remember kids bringing a cereal box to school to make into a Valentine mailbox that we decorated with construction paper and hearts that were cut from white paper doilies. Classmates wrote Valentine’s cards purchased from a local store, then put them in each other’s boxes, and, of course, we were encouraged to be inclusive so feelings were not hurt. There would be a party with candy, cookies, and cupcakes that the moms had sent or delivered that day to be enjoyed with the small cartons of milk that appeared every school day in plastic totes the janitor would deliver to classrooms.
My mom taught first grade at my school, so there was always the bulletin board and showcase to be decorated for viewing from out in the hallway. Although mom was very creative, it was tedious for her to do. I would help by tacking up the background paper, borders, and decorations, such as the Valentine characters with their heart-shaped bodies, irregularly drawn crayon faces, and long white paper arms and legs that were folded in accordion fashion with mitten-like hands and oval shoes pasted on. Mom called it all “first grade art,” and we found merciful humor throughout the years beholding the seasonal decorations slathered in paste that were some student’s proud creation. There was much security, fun, and even prestige having a mother who was a teacher, and her students would call me Mrs. Johnson’s sister because the concept of their teacher having a child was too far to leap.
My two brothers and I often rode to school with her in the mornings and would play in her classroom before the school day started. Mother would go socialize soon after arrival … briskly walking her slim frame down the polished tile hallway to the teacher’s lounge to have coffee and a couple ciggies while leaving us to amuse ourselves.
Her large, tidy desk sat at an angle up in one corner of the room, often with an apple from a student perched on one corner. Out of respect we knew to leave it be … the apple, her papers, and the entire desk. The long chalkboard at the front of the room had a permanent section of lines where students could practice drawing proper letter formations.
On another wall were solid windows that looked out over the school parking lot, providing enormous distractions for youngsters dreaming of escape during the long school year. The windowsill held geraniums and other plants, and Dick, Jane, Sally, Spot, and Puff early readers abounded throughout the room. In the back corner was a small bathroom that mom grumbled about when little boys lost their aim, so a sign was posted on the wall: “If you sprinkle when you tinkle, be a sweetie and wipe the seatie.”
I did not have my mother as a teacher but was just next door in another female teacher’s custody.
Mrs. “T” had an intense personality, was loud, and had a shiny face from smearing on Vaseline every day for moisturizer during the winter months. I never quite got past the glossy, gooey oddness of it because Mother used Ponds and Oil of Olay. I remember on one occasion I said, “shut up” or some awful word to a classmate, and she aggressively attempted to wash my mouth out with a bar of lye soap. She had me in a headlock, but I would have none of it and fought until I tore loose and raced down the hall to mom’s classroom for an intervention. It must have worked, because no soap ever washed the stain of horrific language from my lips on that day or any other day since … but I kept my cool for the remainder of the school year not wanting to get that close to that bar of soap ever again. If I received any kind of reprimand back at home that night, it was not memorable.
My parents expected us to be well behaved, and we three kids were good students all the way through our school days … with me being a bit of a firecracker from time to time.
When I was in seventh grade, all the kids from Hoyt Lakes rode the bus to Aurora and attended junior high, which was part of a complex of buildings for grades 7-12. So, it was on Valentine’s Day that true romance found me when a boy passed me a paper note in Mrs. Brown’s math class and asked me to “go steady.” I had no idea what that entailed, but I grinned and nodded yes across the classroom because he was very cute and looked like a young Robert Redford. I was blossoming up, down, left, and right, and there were burgeoning romantic feelings, too. The private meeting spot for us was on the edge of town behind the Catholic church among the young pine trees until one day, while we were lightly petting and giggling, the priest came running out yelling at us, so we never kissed there again. We instead relocated to the Episcopal church on the east side of town near the woods where he and his brother had built a fort.
I was an early developer and, thinking back, this probably added to the lad’s selection criteria. Teens were experimenting with sex and alcohol by this time, but not me, and soon enough Robert Redford ended up dumping me as I would not leave first base. I remember the devastation the next day at school when he had already taken up with the class loudmouth … a heavy-hitting drinking girl prone to home runs.
In ninth grade, I had another boyfriend who was a classmate of my older brothers and played the role of Casanova quite well. This was quite a long romance, and there were boxes of Valentine chocolates, mushy cards, and shimmery plastic jewelry that was something to behold. He and I were both in speech and drama and played romantic roles together in various school plays until he graduated and decided to enter the Air Force. I remember him walking with me down the street near my parents’ house and asking me to please wait for him.
“Wait? Four years? Me?” were no doubt the words in my young head. I did not do that, not then or ever … as life is too short to sit on the sidelines. He eventually married and settled in Tennessee after service to his country and plenty of ladies along the way. We remained somewhat in touch, and about six years ago he traveled north for a family funeral and drove up to Ely where I was living to take me out for lunch. It had been 40 years when all of a sudden over the top of the table, sandwiches and chips at Insula Restaurant, he said, “Letting you go was the biggest mistake of my life.”
That was all rather shocking, and although I did not share his perspective, I was polite. He has since passed away, but remains my most memorable high school sweetheart.
These days, I have no romance to speak of, but perhaps in the spring I will be accepting applications. I tend to search for deeper meaning in life and appreciate my health, family, and friends. I will most certainly attend a friend’s Valentine’s tea for ladies here in Tower, enjoying a chance to laugh, and share stories and treats in her lovely home. Have a happy Valentine’s Day.