Welcome to the Wakefield Doctrine (the theory of clarks, scotts and rogers)
This is the Doctrine’s contribution to the Six Sentence Story bloghop.
Hosted by Denise, constrained by a sentence limit (high and low) of six, there are worse ways to spend the remaining time you have on earth.
Prompt word:
SNAP
For the boys, (and a little less so for the girls, as the lines of effective communication between the two universal armies was still decades away), the first day of school for the fourth grade at St Dominique’s was every bit the WWII prisoner-of-war movie, right down to harshly confining uniforms and unpalatable food.
By no means a surprise, rule-by-adult nevertheless came as a shock; to the more imaginative among the prisoners, horribly unjust. Despite, (or, perhaps, because of), having been through this indoctrination only three times before, (novelty being the default reaction of the very young), it all felt both new and inevitable.
Order was imposed on the body compelled to wear uncomfortable clothing, the presence of authority undeniable with seats assigned, (as if the ordered rows of desks bolted to the floor weren’t enough), and the penultimate lesson: beyond the windows serving as one whole wall of the classroom, the sun shone with insolent warmth, out of reach for the term of their incarceration.
Standing at the front of the room, Sister Mary Cletus, with the serene patience of the experienced jailor, awaited her charges; the blackboard behind her playing tricks on the eye with the contrast of a black habit and stiff white wimple; her eyes, visor’d by a pair of steel-wired rim glasses were a depthless blue, her face surprisingly soft; a relief map of a long and not always easy journey.
Without a word, the nun, (a member of the unironically named Order of the Sisters of Mercy), turned to face the black board and, with a one-handed snap of a piece of chalk, wrote:
‘Time and Man’
*
About clarkscottroger
What a perfectly amazing line to stop the eye of the reader, and keep the imagination in gear.
thank you
Damn. (highest of compliments, sir)
indeed, thanks
Intricately woven, superb emotional undertones.
TY, GK
Thinking back, fourth grade does sound like a “WWII prisoner-of-war movie”. That was my first year in a Catholic school (because my parents thought the public schools were unacceptable, which might have been the case). I got along with the nuns. I do remember those chalk blackboards. We barely had rotary phones in the good old days.
we no longer have a rotary phone, however, we do have a phone on the wall next to the kitchen… come on EMP do yer worst! lol
I hope we never give up the land line.
I like the image of Sister Cletus.
Thank you.
Oh my goodness… so many things just popped in my head. It was an ancient small yet tall school in the country – I would have been about 10 at the time. Oh and wow, there was a bat in the girls bath room too!
how we never completely forget those days! and the details!! (though ya gotta admit a bat in the bathroom would be tough to forget)
This is a brilliant line. Clark
Order was imposed on the body compelled to wear uncomfortable clothing, the presence of authority undeniable with seats assigned,
thank you, Reena!
Oh. You write so well, wtf. And the first day of school does always remind me of a war lol.
lol thanks (my favorite ‘literary’ joke is, in a story involving a school to name it the ‘William Golding Junior High School’*
* if they don’t a Junior High School categary where you are, these were separate schools between elementary and high school, i.e. Grades 1-6 Grades 7-8 Grades 9-12 so the demographic of the Jr High was 12-15 years old… don’t know about your people, but here in the Land of Y Chromia (males) we call that age, ‘The Age of Practicing the Worst of Human Foibles’