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I
was finishing up a home call one late autumn
afternoon. As I pulled out onto the narrow road
skirting the school I heard the school bell ring. I
braked, put the car in reverse and sidled back to the
sidewalk. It was a lovely day. Warming sun and autumn
fragrances danced on a thin breeze.
I
turned to look at the schoolyard, but my sight was
focused on memories, years old. I couldn??™t recall the
last time I??™d heard the old fashioned school bell. It
had been childhoods ago--that much I was certain of.
My body was sitting in the car, behind the wheel, but
my senses had transported me a long distance from the
present.
I
inhaled and I could smell sun-warmed skin on a summer
afternoon. Gangly limbs akimbo as a group of children
played tether ball. Goofy grins from several of my
schoolmates as they took turns throwing a small
beanbag and jumping to another hop scotch square. Out
of the corner of my eye I catch the flurried movement
of kids scrambling on jungle gyms, merry-go-rounds,
swings, and monkey bars. They were the school??™s
younger pupils, playing in their designated area of
the yard.
Overhead, a shiny crow caws out, as if directing the
play of the little humans below his perch. Over near
some blooming shrubbery, fat bumble bees saw the air,
up and down, as the bees??™ thickly rounded bodies
wobble among the sweet-scented flowers. Hanging damp
and animated, the fragrance of newly cut lawn lingers
in the air, fills my breath with its clean aroma.
Some
one comes up from behind and pounds me on the
shoulder, hard enough to send me lurching forward. I
clench my hands into fists and spin around ready to
spit venom. The words lose direction in my mouth and
all that comes out is the collective sigh of the words
not used.
There, with red hair gleaming, with freckles looking
darker on his pale flesh in the sunlight, and a
crooked grin stretched across his face, stood Jimmy.
My first crush since Kindergarten. Past a grin he
said, "Do you want to play?" Jimmy held a basketball
and gestured to the blacktop court. I goggled at him,
nodding in the affirmative.
Basketball wasn't my game but I loved to throw the
ball and watch it drop through the netted hoop. I had
a few "trick shots" that every once in a while I could
execute perfectly. We laughed and jumped and ran.
While I bent over to catch my breath I could hear the
echoed thwang of the basketball as Jimmy bounced it on
the asphalt behind me.
Just
as I was straightening up the school bell rang.
Everyone scrambled to pick up their possessions and
equipment, then off to their classrooms they went. I
didn't follow them. I drifted for a while on scattered
memories. Lunches in the cafeteria--the same place we
had our concerts and watched educational films. And on
those nights we had school carnivals the cafeteria was
the place they held the cake walks, and played musical
chairs.
Another tolling of the school bell and the students
swarmed out of their classrooms, past the metal fence
and over to the crosswalk where students given the
honor of being Crossing Guards monitored the foot
traffic. Kids who had parents waiting for them ran
over to their cars. The rest of us walked home.
Home
was less than a block away and took no time at all,
even when I dawdled. Once at home, no thought of
school entered my mind with the exception of required
homework. The bell that regulated the important
intervals in my school days held no significance once
away from it.
And
so it has been now, for many years--no thought of the
school bell had I entertained...until I was parked
next to the elementary school, and the bell rang out.
Copyright 2005 by Kathy Anne Harris |
