If the first week of college was about learning patience through standing in lines, the second week was about learning our place in the hierarchy. We were freshmen at the bottom of the heap, no longer seniors glorying in our status and superior rank.
This lowliness of place was enforced by the sophomores, who by tradition had the privilege of making our lives miserable in small ways throughout the week. We were issued felt beanies in the school colors—lacking only a propeller to make them supremely ugly—which we were to wear at all times. Then each day brought some new indignity: wear mismatched clothes, such as plaids with stripes; women, wear a man’s tie; and so forth. Violations were tracked and to be punished as pleased the kangaroo court held in the gym the following weekend. I did not respond well to this nonsense, and though I dared not rebel in any visible way, I pushed the boundaries. I didn’t wear a man’s tie, too shy to ask a boy to borrow one and unable to tie one. I tied a cloth belt around my neck and brazened out the disobedience, following the spirit if not the letter of the law. I determined that the following year I would have no part in terrorizing the incoming students, and with one exception, I kept that resolve. But my lasting humiliation came through the command to perform any task a sophomore assigned. We needed a certain number of signatures on a small signboard we were to wear; only sophomore signatures were valid. One day at lunch I approached a table of students not wearing beanies, hoping to score multiple John Hancocks. “Sing for us,” commanded one of them. “Sing ‘You Are My Sunshine.’” I was mortified, but I sang a verse and reached to remove my signboard. “That’s okay,” said one of the guys, grinning. “We’re not sophomores.”
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Baptist GirlI was a conservative Baptist girl who grew up to become a career Christian, working first in a Baptist school and then in a Baptist college. For about three decades, it was very good until it wasn’t, and I had to leave. But the Baptists formed me. This is my homage to the good times and good people of the world I left, finally, at forty-three, when I became an Episcopalian. These are my memories; others might disagree with my recollections. So be it. Archives
January 2024
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