Who They Are

Who They Are By Kenneth Bennion MIGH school students have been so thoroughly psychoanalyzed during recent years that they have all been classified and pigeon-holed. Every action, reaction, and impulse, from adolescence to matriculation, have been blue-printed and tabulated for future reference and guidance. All the teacher has to do is familiarize himself with a twenty-five-foot shelf of high-priced books, and then, according to directions, apply certain stimuli in psychological sequence to the pubescent minds before him, and watch the required development take place according to schedule. A very simple process! The trouble is, the pupils won't stay classified. They shift around, mentally and otherwise, and upset the whole scheme. "The psychology of the typical Lincoln county high school student" worked well as a guide last year, but this year the typical student quit school and got a job, so now a new book has to be written. It will deal with recent reorganizations in the field of secondary edu- cational psychology, and its real purpose will be to enable another promising young "Ph. D." to make good some of his promises. All that is very exciting, but the most interesting thing is the fact that every high school student, from the brightest to the dumb- est, and from the meanest to the prettiest, is absolutely different from any other. Furthermore, every one is an unfathomable being of two distinct personalities: the one put on in class, and the one worn out of school hours. It is important that a teacher become acquainted with both, if he would apply his carefully prepared stimuli with any degree of success. One method of thus becoming acquainted with the pupils is to have them write brief autobiographies. Such an assignment is sure to be one of the most interesting and profitable of the entire year. The following extracts have been taken from a set of papers en- titled "Who I am." This young fellow was a "typical" teacher's pest. He just wouldn't be quiet and look interested. He spent most of the hour winding his watch and sighing heavily. "I was born Sept. 28. 1927, the middle one of six children. I lived with my folks in a little town in southern Idaho. It wasn't a very big town so there wasn't much excitement. About all us kids ever did was shoot spugs [sparrows] off the stores on Main street, and all we ever went to was Sunday School. One day we went on a camping trip in the mountains. My sister was driving Old Faithful — it used to

938 IMPROVEMENT ERA go a little while every hour — , and pretty soon she came to a cow in the road. She yelled, 'Shoo!' but the cow didn't. Well, after we bent the fenders back off the wheels, we went on up to the camp. While the others were getting dinner ready I decided to climb a mountain. After awhile I came to a high cliff and it took me about an hour to climb up it. Just as I got to the top a rattlesnake struck me on the kg. I jumped back and fell clear to the bottom of the cliff. I ran all the way to camp, expecting to drop dead every minute. When I got there I found I had my boots on. The snake hadn't bitten me at all. "That night I found a beetle in my bed so I took the '22' and shot it." This "ground hog" is an easy-going, good-natured student, unless someone musses up his long, black, polished hair. He talks earnestly with his "girl friend," and then looks up in hurt innocence when the teacher calls him for it: "I was born in Salt Lake City on the second day of February, or 'ground hog day.' My childhood was a dirty one because I was always playing in the mud and getting into mischief. I hated school but after two or three years I settled down to work. I have a high ideal to be a great man, but I have been trusting it to luck. The one big thing in my life now is to have a good time while I'm young. I am called a shiek, but I don't know why. My father is general manager of a supply- company, and after school and on Saturdays I am the general nuisance." A dark-eyed Canadian girl writes this one. If the friend from home is wise, he will come again, and often. "I was born in a little village high up in the mountains of Canada. It is really a very magnificent little place, with its stately old trees and sparkling mountain streams. There are also pretty cottages with green lawns and flower beds. To me it is all very wonderful, but perhaps its description doesn't appeal to anyone else. You see, I lived there for nearly sixteen years, and I grew to love it. I'll always be a Canadian in my feelings, I have to study hard and rush from class to class or I get lonesome. I miss my old friends so much that if it weren't for school I believe I should take the first train home tomorrow. One of my friends came down to see me this summer and wanted me to return with him; but I am determined to finish my school before we — well, before I go back." Cremona is like her theme. There is an occasional suggestion of pathos and tragedy, but it is immediately washed out in a deluge of whole-hearted gaiety. "My name is Cremona Peffin. Now laugh at that if you dare! I have had a very interesting life, and now in my old age I take my pen in hand to tell you, a mere man, all about it. My father is George Peffin, my mother is dead and I have a stepmother. I live with my grandfather. "After my mother died I lived for thirteen years with my grandparents. Then my daddy came home from South America, where he had been working, and brought me a brand new mother. I was rather pleased and went with them to Canada and then to South America. It was a wonderful experience, and I enjoyed my trip, of a year, immensely. Daddy finally decided I might better complete my education, so I packed my little hat and powder puff and came back to the States. "I went to school for a year and a half, and then my appendix decided it would give me some trouble. For a while I debated whether I should pass on or stay awhile and

WHO THEY ARE 939 bother the world. I finally decided on the latter, and here I am. "Many times you will hear me groan under the load of a heavy assignment, but. like a martyr, I will struggle bravely through it. I have the record of never having been unprepared in English. Ahem! My chief failure is that 1 can't keep my mouth shut. I often speak out of turn, but I will try and control myself. "Oh, yes. I have a very nice boy friend." If this young cosmopolitan were not blessed with a charming sense of humor and a complete lack of conceit, she would be a most disturbing element to her teachers. She knows all about the case of the subject of an infinitive, and international bimetalism. She is well read on more interesting subjects than most teachers have even heard about. "To the casual observer I am just an average sixteen-year-old girl, maybe a little above average in stupidity and quite a bit below average in looks. Poor, deluded world! How can you know that poetical genius is budding: great inventions that will shock the intellectual world with their brilliance, and great uplifting ideas are stirring in the average mind of that average girl. "I have claims to almost all quarters of the globe. I'm of English, Welsh, and Irish dercent, and was born in Japan of American parents. Some people have been so unwise as to dispute my citizenship in this fair land, but I show my Irish blood and usually get away with the argument. "I believe in evolution, but not the kind that places my ancestors on the monkey family tree. My ancestors didn't come over on the 'Mayflower,' but I do claim to be a descendent of Eve, although I refuse to believe that my great grandmother was made from a man's rib." Sometimes teachers think that this boy is utterly hopeless, and then the next day he will rouse himself and surprise them with un- mistakable evidences of genuine ability. "Well, I am just another dumb student, trying to get along in school. I have a'bout seventy-five cents in my pocket at this time and I owe fifty of that. I am absolutely satisfied (for the present) . I am going to the school I like best and most of my friends are here, so they are no better off than I am. I am here because my parents compelled me to come. At first I hated it, but there is some good in every necessary evil. I am not very much of a dynamo of ambition, and wouldn't be surprised if you found me unprepared now and then. But take consolation. You will not be the only teacher to find me unprepared. I have a particular and intense hatred for geometry (nasty stuff). It will be the cause of one 'E' on my report card this year. It is my own fault, though. If I would look it straight in the face and dig in I could get it, but it is hard to study when I get home. All the fellows are up on the corner kicking a football around and I forget about lessons until supper time. After supper, there is an interesting article on the library table, or Joe calls around in his 'Lizz.' "No, I can't get anything done in a study period, either, which is why this theme is a complete failure. A fellow across the table from me is biting his pen. The title of his paper is 'Who I Am,' and he has about four lines written." This girl is just an alloy, — but true as steel! "My mother came from Snowflake, and my father is a Frost, but still I am

940 IMPROVEMENT ERA i warm-hearted. My grandparents on mother's side were English and Swedish; on the other hand they were English and Danish. I was born at Chinaman Springs, Navajo Indian Reservation, New Mexico, but I am neither a Chink, Injun, or Mexican. In fact, my ancestors have been in the melting pot so long that I guess I am just an alloy." This embryo dramatist is a very quiet, hard-working little girl. True to her sex, she wants only one thing, but it turns out to be two. "WHO I AM" Act I " 'It's a girl!' (Father registers disappointment.) Act II (Fifteen years later.) "A little junior enters this school. She is promising, young, hopeful, with a intelligent cast to her brow. I am she. Reading is my favorite occupation. I read everything from dime novels up. I even read my school books. I have one bad habit. I chew gum. 'Stounding though the fact mu/y seem, when I was a baby I was very beautiful. But that was a long time ago and doesn't help much now. "I am not positive what line of work I shall follow up, but I think I shall be a nurse. Of one thing I am certain, and that is I want to have a profession and get married. Then if I have lots of money I want to travel and have plenty of pretty clothes." At eleven months, this student astonished the neighborhood by her physical accomplishments. At sixteen, she is a poet. What next? "I had done it! I had actually done it! Imagine me doing a wonderful thing like that! My mother and father watched me do it with amazement and happiness on their faces. The neighbors' children began to scream and laugh at me and their mothers came out to see what had happened. How could a little girl like me do such a thing? I did it once, then turned around and did it over again. I had stepped over the hose, the long, black hose lying on the front lawn. "That was my first great adventure. I am now sixteen years old, and therefore get a kick out of life. I don't like to stay home any more than I can help, although no home could be more pleasant than mine. I like the canyons very much, but most of all I like the desert, where there is nothing but cactus and sand everywhere. I like horse-back riding, tennis, hiking, dancing, etc., and I like to write poetry. Several of my poems have already been published." Elaine also writes poetry, and short stories, but she has never written anything more romantic than this little story of her life. "I am just the ordinary girl with the ordinary face and mind of any girl my age. Perhaps there is something extraordinary about my ideals and ambitions but I shan't bore you with details. "I was born in a lovely little white-frame house in Oklahoma, but this peaceful existence lasted only a little while. My earliest recollections were in the town of Norton, Texas, where I, the youngest of seven children, could not realize the reason for the tears when my father, an engineer, was killed in a train wreck. The family was sadly broken up, and my poor mother, broken physically and spiritually, as well as financially, moved with her three youngest children to Austin, where she started a boarding house. The war broke out and two of my brothers went. No one knows better than we the bitterness of war. After a year with the two boys somewhere with

WHO THEY ARE 94 1 the army, and a married girl she knew not where, mother's nerves broke and for years she was an invalid. "After an eternity the war ended, the boys returned safe, the girl came home a widow, and the family was re-united. Now, mother is in fairly good health, five of her children are here with her, another is coming in the spring, and the seventh, with his wife and three babies, is on a farm in Texas. So, like a piece of fiction, this little autobiography ends with everyone happy." Believe this one or not: "I was born in a little town in New York called Schenectady. Later my mother and father moved out West and I was left with some relatives who were to take care of me. When at about the age of ten I got tired of going to school and also of the relatives, so I made up my mind to follow my parents. "I left without telling anybody what I was going to do. I got as far as New York and made up my mind to work in order that I could go farther on my trip. It took about two days to get a job. My clothes were fairly good and this must have made a good impression on some gentlemen because I got a job as errand boy in an office. "I didn't tell the boss my right address for the simple reason I didn't have one, and for another thing, one night maybe I slept on some porch and another night in some store. "I worked and traveled for about four months and finally reached my destination. I had quite a bit of experience up to this time and so I found the police headquarters and located my parents." This dusky maid who has laughing, wistful eyes, is a descend- ant of royalty. She sings of her native land. "Somewhere in this world there is a spot so dear to the life and hearts of millions, and so romantic and thrilling to me. There, there is music, love, charm, and allurement. Roam the world as you will, nowhere will you find a more enchanted spot. There, 'every month is the balmy month of May.' There, flowers are always in bloom, and fruits are always in season. There, showers are hailed as 'liquid sunshine,' and triple rainbows illumine the clouds. "There, too, Nature, though smiling in most parts, can be seen in her angriest moods, belching forth from the bowels of the earth geysers and mountains of liquid flame and lava, from the greatest living volcano in the world. "And this very descriptive spot, known the world over as the 'Paradise of the Pacific,' do I claim as my home and my native land" This girl's mind ran to cottages and flower gardens. She be- came quite absent-minded and used to bring to class a thimble in- stead of a pencil. When spring came she spent most of the hour watching soft, white clouds drift lazily across a patch of blue sky. "Every year of iffiy life has been worth more than can be estimated in dollars and cents. The first part of my life was spent in a most beautiful, little country home. A small garden and fruit orchard adorned the south side of our little estate: on the north was a green-latticed playhouse where my sister and I learned the first fundamental principles of housekeeping. A beautiful flower garden and lawn bright- ened the west, or front, and at the back was the barn, in which lived our faithful cow and horse. In the center of all this stood our five-room, blue-painted home.

942 IMPROVEMENT ERA i Our life here was full of many interesting events. Happy days were spent with our friends and our many pets. "After we moved to the citfy, daddy began training me in bookkeeping and clerk- ing, and I also began my musical training, which means so much to me now. These valuable principles taught to me have helped me pay my way through high school. I have worked in business houses during the day and placed with a dance orchestra at night. But my work is more of a pleasure to me, as 1 enjoy every moment of it spent, especially in playing. "While living in the city I have been very happy. Helen, my best pal and sister, and I have not been lonely for friends as many girls are when moving into a different city. We have been in schools together and 'she has me, and I have her, so every- thing's gonna be all right.' "Though my future ideals and dreams are too lofty to tell about in this composi- tion, I will promise to write of them when they are realized." Poor girl! Instead of a little white cottage and a flower gar- den, it turned out to be a "kitchen, bedroom, and sink," with dis- appearing furniture, in a big city. But she says it's just what she wanted, after all, and that she is just too happy for words. Then she looks across at John and — Oh, well! It's none of our business, anyway. MOONRISE (From the poem "In the Temples of the Great Outdoors") There where the red dawn floods the skies And the last kiss of sunset dies A mellow radiance distills, Expands and deepens o'er the hills. Now, like a blade, a burnished rim Breaks o'er the range in shadow dim, Emerging 'till a sphere of gold Looms over dark Olympus old. See, dripping down the dreamy dome, Fine fleecy flakes of filmy foam, Like kinky curls of hoary hair, Enfold her fiery figure fair, Intrude upon th' enraptured gaze And hold the fluent tongue of praise. Up through the cloak of cloud she glides And, I suspect, she dreams she hides; But, like a tuft of ocean spray, The misty mantle melts away, And lo, the Venus of the skies Draws throbbing night's ten thousand eyes. Theodore E. Curtis