Parents Packing Pistols

In the year of 1967 I was a freshman In high school in a small Midwest Iowa town. Before teachers cared about bullying and goofy stuff like kids’ feelings We were not allowed to have them anyway back then The gym teacher was snippy and mean. Pinched nose, hair teased and sprayed With enough hairspray to choke us all to death She had beady eyes. I do not recall the color. Never happy, snippy usually. Cindy and Susie were always the basketball captains. They were the giraffes of our class. They chose us one at a time from a line. My twin and I and our friend Debbie were always the last to be picked. When they got to us, they always had a huge argument about who had to take us. “You can have them!” “No, you take them.” If we had gone home whining about it, our parents would have laughed. These days, if a child accuses another child of looking at her wrong, Mommy, Daddy and Grandma come up, packing loaded pistols.