It's going on your permanent record!

Short story by

Bob Ford

Mrs. Hibbard was old. Probably about 40. She was tall, maybe 5' 10" with steel gray hair tied in the back in a large bun. Piercing the bun was what looked like a railroad spike. Mrs. Hibbard was my fifth grade teacher.

She always wore long dark dresses, black stockings, and flat oxford shoes. Her clothing was always "sensible," especially for a grammar school teacher. Her fingers were pure white - a cloud of chalk trailed her every step.

I served time in the fifth grade at Overbrook Elementary in 1940. At that time the German Army was already on the move in Europe. They'd vanquished Poland a year before, and Great Britain was under siege from Adolph Hitler's Luftwaffe.

Back to Mrs. Hibbard. On the first day of school I sat in the back of the room next to my life-long buddy, Gene. Every year we sat together -for one day. Gene was the first to be sent to the cloak room for talking too much. That made Gene cry, but his tears made me laugh, which put me next in line for banishment to the cloak room.

Actually, Mrs. Hibbard made my day. From the cloak room I could peer around the corner at the class and make outrageous faces. My favorite move was to attack myself with one hand which seemed to come out of nowhere and attempt to strangle me.

That comedy routine was short-lived because my giggling classmates caused Mrs. Hibbard to look around and catch me in the act of being a class clown.

"That will go into your permanent record," she'd say, then send me to the principal's office. There I'd sit for the longest time until the principal's secretary ushered me into "the big guy's office," where I got a couple of whacks with a wooden paddle. Teachers could do that back then. Properly punished, I was sent back to

class. I knew a note would be placed in my permanent record.

One of my favorite things to do during class was shoot down German airplanes. In those days, boys used a sheet of white paper to draw enemy airplanes with swastikas on the wing tips. Then we put the paper on the floor, and would "dive-bomb" the planes with ink.

Now remember, this was 1940. We were using real ink pens, the kind you dip into inkwells. With the nib fully loaded with ink (our ammunition) we'd aim at an enemy plane and drop the pen. We always knew if we hit our target. The airplane was well marked with an ink splatter. So was the floor underneath.

We kids never seemed to understand that the ink-loaded pens pierced the paper and stuck in the wooden floor. There were other ink stains throughout the room, but the floor under my desk looked like the Battle of Britain.

"Disgraceful," was how Mrs. Hibbard described it, "that'll go into your permanent record."

She had a way of dealing with my anti-aircraft episodes. Every now and then I was told to be at school on a Saturday morning. Saturday? There's no school on Saturday. But for me there was.

The purpose of these Saturday morning specials was for me to sandpaper and steel wool the ink stains on the floor under my desk. Those chores didn't chill my attacks on the German Air Force for long. Saturday morning sanding parties were a regular part of my early education. Each incident, of course, went into my permanent record.

On a more serious level, Mrs. Hibbard regarded reading as one of the most important elements of education. She read to the class every day, illustrating the point of the prose whenever possible.

One day, reading from Robert Browning, Mrs. Hibbard read the word embrace. "Class, what does the word embrace mean?" she asked. Most of us knew but no self-respecting boy would dare use such a word in public.

After a moment of silence, Mrs. Hibbard walked over to my desk and threw her arms around my neck, saying, "I embrace Bobby!"

In my mind, Mrs. Hibbard's illustration did more damage to my social career than anything. During recess that day I heard such teasing as, "Bobby loves Mrs. Hibbard..."

A hug from Mrs. Hibbard seemed worse than a kiss from the Godfather. I prayed that incident wouldn't go into my permanent record.

Looking back many years later, I believe that Mrs. Hibbard really cared about me as badly behaved as I sometimes was. One Friday afternoon she told me to be at the front door of her apartment Saturday morning at 10 am sharp. When I arrived, she handed me a bucket containing soap powder and a brush. We walked around to the side street where her car was parked, and she instructed me to "make it shine." Later I was paid 24¢, got a pat on the head, and told to go straight home. In 1940, that quarter paid for two movies and a near lifetime supply of bulk candy.

Throughout the year I was worried because I knew my poor conduct had hurt my grades, and I feared having to repeat the fifth grade. But on the last day of class Mrs. Hibbard walked over to my desk and informed me that I had been promoted. What great news. Then she said she had a surprise for me. "In the sixth grade, I will be your teacher -isn't that grand?" I'm thinking, "Grand? Yeah, about as grand as stepping into a nest of copperheads."

Many years later, when I applied for Social Security, I watched impatiently as the clerk scrolled through my work record. She stopped abruptly saying, "I'm looking at your permanent record - I'm sorry, Mr. Ford, but there's a note here from Mrs. Hibbard!"