Chapter Seventeen - SMA: Winter '74

Let it Snow

I remember very clearly the first time it snowed while I was at SMA. It started late, around midnight, and I couldn't sleep. The steam radiators in our rooms were from the 19th century, and you could hear them getting ready to warm up for a half hour before they actually started working. It sounded like several guys were walking around in the walls with ball peen hammers, sending incoherent Morse code messages to one another. Then the endlessly painted-over old radiator would start hissing, and eventually it would come up to a certain temperature and stop. What temperature that was varied from room to room. It could be just above refrigerator all the way to sauna. Then the whole works would come to a shuddering stop, pipes clanking as they cooled, until the Trolls in the steam room turned the works back on again.

(top)South Barracks/Sally Port (bottom) Asphalt/North Barracks


I lay there listening to my roomies snore from up on the top bunk. It was right by the window, so I got a nice cross breeze from the draft mixed in with the occasional warm gust. My window faced out over Flagpole Hill, where I saw the silhouette of the pole and the ever-vigilant cannon that protected us from Townie invasion. It was pretty dark, but lights from the owner's home and the town lights reflected against the cloudy sky showed the Hill in dark relief. As I stared out the window I noticed that grayish blots were floating past. Looking closer I saw them sticking to the ground and falling thickly. "Hey!" I said. "Hey, it's snowing!" The other guys woke groggily and looked outside. For some reason I was incredibly excited. I had to get dressed right away and get out in it. Only problem was, we weren't allowed out of our rooms after Taps unless we were going to the bathroom. I could hear other guys out in the Quad, scooping up snow and tossing around snowballs, but before anything really got started one of the faculty officers came out and sent them all back to their rooms. I lay in my rack watching as the Hill turned whiter and whiter.

On any other morning back in the Real World I would have been listening to the radio to see if school was closed for a snow day. That just didn't happen at a boarding school. Our classrooms were right across the Quad or just a short walk away, albeit on some very slippery brick walks. There were "rubbers" we could wear on our dress shoes to keep from sliding all the way into town but the damn things really messed up the shine. And it was a lot more fun to ski from place to place. I was standing outside the sally port to South Barracks talking to a classmate when Mike Jeck from C Company yelled "Hey Newbegin, heads up!" Like a fool I did look up in time to see the snowball he had just thrown smack me right in the left eye. These memories are golden.

The Dating Scene

In my first Fall at school I met a nice girl from Stuart Hall named Bernie. We went out a few times and I got the idea of how things worked at an all-girl school. The young man desiring to take a girl out on a date had to come to the parlor and present himself, announcing who he was there to see. The young lady would be summoned and any interactions carefully monitored while the couple was in the parlor. We were allowed to escort the ladies around town, but I really didn't do much of that. I dated one other girl, Diane Green. She was funny, vivacious, smart. And black. That didn't go over well with a few of the guys at school, most notably Ratcliff. I couldn't prove that he was the one who painted "Nigger Lover" on my door with Cadet liquid, but it's unlikely to have been anyone else. As a coda to his story, he was never promoted past corporal and left the school in tears that Fall. I'm sure like most of us he has seen the error of his ways and found gainful employment, maybe in the law enforcement field.

One day I was doing Guard Duty in the octagonal building at South Barracks known as the guard hut. It was a boring weekday and I was doing homework or napping. The phone rang, which surprised me since I had never heard it ring before. Turns out it was a rollover line if the main phones were busy. A young woman's voice asked me what time the parade started on Sunday. We talked for a while and I started to realize that she thought I was pretty interesting. too. After I found out she was 23 I was thinking "Wow! Older woman!" It took a little convincing to get her to meet with me but she finally told me where we could go for a soda. That afternoon I went to the little cafe and sat waiting, anticipating....what? Well, let's find out, man. Finally she walked up to the table. I looked up, smiled and said "Hi" to a young lady with a very nice personality. That's the universal code for plain and overweight. We sat and talked, but she could tell I was less than enthused about being there. Yes, I was a shallow boy who had much higher expectations of this experience. We parted with no plans for another time. While I was relieved to be going back I still felt disappointed with myself for being so obviously callous.

The last girl I dated was the daughter of the Commandant's secretary. She was a lovely young girl with passion to spare. I took her to the Senior Ball and we didn't dance much. We found the darkest corner of the gym and remained stuck together at the lips for most of the dance. Eventually a chaperon came over and admonished us to knock off the PDA or the evening would be over immédiatement. The picture shows us looking just a tad disheveled, and it makes me cringe just a little bit every time I see it.



Christmas

Finals went well, I was off the "needs to be watched" radar and I had been promoted to Staff Sergeant. Now home for Christmas and no hassles from the folks. Some partying with my buddies, old and new, and damn near killed myself once more, spinning out on black ice. The car spun three or four times and ended up facing the right way on a clear patch with no oncoming traffic. It's a wonder I made it to 18.