The book was confiscated for good five years before I became bold enough to ask for it. My friend and I had spent a whole week on tenterhooks. My mother played well on my fear by doing absolutely nothing.
No sex education was given, no calls were made to my friend's mother or teacher met. Instead I was given the silent treatment along with pointed looks. My father and siblings remained oblivious to the tension between my mother and me.
Time passed slowly but surely, and I finally received my sex education by pouring over the Britannica Encyclopedia set that I received as a birthday gift a month later.
Enlightenment dawned on me soon enough, and I made sure I shared it with my fellow friends the next day, and the word spread to other classes soon enough. I enjoyed the status of a minor celebrity for the rest of the year.
I was the Miss Know-it-all till one fine day the nuns got a whiff that we knew "stuff," and were given Sex Education a grade earlier. We knew that the penis went into the vagina and about orgasms, but it came as a shock when Sister Rose dressed a banana with a condom and passed packets for us to check out.
We were told about contraceptives, about boys wanting only one thing from girls, and how romantic relationships impregnated girls, destroyed career plans—not to mention the social stigma that accompanied a sullied reputation.
Romantic books were said to be as distractive and corrupting as the opposite sex, and we had regular raids in our classes to make sure we weren't having illegal transactions.
But no amount of corporal punishment, swollen calves and knuckles, stopped the barter; if nothing else we became creative in our hiding places. Our bags had false bottoms. I had made a slit in my coat where about ten books were hidden when we had a surprise raid, and my fellow mates were eternally grateful for coming to their aid.
Boys naturally followed, as curiosity and age made us test the boundaries marked by our parents and teachers.
Article comments
1 - DrPat
she screamed my name in a loud, truly dissed voice...
Did you mean distressed? Or that she felt "dismissed" or "disdained" by your choice of reading?
Not having had the advantage of attending an all-girls school [grin], I can tell you that my singular "forbidden" read was Nevil Schute's Trustee from the Toolroom. Once I read that, and could see no reason for it to be on the prohibited books list, I never looked back.
2 - swingingpuss
Don't diss me, man!
diss, dis (-ss-)
verb {T} US SLANG
to speak or behave rudely to someone or to show them no respect:
Perhaps she was distressed, and after her scolding, I was dissed:)
Must read the Shute - haven't
What worlds our books weave!
3 - Bennett
After all these years, I finally get the inside skinny on coming of age in an all girls school. Thanks swingingpuss! Fun reading. :-]
4 - Temple Stark
Aaaah, a girls's first love.
I skimmed right over that and read dissed as pissed.
Why did the Nuns instruct about condoms. That's a Catholic no-no or ..... ?
Well read. Well told. Well Well.
5 - swingingpuss
Not only did the nuns talk about condoms but also other forms of contraceptives and before we passed out of school they had an OB-GYN come and talk to us and that lady was a hardcore feminist.
I later taught in another Catholic School for about two years and was told by the nuns there that my school nuns were rather 'forward and controversial in their thinking'.
And by the way Temple not every girl's first love are books:)
6 - Temple Stark
I was just riffing on the "fun" nun stereotypes and wondering.
>And by the way Temple not every girl's first love are books:)
Father ........... forgive me for i have sinned.
7 - swingingpuss
Lol, if you are gonna open the pandora's box... we had a Catholic Boys school next door and were used to seeing priests coming out of the nuns quaters early morning...obviously it was perfectly innocent, confessions followed by breakfast but then again we knew who the favorite priests were as some of them graced our assemblies too often and had beaming nuns looking up to them.
8 - Temple Stark
Pandora's box is very nice. Warm. Overflowing. Effusive. Easy to open really, I'm not sure of all the fuss.
...
Can there be a more hormone-charge area than a Catholic boys and girls school next door?
Give me nuclear radiation fallout any day instead. OK .. maybe not.
9 - Shark
Nice piece, Puss.
(May I call you "Puss"?)
It's very interesting to see behind the Iron Curtain of Adolescent Gender Histories.
I can't remember my first 'dirty' book, (we liked to look at the lingerie ads in the Sears catalog, this was ca. early 1960s!) -- but I do remember the first stirrings in my loins:
Miss Powers, *third grade teacher, South Hills elementary.
(*Wow, is that too early?)
10 - Shark
BTW: Some psychologist might find it significant that I can't remember what I had for breakfast this morning, but I can remember my third grade teacher's name and the precise shape of her butt as she wrote on the blackboard.
Oy.
11 - swingingpuss
Sure Shark, puss sounds just fine.
It is funny how hormones helps us remember certain memories down to the smallest details... I remember a whole bunch of first times...first crush when I was five, my first kiss and I even remember the date when 'it' finally happened ;)
12 - Temple Stark
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The shape of your teacher's behind Shark? Hmmmm. :-)