Gotta Be In American History

Free AI web copilot to create summaries, insights and extended knowledge, download it at here

1045

Abstract

y titled Paul DeVere, with my name in the upper corner.I cut class after that.The school was the Jakarta International School, and being International, it catered to several systems of education: Baccalaureate; O Levels/ A Levels; and American SATs, and maybe others, but me, I was in the American stream, as my step-father was American.The American kids made up at least half the school, and they were snobs. They didn’t mix with the rest of us. The school events were exclusively from the American tradition — Sadie Hawkins, Proms, yearbooks, and big dramatic productions of American musicals, whose cast was always exclusively American. The rest of us were lucky if we made it into the Chorus. If you weren’t American, you weren’t Cool, and you weren’t In.Ji Hee Kim’s brother and I won the Senior Dance contest, but the American couple who came second acted like they came first, and the school photographer ignored us completely. The yearbook featured them, a-glittered and

Options

a-gloating, cutting the cake they won.My friends, all girls, were Korean, Japanese, Yugoslavian, Australian, Iraqi, and French. But I had developed a huge crush on an Indonesian-American girl, and — as you do if it is 1975 and you are not out to yourself as a lesbian— I transferred that crush onto her boyfriend, Scott.Well, Scott was in my American History class. I started showing up there again, and it was not because I cared that I had to have a credit in American History in order to graduate. No, it was to feed my addiction to catching sight of Scott. My journal was filled with ecstatic entries of each sighting, each word he spoke, each look he (maybe) threw my way. Any detail that might be spun to show he was even aware of my name, I spun it.The thread was wearing thin. Hence my renewed attendance to the only class we had in common, about a month before the end of the year.Tell me, please, how, but how, did I get a B for American History?</article></body>

Or else you won’t graduate

Map of The States (Photo property of author)

Mrs. Krimpoltz, first day of term in 12th grade American History, told the class to draw a map of the USA, and to label the states we knew. We got busy, — some busier than others— and when time was up, she collected our maps. Then she held mine up to show the class, and they laughed so hysterically that one clown fell off his chair.

My USA looked like a creature half frog, half turkey, and only its leg was labelled: Florida.

I was mortified.

I was so mortified that the next week, when Mrs. Krimpoltz called on me to read out my homework essay on Paul DeVere, I said I hadn’t done it. She was standing right behind me, and the only thing on my desk was a handwritten three-page essay titled Paul DeVere, with my name in the upper corner.

I cut class after that.

The school was the Jakarta International School, and being International, it catered to several systems of education: Baccalaureate; O Levels/ A Levels; and American SATs, and maybe others, but me, I was in the American stream, as my step-father was American.

The American kids made up at least half the school, and they were snobs. They didn’t mix with the rest of us. The school events were exclusively from the American tradition — Sadie Hawkins, Proms, yearbooks, and big dramatic productions of American musicals, whose cast was always exclusively American. The rest of us were lucky if we made it into the Chorus. If you weren’t American, you weren’t Cool, and you weren’t In.

Ji Hee Kim’s brother and I won the Senior Dance contest, but the American couple who came second acted like they came first, and the school photographer ignored us completely. The yearbook featured them, a-glittered and a-gloating, cutting the cake they won.

My friends, all girls, were Korean, Japanese, Yugoslavian, Australian, Iraqi, and French. But I had developed a huge crush on an Indonesian-American girl, and — as you do if it is 1975 and you are not out to yourself as a lesbian— I transferred that crush onto her boyfriend, Scott.

Well, Scott was in my American History class. I started showing up there again, and it was not because I cared that I had to have a credit in American History in order to graduate. No, it was to feed my addiction to catching sight of Scott. My journal was filled with ecstatic entries of each sighting, each word he spoke, each look he (maybe) threw my way. Any detail that might be spun to show he was even aware of my name, I spun it.

The thread was wearing thin. Hence my renewed attendance to the only class we had in common, about a month before the end of the year.

Tell me, please, how, but how, did I get a B for American History?