At the end of first class, when we tiny creatures finally managed to learn all the letters of the "alfabet" / the ABC of the Romanian language, there was always a big end of the year school event organized by the class teacher. Back than, I started school at 7 years old, had the same teacher for the four years of primary stage and after that move on to secondary stage, where there would be a teacher for each subject. And as you can imagine,there was a special bond between us and our teacher of four years. I pretty much adored my primary teacher. She got to teach me and my both sisters,twelve years in a row, she was part family you may say, but I ve always been her preferred. I was lucky I can say, the studious good pupil, rarely got into trouble at the time, would wake up at 4 am if I had something to finish off for the day. I wish I am like that now, but no, I got lazier.
And this end of year "party" meant an unofficial competition between teachers, because the whole school got to hear and talk about it: there were small role plays and various acts carried on by each of us, than a big buffet with so many of our mothers home made sweets for us to munch on .
The main play at the end of my first class was "The Four Seasons" play. Only us, four fortunate girls out of the whole class, got to act as season princesses. After much deliberation I got to be the Winter Princess. I wanted badly to be Winter, in my eyes I could easily be the "prettiest", a fairy like the ones you get to see in fairy tales books.
Mum and dad were so proud I got the role, and I remember my mum loosing a couple of nights sleep over my princess dress. She bought white silk and shinny ribbons and half a meter tulle and tailored the dress herself. She even smashed a couple of Christmas balls to add sparkle to the bottom of my dress She cut a beautiful veil out of the tulle and added smashed sparkle to that too. She gave me a magic wand: a wooden stick covered in metallic foil with a small star at the end. Cheeky me, I would threaten my younger brothers that I can transform them into small animals if they mess with this princess!
Oh, and the nerves before the day! I would not sleep at night until I knew my part by heart/ but than again, I kept on being like this all throughout my studying years.
The show was a success. Every primary teacher in the school came congratulate us. We were little VIPs, back than, when the word was not invented yet. The whole school and ten blocks around got to see my Winter Princess dress.
I sure was the pretties princess and everybody got to compliment my dress.
Those were happy days, when my dad was still home and we had no idea how sick he was... I have already gotten the First Prize Award for the year a few days before the party and he was the proudest dad around. He would carry me on his shoulders and be so loud in his happiness. I did not know back than how precious those moments were. I sure know now.
There s no such thing as proper winter here ....and I miss snow as much as I miss vitamin D. When Brandon was around eighteen months old, we spent Christmas back home...he does not remember that....but many years later, when he was 11, we traveled to Romania in February and he got a proper feel of it. He would sit on the windowsill of my sister's living room, only to look at how it snowed, amazed and taking it all in, the beautiful view of the streets, the main park and the stadium, all getting whiter by the minute. And when we did go out, our noses getting red and I could not stop him throwing snow at us and hiding snow under his jacket ,just so he could bring it in the house and make a mess- like I used to back in the day. I told him how winters were when my dad was around: we could simply step in our home through the window, that s how thick the snow got. My dad would look at us playing in the snow, than pick me up through the apartment' window, put a kiss on my frozen cheek and take me inside. Moments I will never forget. I wish Brandon lived these special short times I did. But I am happy he did get to love winter. Because for me at least, snow provokes responses that reach right back to childhood.
No comments:
Post a Comment