During my childhood, I was afforded the opportunity to attend a prominent preparatory school located in Montego Bay. During my tenure I exceled as most of us that age did; the work was easier and the term deadline was non-existent. Fast forward into Grade 6, where things got real serious because of GSAT. This was the time to settle down and show what you have. The fear of failing, the potential embarrassment of yourself and family name, the pressure was on. I approached this grade very different in the beginning, I was focused, I joined extra evening classes, and no it wasn’t because a girl I liked was going there too but anyways, serious time. Somewhere down the line, the focus disappeared and I drifted… I started to hang around the labelled “troublemakers” of my class. They seemed cool at the time, the girls were always with them and well it was never a dull moment with them, or so I thought.
One eventful day, the teachers were forced to take drastic measures, why? We got out of hand, honestly looking back, we were horrible, I won’t go in details, but the girls who were showcasing puberty early hated us most of all. So the teachers and principal called our parents in, I imagine the conversation going like “Hello Ms. Oc***, We need you to come the school immediately.” If I know my mother well, she asked why and apparently the teachers refused to say why. Side note, the teachers did not let us, the students, know that they were in fact calling our parents.
One by one each of my friends’ parents arrived at the class disappointed and weary of us, the culprits. Some of them were scolded, humiliated, taken home, we all knew what they meant when they said “home” too; it was painful to watch. The intensity and overall anger level of the parents went through the roof when my mother arrived. To list everything in a perfect chronological order, she arrived, she listened quietly to the teachers and principal remarks all whilst giving me no form of eye contact. Once she was finished listening, the tears started to flow, hers, not mine, not yet for that matter. During all this, I’m just sitting in my chair, picturing my funeral, and how I wanted everyone in cheerful colours. After the tears, came the shouting and scolding and then silence. It is at this point, I held my head on my desk, embarrassed beyond belief. A couple minutes later I decide to hold my head up and to my disbelief, there she was, my mother removing a black leather belt from her purse; it was folded ever so neatly. She struck me one, the entire class gasped and that I explains why, when I gasped, it felt like there was no air left in the room. I twisted approximately 175° degrees in the chair as my skin caught on fire. The second blow was similar to that of Serena Williams in a final, so much so that the belt broke against my back and fell on the ground. She left immediately after and the second most embarrassing thing I had to endure after that ordeal was picking up the weapon used in the act. The tears flowed even harder after I held it in my hand. The teacher wanted to smile, I am 100% sure of it. Surprisingly none of my classmates laughed, I was actually comforted by some of them. I knew what I had done, I knew that I wasn’t the David she grew so well, I knew that the rest of that week would be stressing and finally I knew what I had to do.
The moral of this story is that you should always be mindful of the company you keep, it may come to define who you are and you may fatally adapt their traits or become even worse. Also to dishonour your parents is one of the worst feelings in this world. I was always a reserved
True Identity 