Culottes

 

David Sedaris has been professing his love of culottes.  In interviews, my favorite author tells of his love through words such as "stylish" and "comfortable".  The garments aren't new - the term was used by the French in the 18th century refers to breeches that buttoned at the knee, according to Wikipedia. 

Being born in the early 1960s, I remember culottes as a clothing staple that girls and women wore in the 1965-1970 era.   Back then, the culottes I remember were garments that were above the knee, but the shorts were hidden behind an apron of fabric in the front (and sometimes the back) of like material.   

More freeing than a skirt, but more formal than shorts, these skirts were especially popular with the mothers who were you, who golfed, or played tennis.  The store, to the pool and to watch Ed Sullivan. 

I saw them everywhere but two places - temple, because you always wore your best to temple, and at school. 

Shaker, like most public schools, had a dress code. And ours at our elementary included the then-standard "no jeans" rule.  But for girls, culottes were a big no-no in kindergarten and first grade.  That was spelled out on the ditto sent home to parents, and lectured by Alice Van Dusen, the beloved principal of the school. 

And back then, no meant no. If some said no, you didn't do it. Unless you were a certain girl with a first name of "T" who was clearly the bully in our classes.  

One of my friends was a girl named Mary Beth Healy, and Mary Beth rolled out of your mouth as "Marybeth".  I loved her because she was kind, but she was her own person. If so and so didn't want to sit next to Mary Beth, then someone else was happy to do so.  She always had friends. 

We made it through Kindergarten, but because I had been tracked into a regrettable whole language experiment called ITA in kindergarten, our first-grade classrooms had the same children as the kindergarten classes that were taught by a wonderful woman named Mrs. Bauter.  Mrs. Bauter's children were funneled into the class of another saintly woman, Mrs. Smiley.  Her job was to get us back onto English leave the whole language behind. 

Mrs. Smiley was a dear, and no one dared to say a word else wise.  She never had to deal with anyone sassing her. 

So when the year was winding down were told at the beginning of the last week of school that since it was mid-June, on the last day of school, we could wear shorts.  

And that was a big deal. 

Then on the second to last day of school, Mary Beth Healy showed up in culottes.  Deep pink culottes.

And they were the type that had a front flap only. 

"You aren't allowed to wear them," we said - as if she had just committed a high crime of some sort.

Marybeth was non-plussed.  Ever the cool cookie, she simply said "We're moving after school."

For the rest of the day, all eyes were on her.  In those days, Shaker students in grade school went home for lunch.  When I got home, I told my mother "Mary Beth Healy wore culottes today, and they're not allowed at school!"

My mother took a drag off her Kent cigarette, blew the smoke up into the high kitchen air, and said "People aren't supposed to speed, but everyone drives a couple miles over the limit." 

Since I was and still am a literalist, the whole comparison was lost on me. I ate my bologna sandwich and soon became engrossed in what Pixie and Dixie were doing to Jinx the cat. 

Back in school, Mrs. Smiley told us to "come sit on the floor Indian style" - a term that no one uses anymore, but that was what she said. And we gathered around her, and at that moment, she caught a look at the shorts under the material flap on Mary Beth's Culottes.  

Mary Beth stood, as directed, turned around, and Mrs. Smiley said, you can sit down - they look more like a skirt.  She had won in our mind.  I don't think it was ever her idea to be a rebel - I think that there was a lot going on at her house in preparation for the move and she wore what she was going to wear. 

"I knew she wouldn't send me home," she reasoned. 

At the end of the day, Mrs. Smiley reminded us that we could wear shorts (no cut-off or anything ragged) and we all went home. 

The next day, which was a half-day, there was no Mary Beth.  Evidently, when she said her family was moving after school, they were moving after the second to last day of school. 

And it was also Mrs. Smiley's last day of school as well. She was ending her teaching career.  I don't any of us had an idea in our head that we would never see her, or even Mary Beth again, but that's how six years old sometimes think when they are insulated from the finality of a goodbye that won't be undone.

I often wonder what happened to Grace Smiley, I hope her time after teaching was full and enriching.  She was by far my favorite teacher.  After first grade, the affection I felt for my grade school teachers declined every year.  The last, an old battle-ax named Maxine Brown was a horrible old yeti, and that feeling is evidently shared by a number of us that year. 

But Mary Beth Healy remains an utter mystery. 

If you are out there Mary Beth, you have been missed.  Let me know how you are doing.  We have a lot to catch up on.