Thank You Mrs. Austin

My guess is that Mrs. Austin is still beautiful, even after 40+ years. Mrs. Austin was my fifth grade teacher at Fort Shafter Elementary School in Hawaii. She wore her pretty brown hair in a 1960s up-do that, in my 10-year-old fashionista opinion, looked so sophisticated. Fifth grade wasn't a great year. My best friend Florida Sunshine, who was a year younger, moved back to the Mainland. Without a friend to pal around with at recess, I was easily frustrated at school. Things didn't go well for me. The class voted on class librarian, and I lost to a popular girl who didn't like books near as much as I did. Also, I couldn't get the yarn on Ruby's head to look like hair. Ruby was a fabric and styrofoam ball puppet. I wanted her to sport long flowing brown hair with a snappy center part. I wanted her to look 10 times better than the popular girl/librarian's puppet. I got a gooey glue mess. Her blond-hair puppet Opal looked great. Fifth grade was also the year I started wearing glasses. I was glad to get them because I really couldn't see the blackboard. But glasses added one more strike against me. Now I was the short, left-handed girl with glasses. Getting picked for teams pretty much meant I was last. I cried a lot in fifth grade. That embarrassment was written in ink on my report card. Clearly I wasn't the class favorite, but Mrs. Austin was my favorite. I remember her as beautiful and after a year of being in her class, I'm pretty sure the beauty went way beyond skin-deep. She put up with me and my whines. She also taught whatever fifth graders learn to a whole class of military brats suffering through being 10- and 11-year-olds in uncertain times. Thank you Mrs. Austin.