I recall from my long-ago school days a master of mine making me stand before my third-form mates after some perceived outrage during my translation of Cicero. “Smythe-Brown, you are a fool,” he said, gripping me by an ear.
“Yes, sir,” I replied nervously.
“ What are you, boy?” the master bellowed while folding my appendage harshly.
“A fool, sir!” I said, dropping to my knees in pain.
“Then get out of my sight, cretin!” Whereupon he kicked me in the rear end with one of his size 15s, out the door.
Can one imagine that today? Hardly. That was the “normal” at my all-male boarding school in the early 1950s. Now a wet compress would be applied to my temple and several pills slipped into my young throat to clear up any phobias I might have acquired because of poor genes. Then I would be questioned on possible transgender leanings. It is all very different today, to be sure.
In fact a streak of madness has descended upon us. Not many mornings arrive without more shocking news of 14-year-old boys who purport to be in congress with their married female teachers. This appears to be a growing trend and needs watching. What is even more incredible is that often the women involved are extremely attractive.
Several mems at the club come right out and say they are jealous of these “injured” boys caught in the Venus flytrap of older women who take advantage. I am shocked, of course, by that, as I cannot imagine any woman, much less one who is a “bit of all right,” being interested in young boys when I was one of them.
For a start, most of us chewed nervously on our ties so they were always disgustingly moist and stuck to our blazers. Also it was a dermatologist’s Promised Land as far as cratered skin and well-scratched acne was concerned. Many of us were walking petri dishes.
Even our loving parents were startled by the sight of us as they arrived to take us home. My father refused to have me in the front seat and on more than one occasion I was ordered to lie on the floor in the back and cover myself with a rug. I am sure that had a lasting effect on poor Nigel.
The women such as they were at school, as we had no teachers of the female persuasion, were the maids, who tended to be imported Polish women who smelled bad and one or two school nurses, depending on how strong their stomachs were.
There was a master’s wife I recall who was a delicious sort, but she kept out of our way and had the look of something hunted by 400 boys, which was understandable. There was another master’s daughter who was incredibly ugly, but by half-way through the school year took on the beauty of the goddess Diana to all the desperate boys.
One friend of mine actually kissed her after promising to marry her but came to his senses and reneged, at which point she kicked him in the shins and told her father, from whom my friend got “six of the juiciest” for his daughter’s hurt feelings. So there was not much choice, if you see what I mean.
I discovered years later that our school dietician, Betty North, had a few liaisons with one or two of the prefects of my day, which I find other-worldly even now; we called her “Sweaty Betty” for a reason. However as the year dragged on, some of these boys were broken on the hormone wheel and went mad, and so became enamoured of the semi-willing Betty, the woman of the damp underarms.
I can quite understand that 14-year-olds of today cannot help boasting of their exploits concerning attractive teachers, but in my day no one said anything about succeeding with the durable Miss North, who was in her late 40s at the time, as that would not have been a badge of honour, so she was safe from detection. I have heard that a few of her student suitors went off the deep end upon graduating. One or two took up the cloth while others developed eye ticks and still others spoke gibberish incessantly and were confined to attics by their shocked families.
I think it best to leave the teachers alone and concentrate on translating Cicero. Much safer for the young and gentle mind.
Copyright Christopher Dalton 2015
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