A Southerner’s first day in a Minnesota school

Tell us about your first day at something — school, work, as a parent, etc.

We have lots of first days of school. If you started in kindergarten and graduated high school, you’d have 13 first days. If you were lucky enough to stay in the same school district then those first days gave you butterflies. If like me you moved a lot and changed schools then you didn’t get butterflies, you got bats.

Butterflies, to me, express excitement tinged with a little nervousness. Bats however are nothing but fear.

When we moved from Oklahoma to Minnesota it was in the middle of fourth grade. Completely unaware of having a southern accent, I was shocked and humiliated when the class made fun of the way I spoke. The teacher even joined in. (Bullying was considered normal childhood behavior). The staff wanted to send my sister to speech therapy!!

This affected me a lot and is probably the reason going anywhere I have not been before brings me back to bats in the tummy.

After that experience, I quickly lost my southern accent. To this day, even after 40 years in Texas, I refuse to use ya’ll. I monitor my speech and when I hear something I’ve said that sounds southern, I quickly correct myself.

Firsts are scary and can alter us for a lifetime.