PAULETTE SOUTHWORTH’S BABY GIRL IS THE PRINCIPAL OF PINER MIDDLE SCHOOL IN SHERMAN, TEXAS

     My 50th high school reunion is coming up in October in Sherman, Texas and I (as always) have mixed emotions.  It is nice to see old friends, but bushels of them have died or fallen off the face of the earth

and disappeared.  This causes me to pause over the enormity of life’s relationships, eternity and what we can actually accomplish in our allotted time here on earth.  One minute you are a pre-teen knuckle-head kid in elementary school, attempting to figure out life, making friends and establishing relationships.  The next moment, you are an almost 70-year-old knucklehead grandparent, your friends seem to be vanishing and you are still hoping to figure out life.  What is going on?  It is all too fast!  I want to nurture the good memories to savor as I age and to lessen the impact of those unpleasant events still lodged in my psyche.

     Scheduled events for the weekend include tours of our old high school building (now housing Piner Middle School) and the original Piner Jr. High building on King Street.  On the surface this struck me as terrifying.   

     High school was OK…I enjoyed most of my teachers and administrators, where today’s Piner Middle School is located.  However, my DNA is all over the old King Street, former Piner location,  which undoubtably has my blood stains and brain matter still stuck to the walls.  Frightened memories abound and the name “PINER WILDCATS”, in green and white still strikes terror into my heart.    

     My remembrances of the old Piner - King Street location are like a black and white prison movie…no colors.  A lot of shades of grey… and not an abundance of cheerfulness.  The male teachers and

administrators were stern, unsmiling and didn’t seem to want to be there.  I was flogged on a regular basis and while I usually deserved it, there was no good will or perceived “correction” associated with the interaction.  It was strictly punishment and I felt like I was incarcerated.

     I would get thrashed in high school, but Mr. Onley, our Vice-Principal, would do it with jocularity and ask what it was going to take to keep me on the straight and narrow.  “Come on, you’re better than this…if you are going to sign your mother’s name to an excuse, do a more credible job than writing ‘my mom’…show some creativity.”    

     Mr. Carpenter, our Principal, wouldn’t even whack me…he whacked the desk, made a big show, with a lot of noise for those outside his office and sent me back to class.  “Please, please…quit talking in class, calm down…come on, your killing me here, Bucky.”     I felt it was all with good will and they actually liked me.

     I rarely saw our Principal at Piner.  But, you knew he was behind that massive door…it was more like you knew there was a warden back there.  When he was visible, he was always unsmiling, buttoned down and grey…suspicious and foreboding.  He and all of his henchmen appeared threatening and I felt I was on the verge of being beaten up at any moment.    

     However, now I AM looking forward to touring Piner Middle school and basking in the glow of a new day!  Instead of cranky old white men running the school, Piner has a lovely young woman at the helm.  This creative educator is Amy Ferman Porter and is the daughter of fellow 1968 SHS graduate, Paulette Southworth Ferman and her husband Roger.  From the video explaining the Piner Wildcats are now the Bearcats, I saw Amy as an engaging, articulate educator, who makes middle school a worthwhile, enjoyable experience.  She is a 180

degree change from my “chain-gang” memories.    She undoubtably gets this attitude from her folks, who are a couple of my favorite humans and loved by all.  (I actually escorted Amy’s mom to our graduation prom in 1968.  When I picked her up at her home, her brother offered the opinion my haircut was reminiscent of Hitler’s.)

     

     I was a regular at the Piner “after school program” and spent as much time in detention, as I did in class.  With Amy’s “breath of fresh air” attitude,  one senses school can actually be what it is supposed to be…a terrific, enjoyable learning experience.  I believe even a potential “John Dillinger Scholar” such as myself would have achieved a more worthwhile middle school education under the guidance of someone like Mrs. Porter.

     I hope other schools get the benefit of nurturing,  intelligent women to direct their educational curriculum.  I am married to a former “school marm” and believe women’s innate abilities make them better than most men to lead education.  (I have also experienced first hand, women are as good, if not better than men in politics, business leadership, ministry and medicine…but that is another topic.)

     So I plan to enjoy the 50th reunion, taking the scheduled tours of the schools and seeing my  friends who are still alive and can attend.  I have ordered a special “alumni” shirt for my stroll thru Piner and down memory lane.  Piner is no longer the green and white Wildcats, but the maroon and white Bearcats!  This will all enhance the total exorcising of my demons from the halls of Piner Middle School, thanks to Ms. Amy, her mama who gave her to us, and the (thankfully) evolving Sherman Independent School system.