Bio Lessons

     So in ninth grade biology I wanted to get a good grade, but the material was hard for me to grasp. I did okay, but no where near 100 on the final. Oh, my gosh, I just now remembered that Dad had said he took the biology regents exam back when he was in high school, and he got an 89% on it. My goal was then to do better than 89! – can you imagine me being in a brain competition with Dad? And I didn't beat the 89 after all, coming up with something more like 82. Good thing I never told him I was trying to beat his score!

     My biology teacher was Mrs. Fugle. I do not recall any anecdotes other than I think it was this class that I missed the worm dissection one day because I was absent – and I had to make it up after school. I had the workbook out and a pegboard and a worm and some pins along with dissecting tools. I followed the instructions in the book, squeamish the whole time about violating this worm. When I handed the board back to Mrs. Fugle, she looked at the pinned worm and told me I had not cut into it at all! How about that – I had seen all the internal organs and other stuff without even getting under its skin!

     Oh gosh – competing with Dad, he who had all the hardships of childhood and I who had all the advantages, and losing, and dissecting a worm with no clue whatsoever – what embarrassing memories!

     Mrs. Fugle lived not too far from the school in Hamburg, and at one point during the school year, she had a pool party at her home for her biology classes. I'm sure it was not during the school day – maybe it was on a Saturday toward the end of the school year because it was warm enough for swimming!

     I was wearing a two piece bathing suit at the party as were all the females – so I was as inconspicuous as possible, or so I thought. All of a sudden, two of the boys, and I do remember their names, grabbed me – one took my arms and the other got my feet, and they carried me from the patio down to the pool and threw me in! I was screaming the whole time. I didn't think I had been obnoxious at the party (until being carried to the pool!) – but who knows, were they mad at me and decided to throw me in? Nobody tried to stop them despite my screams, and not any of them would have known for sure if I could swim or not – was it that every last one of them hated me so much they would be okay with my drowning?

Maybe they liked me, and this was their way of getting my attention? No, that was probably the least likely scenario.

     After they threw me in the pool, the two young men walked away with big smiles. The truth of the matter was that they had decided that anyone who had not already been in the pool needed to go into the water at least once.

     All in good fun.

     Biology and life's curiosities!

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