Old Haunts

Sadie by Ron Smith

Ah, Halloween…does any grownup remember the thrill of anticipation all day long? Especially if the holiday fell on a school night and you were corralled in an over-warm classroom as Miss Kaser (Sadie) droned on about the deplorable living conditions in Czechoslovakia after the “big” war.

           "2:35,” I thought to myself, glancing at the clock above the classroom door, “twenty-five more minutes…”

“What then, Ronald, is the capitol of Czechoslovakia?” She was looking right at me; everyone was. I felt myself redden. “Uh…Budapest,” I ventured, unsure.

“No. Susan, you weren’t watching the clock…maybe you can tell us.”

“Of course Miss Kaser. Prague,” answered the always prepared, smirking Susan Painter. Czechoslovakia was a big deal for Miss Kaser because she and her old-maid roommate, Miss Mary Majors had toured Eastern Europe right after the war; just before the so-called “Iron Curtain” clamped on those small, ravaged nations whose misfortune was to border the Soviet Union. Miss Kaser emerged from the experience a rabid anti-communist and political conservative.

It is regrettable that more government “hands-off,” free-market philosophy didn’t infuse her classroom. She was a tyrant and she-ogre of the first stripe. One moment she would be calmly discussing something with a pupil at her desk, when suddenly the luckless student would be “spread-eagle” over the desk. Under a series of blows to the flanks, the child resembled a tiny, half-swallowed lizard in the jaws of a garden snake. One of her favorite disciplinary tactics was to compel her victim to navigate around the classroom, outside the square of students’ desks. When the accused passed Miss Kaser at the head of the class, she whacked them with her paddle, her eyes gleaming. She once made a girl wear a paper hat all afternoon for refusing to eat peanut butter at lunch.

What made her so mean? “I am Sadie Kaser,” she introduced herself on the first day of class. Please call me Miss Kaser.” She paused and then added somewhat enigmatically, “I was called Sara as a girl.”

Did Sara, the girl, dream of an exciting evening past as she slumbered beside a wilting corsage after the prom? Her gown draped carelessly over a chair? Was her bedside drawer stuffed with letters from admirers, some upperclassmen? It all passed her by in a way beyond the scope of this narrative to analyze. Now she was fiftyish, hardening, a wearer of cardigan sweaters and sensible shoes. A thick salt and pepper braid clustered close to her head.

“Miss Majors and I are not passing out any more candy and junk tonight,” she stated, switching from Czechoslovakia. “We won’t be home. We’re going to a party at the Campbell Center, which is the teachers’ union. This is our rebellion against the commercialization of Halloween. All those sweets aren’t good for children.”

She was hot now; “on a roll” as they say. “Last Halloween, Miss Majors and I passed out some lovely red apples from our own tree.” She continued, “Firmer, sweeter apples you never tasted. We were so happy and proud we could share them with the children in the neighborhood.” She paused for effect. “Next morning, as we left for work, we noticed most of the apples had been pitched on the walks and curbs and had been so punished.” “Punished” being her favorite word. She worked it into discourse three or four times a day.

The three o’clock buzzer sounded; class was over. She couldn’t touch us and we were out of there.