June 2, 1977... Last full day!! We signed yearbooks all day. The last day of school was always fun. It was a time for reflection and reliving past events, and while in the midst of such activity, one classmate turned to me and casually asked, "Laurie, you had cancer, didn't you?" "Yes," I replied, and briefly related that which had occurred to me, including my loss of hair. At one point in the conversation, I noticed the teacher staring widely at me, as if in disbelief. "You look healthy now," his face seemed to say. After the conversation turned to a different subject, the teacher sat down on my desk and asked more details of my experience. Suddenly, he began lamenting his marital difficulties and personal problems. It was my turn to listen in disbelief; it seemed odd to be selected as a teacher's confidant. Although aside from teacher and student we were both human beings, I did not feel comfortable with the conversation. I tried to react as an unsurprised, objective listener; perhaps having been subjected to pain, he felt comfortable and rather compelled to tell me of his own. It was something I never forgot, nor did I encounter such circumstances again. The end had come of what, at first, had been an emotionally draining year. I had experienced much kindness and cruelty, pleasure and pain, yet I persevered through all the trials and returned all of the smiles... and at last, the positive outweighed the negative. As I left the hallways of the junior high school which had, only three years before, appeared a massive array of corridors, I welcomed summer with customary gladness and reveled in the freedom that greeted my steps. My exit was not saluted with lengthy accomplishments or popular admiration, and that did not mar my happiness; I cared neither for applause nor popularity. I knew, however, that I had done my best and touched several lives; making an indelible impression on someone's mind was indeed the highest of compliments that I could have merited. Directions Directions are disturbing, At least they are to me, How anyone ever follows them Is more than I can see. They say to take notch "B" And slide it into "F" Or else to take the "right" side And fold it to the "left." Then in opening a band-aid They say to pull a string, Well I could pull and pull and pull all day And never reach the thing. And say you want some Pringles, Preferably for Brunch, But you couldn't get them open Until it's time for lunch! Directions are a problem, (I think to everyone), And it's comforting to know I'm not the only one! Lauren Isaacson 9th Grade PAGE 133 Chapter 18 Summer 1977 "I felt as if my heart would burst, for never had I experienced such profound closeness with nature. . . My sense of reality had heightened and every inch of my body was alive with incomparable sensations." CHAPTER EIGHTEEN Summer 1977