The Report Card
My best subjects in school were English, literature, composition, and history; after that came art. I am also a bookworm. I had and still have a vivid imagination. On the long car trip to the Caspian Sea in summer, I would look out of the window at the shapes of the clouds in the sky and build up a grand story from them. I spent long hours doing that as we traveled north. I also found history exciting and often wished there was a way to go back in time to the different eras I was interested in at that moment. I imagined myself walking amongst the people that lived then, feeling what they felt, being part of them for just a while.
I had no problem getting good grades in those subjects. If they had made geography a bit more interesting, I would have perhaps liked that as well, but I wasn’t interested in what their main products were and how many tonnage they produced or how large their population was. Who cared? I certainly did not!
I was more interested in what their everyday lives were, how they lived, what they did, what they thought. That is what interested me.
There were subjects I truly disliked with a passion. Those subjects were maths, algebra, geometry, and biology! They made no sense to me. My poor father would sit with me for hours on end trying to make me understand the beauty of these sciences. I tried hard, but those subjects left me feeling completely comatose. The smell of whatever they used in the lab as they dissected various animal parts left me gagging violently! On one occasion, in a biology class, they had arranged a neat row of white dead mice to be dissected. I took one look at them and cried, ‘I can’t! I can’t!’ I gasped as I practically ran out of the room. I got a zero that time. On one algebra test, I got 9 out of 100. I was mortified with embarrassment. However, when I am nervous, I laugh. That was one of the times I did. The teacher became so enraged, she permanently banned me from her class. Instead of giving me 9/100, she gave me another 0! I guess that is not too much of a difference!
Now, with my parents, anything less than a B on their children’s report card was quite unacceptable. If you can just imagine how I felt that term. I did well in history, English, French, and geography, A+, B, B. Then I got C in maths, F in algebra, and biology. I took one look at those grades on my report card and my blood began to run cold in my veins! I felt faint! How was I going to present this report card to my parents, especially my father? My heart was filled with shame and dread. At that moment, I wished the earth would open and swallow me up! After much thought, I decided the best approach was to ask my mother to sign it. She was the softer of the two.
Upon arriving home from school, my mother’s first concern was for us to wash up, then sit around the dining table and eat something to tide us over until supper. That was also the time she asked us how our school day was and what homework we had. Sometimes she helped us with any difficult problems we had with homework. That day she asked about our report cards.
With a great sense of shame, I lowered my eyes as I handed her my card. I took a peek at her face. A pleased smile hovered upon her lips for a moment, then she saw the C and F. A slight frown appeared between her brows. She raised her eyes and looked at me.
‘I cannot sign this report card, Stella. Papa will have to see this,’ she said sadly.
‘Please Mama. He will be very angry. Please Mama! The sciences are hard for me to understand,’ I pleaded.
It was no use. That evening when she handed my report card to Papa, the house was immediately transformed into a house of gloom and doom. My father’s face turned stern and as cold as carved marble. He showed me no warmth. Banter around the supper table stopped. There were no jokes and no quizzes about classical music or history or politics. My father did not even peel and cut up fruits and distribute them amongst us, his children, at the dining table. He gave me a cold, stony glance.
‘The only thing in this life that cannot be taken away from anyone is knowledge. Health and wealth can be lost. Family can be taken away. Circumstances change and sometimes one loses everything that one has.’ He looked each of us in the eye as he spoke. ‘I have tried to impress this on you over and over again. Whatever you attain in life is not nearly as valuable as the education you receive. I want you to understand that,’ he said. The look on his face softened. He so wanted us to be smart and not giddy, spoiled girls. And we were not.
My grandfather was a rabbi. Of his six sons, he had chosen my father to become a rabbi. He did not allow him to go to regular school. He was to spend his time studying the Talmud and other aspects of the Jewish religion. However, his grandmother, my great-grandmother, strongly disagreed with him. They all lived in the same large house. She ran the household, and she ran it well. There was no way her grandson would not receive a proper education! She would see to it! Secretly, she sneaked the young lad off to school. No one was allowed to tell my grandfather. As long as my father showed up at the synagogue for morning prayers, he was safe. For many years my grandfather was unaware of this situation.
One day, however, my father did not show up for synagogue. That morning, as they all sat around the breakfast table, my grandfather asked him the reason. My father had been unhappy with all the years of duplicity. He told him the truth. ‘I have finals at school. I was up late studying and I overslept,’ he declared. There was an uneasy hush at the table. They all held their breath! Everyone knew what would happen next. There was a sense of dread in the room. They expected a huge outburst! They did not have long to wait. With a roar full of rage, my grandfather rose from his seat and lunged at him. ‘You dared to defy me? You dared to defy me all of those years?’ His wrath poured upon his son mercilessly. He started to thrash him mercilessly. My father took the blows bravely. His face became a mask of controlled anger. When my grandfather’s rage subsided, my father said, ‘Know this. I will never set foot in a house of worship ever again.’ For many decades he did not. Education was so very important to him because he struggled to receive it.
It took several days before my father allowed my mother to sign that report card. It took much pleading and begging before it was signed. He refused to acknowledge any report card with a bad grade. To this day, I can still feel the writhing discomfort I felt that time when I was nine, ten, or eleven years old. It taught me to strive harder in those subjects. I had always known the importance my father felt towards providing us with a good education. It taught me not to do anything but the best that I can give to everything that I accomplish. Either do something well or don’t do it at all. And that was a worthy lesson to attain.