You're gonna be a convict when you grow up. - David Ghettys sister to my sister Tammy

My first grade teacher was 100 years old. Or so it seemed. She had "aged out" of public school teaching and thus came to our little Christian school to teach. She was a very sweet farmer's wife who was slightly aloof when the going got tough. At least this is the way I remember her.
Her name was Mrs. Zuidema and her disciplinary tool of choice was the Naughty box... (WOW I have just this instant figure out what I have such an aversion to the word naughty..) The Naughty Box was a chalk box drawn in the corner of the chalk board and whenever you were bad your name was written in the box for all the world to see and then you paid for your sins by forfeiting 5 or 10 minutes of your recess time. Also for some odd reason, if you had to go to the bathroom during class you had to put your name in the naughty box and then give up 5 minutes of your recess time. I am pretty sure this is the reason I can remember at least two people peeing at their desk and one person throwing up or vomiting as Mrs. Zuidema called it. (Rodger just did what??VOMITEDTTED??? Oh My WORD will he live? I was truly in fear for Rodger's life until one of the second graders explained - it means he barfed)
One of Mrs. Zuidema's passions was puppets. Each year the first and second grade classes performed two puppet shows for chapel. One was the story of Joseph and his coat of many colors and I can't remember what the other one was.. but it must have been New Testament. The puppets were made of a simple white cloth with stitched faces and each had a different colored vest. Danny Kettler played Jacob and gave a great puppet performance of weeping over Joseph's blood stained coat after his brothers had sold him into slavery. I never got any good parts in any of the puppet plays. My puppets never had to bounce their heads up and down as I spoke a line for them. My puppets were all just filler puppets or extras to fill out a crowd. All the troublemaker kid, kids whose names appeared at least once a week in the naughty box, (kids like David Ghettys who was the naughtiest kid in my class. One day Mrs. Zuidema left him in charge of the box while she left the room to visit the office...probably the potty... and he wrote each kids name in the box and smiled at us in a way that said - I dare you to protest. Then he slowly erased each name. As he erased a name he looked at that kid and said "Just know until she gets back I can put it back in." I was terrified the whole time and it must have shown because when David got to my name he just looked at me, rolled his eyes and said "too easy", erased my name and went on with the list.) got the good parts. This seemed unfair to me at the time but now I realize it was just a way to keep them occupied and out of trouble. I was a quiet kid in first grade and while all the naughty boys practiced their puppet moves, I just sat with my long blonde hair puppet and wondered why Mrs. Zuidema did not like me enough to give me a meatier part.
Mrs. Zuidema also had a clown puppet that she kept in her desk drawer and on special days she would sneak him out the drawer and put him on her hand and then have him pop up at the side of the desk. She would then talk with the puppet. Oh my word, this scared me and half the class to death. I would flinch at the sound of her desk drawer opening for days after that stupid clown had popped out. (This is most likely why I never liked Mr. Rogers either.) I am not sure which was scarier. That the puppet was a clown or that Mrs. Zuidema acted so well that I actually believed she thought the puppet was real.
Hi Mr. Clown. How are you today?
Oh I am doing just great Mrs. Zuidema and am so happy to be getting some time out of that drawer - she would answer in a slightly higher squeaking voice.
That is so grand Mr. Clown. And I know the children are happy to see you.
And with this the clown would turn and stare right at me and say..
Oh and I AM SO happy to see them ( now I know Mrs. Zuidema would never chuckle but I heard the clown chuckle none the less)
And I write this all to remind my sister Tammy about how years later we would both remember the clown puppet and would laugh so hard at the thought of Mrs. Zuidema and the clown puppet that we thought we might just bust a gut. It is T's birthday today and I hope I was able to bring it all back to mind again and give her a laugh for her birthday. Happy Birthday T.