6th grade. Couch. The place, not the furniture.
It would be interesting to know how many people even know there is such a place called Couch, Missouri, much less that there was a school there. Apparently still is a school there. And apparently I got to attend not long after a new elementary school was built.
Couch wasn't very far down the road from Alton, but far enough to be in a different school. We lived right inside Couch proper, such as it is. In the house right in front of "the" church (there was only one church), and across a tiny little gravel road from the little grocery store with the wide wooden-plank squeaky, uneven floors. No supermarket, that. But they had candy. And pop. And that's all I got to say about that. LOL. And sorry, but no class photo this year. For some reason, my Mom decided that I, who had naturally curly-frizzy hair already, needed to have a PERM before school started, so I literally sported a poodle-with-a-pompadour hairstyle for my 6th grade class picture. Nope. Not gonna' share that one!
My teacher was Mr. Copeland. I don't remember his first name, but I remember he was also a minister. I didn't know where his church was, but it wasn't the one in my back yard. I also remember that Mr. Copeland was a very nice man.
And guess what? Yup, we moved away before the end of my 6th grade ended at the Couch elementary school. On the last day I was supposed to go to school there, Mr. Copeland threw a surprise going-away party for me. I got presents and everything, which I kept and carried around with me for, oh, at least the next 2 or 3 schools. It was amazing, and apparently made a lasting impression on me.
Anyway, my parents said the reason we needed to move was that there wasn't any construction work left around there. And since my Daddy's family all lived in a place "out west" where they told him there were lots of jobs, we had an auction and sold everything, including my piano. They said it was just too heavy to take with us.
We didn't use a moving truck. Heck, by now, we had moved more than the moving guys who did it for a living. Daddy just bought a used, windowless oversized panel van that we kids dubbed the Cookie Wagon, and we only took what would fit in the Cookie Wagon with us, and headed west. We also still had a car, so my Daddy drove the Cookie Wagon, and Mom drove behind in the car. And between my brother and me, they took turns switching out which one rode with them. I rode with whichever one of them said "I've got to have some peace and quiet for awhile." We made lots of switching stops.
There was no air conditioning in the Cookie Wagon, so when we reached Needles, California, whose slogan sign bragged: "Needles, CA: Hot spot known for absolutely nothing, 20 miles from water, 2 feet from hell." Pretty much how I remember it, all right. We stopped the Cookie Wagon at some sort of reservoir to take a swim and try to cool off a little bit, let the Cookie Wagon cool down before it blew the radiator, and had to literally RUN across the scorching sand to the water to keep the bottoms of our feet from blistering. TIP: Never go barefoot anywhere near Needles, CA.
It was hard to believe this was right before Christmas time. Just didn't seem right for it to be so warm in December. But our California adventure was just beginning...
School #6, Couch, MO, was now in my rearview mirror.
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