When I was in 6 th grade at Lake Harriet Institution in Minneapolis, I began every morning similarly: turn over heart, eyes on the flag, reciting the Promise of Loyalty like a divine incantation. Then came My Country, ‘T is of Thee , belted out in the off-key warble of kids who didn’t know what “land where my fathers died” was expected to indicate– yet knew it was severe.
After the patriotic routines, our instructor Mrs. Kleinberg, a female that emitted Cold Battle paranoia like warm from an old radiator, would pivot to her preferred topic: communism However this had not been some dry social researches talk. This was performance art with bleach.
She ‘d march into course with rubber handwear covers and a bucket and reveal, “In communist countries, kids clean up the commodes. They wipe the floorings. They scrub the windows. Because they have no freedom.
Then she gave out the tools. And we cleaned up. Floorings, workdesks, toilets. Windows that currently looked tidy. And every time we whined, she ‘d say, “That’s what it resembles under communism.”
I bear in mind thinking, with real wonder: Communist nations should be pristine.
Something didn’t rather track. Why was cleaning a penalty if tidiness was a good thing? Why was our own …