A child’s eye
At convent school, yearly exams were the norm from age seven, our results in every subject pinned to the classroom wall in rank order. The philosophy was clear: the nuns liked the students who regularly made the top five, tolerated the middle bunch and gave up on the rest. I was in the top five squad — if I slipped, questions would be asked: what went wrong? are you unwell?
What a relaxing introduction to the notion of achievement.
At the end of primary, cups and shields from an impressive cabinet — which we’d pass by with the same reverence we felt for the altar in chapel — were awarded at the year-end assembly. I won the shield for French, the cup for History, and a consolation clay pig for English. The headmistress nun explained to the whole school and all the parents that because I’d scooped the English cup the previous year, it wasn’t fair for me to win again. Hence the pig.
Unfortunately, I misread this a bit.
When I walked up to accept the little pig from the nun I …
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