This document was prepared in response to a request from the last middle school
class at what was then West Maple Middle School.

I do not have a wealth of memories about my years at West Maple. It's not that my
years there were unpleasant, but just fairly unremarkable. While High School also
only lasted three years, those years seemed more meaningful. Jr. High was more of
a transitional period. In elementary school, you were clearly a kid. In High School,
you could drive, had a measure of control over your life and sowed some wild oats.
Jr. High was really the bridge between the two and it was filled people on both
sides of that bridge. Maybe that's why it's now called "Middle School."

Only in Jr. High

In spite of this, there were some experiences that were uniquely Jr. High. You only
had classes like "Shop" (or "Home Ec" for the girls) and "Health" in Jr. High. Of
course, "Health" was just a euphemism for "Sex Ed." In seventh and eighth grade,
Mr. Rozema provided non-judgmental answers to questions such as the meaning of
certain street vernacularisms. The questions were of course submitted by secret
ballot so that no one would be associated with a particular question. We also dis-
cussed "values." We would gather our chairs in a circle, have group discussions or
role play.

One exercise divided up the class to prepare some sort of group presentation. One
group of some of the more rebellious chaps, which I remember included Rob Beau-
bien, did their own version of what they called "spastic circle." A group which in-
cluded Jeff Shaya did a skit based on horse racing to illustrate risk-taking behavior.
What I remember most clearly was that the person in the skit who was the biggest
thrill seeker bet on "Chump on a Log" to win.

Shop class was conducted under the watchful eye of Mr. Kelata. Long before the
days of This Old House and Home Improvement, old "Killer" Kelata showed us the
difference between a scratch awl and a nail set. Mr. Keleta was also known as the
proud owner of his self-proclaimed "Rustang." He even went so far as to affix that
moniker to the body of the car itself.

One thing that all shop class students should remember were the car races. Every
spring, you could walk into any seventh grade class and see somebody sanding their
wooden car body. Once cars were painted and fitted with spoilers and wheels, we
raced them down the ramp in the back hallway.

Shop class was also interesting because of all of the injuries it produced. Scott He-
mrick might have looked sharp in the tie that he wore as a member of the basket-
ball team the day of a game, but he forgot to tuck it into his shirt when he worked
the grinder. He got a nasty cut when his chin slammed into the tool rest. Ron Bi-
towski gave himself an unintended manicure on the disk sander. My maladies were
far less interesting. I recall once sitting out the afternoon in office after becoming
nauseous from breathing sawdust.

The lunch room was a key node of social interaction. It was one place where you
could associate with whomever you wanted. It was also before High School where
you would eat at different times depending on your schedule and you could always
escape to McDonald's. One thing in particular that I can remember about Jr. High
lunch is pizza. Unlike the other entrees that were served, the pizza was considered
some what of a delicacy. Such was the demand on pizza day, that students would
resort to extraordinary means to gain advantage in terms of lunch line position.
One teacher, Mr. Tomchuck, would offer to let students who wore ties leave a few
minutes early to lunch. This was serendipitous to any of us on a sports team, who
wore ties the days of games or meets.

Seventh Grade - Two Kinds of Spirits

Every fall we'd have "Spirit Week." Another attempt by well-meaning adults to
create a sense of school community in the student body. Spirit Week culminated
with an all-school rally where the grades faced off against each other in a cheering
contest to see who could yell the loudest. We seventh graders were ecstatic when
Mrs. Balaam (the "team leader" for our grade) came running out of the judging
committee shaking the seventh graders' banner triumphantly over her head. It was
only in the eighth grade when the same thing happened to the next crop of seventh
graders did we realize that the fix was in. This was just a clever ploy to get the
newest residents, still wearing their Meadow Lake, Franklin and Walnut Lake
hearts on their sleeves, off to a unifying start in their brave new Jr. High world.

Another thing that I remember from my first year was the open area directly to the
south of the school, "The Ravine." It was aptly named as it was in fact a wooded ra-
vine. You could walk through a path there as kind of a short cut to get to Maple
Road. But most of the folks who ventured down there weren't interested in expe-
dience. Instead, all sorts of illicit activities took place, or so I imagined.

As a seventh-grader, sometimes on the weekend, I'd take a look. At the bottom of
the ravine, the evidence was incontrovertible - cigarette butts, a tell-tale sign of
adolescent mischief. One day after staying late at school, I felt daring and started
down the narrow dirt path in the woods. Much to my surprise, I encountered two
ninth-graders making out in the dirt. I beat a hasty retreat and did not return for
quite some time.

These days, the ravine is occupied by a professional office complex and some subur-
ban condo developments. I wonder if late at night, the ghosts of teenage delin-
quents wander their halls.

Eighth Grade - The Middle Passage

In eighth grade, we participated in a learning experience known as the simulated
Senate. The primary issue we were supposed to debate was the adoption of the me-
tric system, an idea whose time never quite came, but was peaking in the mid-
seventies.

Students were designated senators, aides and reporters. I was Henry "Scoop" Jack-
son. I wrote his office, explained the project and asked for some background ma-
terial. A package arrived some time the following August. Evidently, the nuances
of the school year were lost on the good senator from Washington state.

I never had Mr. Parker for science, but there was this famous story about him.
Every year, the eighth graders had a unit on rocks and the identification thereof.
This unit always ended with the first experience many of us had with a "practical"
exam, where we would have to identify actual rocks placed on those weird trape-
zoidal tables in the back of the room. But I digress.

Mr. Parker, though probably in his sixties, evidently had been quite the athlete in
his youth. The normally stoic science teacher took advantage of these skills to have
a little fun with his class. Almost without fail, someone would say something to a
neighbor in the middle of one of his lectures. Mr. Parker would then take this op-
portunity to pick up one of the rocks on his desk and peg the offending student on
the noggin. Of course, he'd do this with the sponge rubber rock he'd placed there
specifically for that purpose.

One day in eighth grade, a car crashed into the ditch just east of the ravine. What
was so amusing to all of us kids was that the car had a bumper sticker that read
"Sex maniac at the wheel."

In a rather successful attempt at educational enrichment, the last few weeks of reg-
ular course work were scratched for something called "mini-courses." These were
short seminars in everything from drama to astronomy. One of the most popular
mini-courses was "The History of Sports" by Mr. Buck. We learned about all sorts
of sports, from familiar sports such as basketball to obscure ones such as bear-
baiting. Mr. Buck was well renowned as a raconteur from his regular Social Stu-
dies courses and he kept up his reputation in his mini-course.

The summer after eighth grade and our first year of mini-courses, I was having
dinner at the home of Jeff Bellefleur. Eager to discuss my experience with Mr.
Buck at the table, I turned to Jeff and said, "Have you ever had Mr. Buck for inter-
course." There was a brief awkward silence until Mrs. Bellefleur saved me by chim-
ing in, "Well, was he good?"

Ninth Grade - Next Stop Toronto

Of course, the penultimate experience of the West Maple adventure was the ninth
grade trip to Toronto. This was a multi-day field trip including a train ride to and
from Toronto, expeditions to Ontario Place and the Science Center and a formal
dinner-dance. These activities all took place pretty much as scheduled, but they
were accented by numerous stray incidents that gave the trip its own character.

One thing I remember is that we had to get up at some ungodly hour to meet the
bus in the school parking lot. Despite the explicit and repeated pronouncement of
the prohibition on the wearing of blue jeans, Scott Shallop showed up at sun rise in
some seriously suspect dungarees. He claimed they were "brush denim" and were
therefore exempt. I don't recall how the situation was resolved, but we somehow we
rolled on to the Windsor train station.

During the four-hour train ride, students read, looked out the window or broke up
into groups and talked or played games. Mr. Buck joined a group of boys in the din-
ing car playing cards. At some point, the authoritarian principal Mr. Fredo stepped
to the head of the car to make some sort of announcement. All eyes were on Mr.
Fredo as he droned on about some administrative details. Then, out of the back of
the car, Mr. Buck dramatically threw his cards on the little dining table, pointed at
the student across from him and practically screamed - "YOU CAN'T THROW A
DIAMOND !!! THAT'S A RENEGE !!!"

I remember arriving at the hotel and being confined to quarters for quiet time in
the few hours after we checked in. I also remember watching several students
climb out of their first and second floor balconies and scale the hotel fence to do a
little reconnaissance work in town.

During the day, our time was fairly structured. After hours, we were more or less
on our own, within the confines of the hotel. There were two primary ways in which
we entertained ourselves. First, we ordered in pizza. This was in spite of the fact
that we had been provided with a perfectly good dinner a few hours earlier. After
all, we were a bunch of 14-year olds. Ordering pizza was not verboten, but it was
regulated. I suppose the school had to make some concessions to the Don Valley
Holiday Inn in terms of our activities and a pizza curfew was one way to enforce a
certain degree of decorum. So, we were under orders not to order pizza after 10:00
PM.

One room ordered pizza that arrived significantly later than the designated hour.
Shortly after the students opened their pizza boxes and dug in, Mr. Buck came
storming in to their room and read them the riot act on how they had been warned
about ordering pizza at that hour and how they would have to accept responsibility
for their actions, and so on. Then, to the students' amazement, he scooped up the
pizzas and marched out of the room. No doubt Mr. Buck took great delight upon re-
turning the pizza to the dumb struck-students, after an appropriate interval.

I also remember that in our room, we didn't finish all of our pizza the last night.
So, we left it in a drawer. Probably about the most malicious action in which I par-
ticipated during my Jr. High career. But, I remember reveling a bit in the sheer re-
belliousness of it all.

The other way in which we entertained ourselves was through ice fights. Our block
of rooms was in an L-shaped configuration which overlooked the pool. Everyone
had balconies and when we were restricted to our rooms, many people took to them.
It wasn't long until someone discovered that that ubiquitous hotel amenity, ice,
made an excellent projectile, well suited for harassing your neighbors. We enter-
tained ourselves for what seemed like hours with this frivolity.

I remember two things about our last night. This was the occasion of our "formal"
dinner and dance. We boys wore sport coats and ties. I believe I also wore platform
shoes. My first recollection was that the band or DJ played Paul McCartney's "Silly
Love Songs." Not exactly a deep song, but I often find it interesting that a particu-
lar song can be singly associated with a particular event. The other aspect of that
evening that I recall is that one of my room mates, Brett Green, left the dance early
and filled the entire bathtub and toilet with ice for that night's battle.

The school year ended with a little trepidation about returning to the bottom of the
totem pole at Groves after the steady ascent to the top of the West Maple food
chain. But most of us survived, and in retrospect, maybe those years as a Wildcat
left more synapse paths burned in the back of my brain than I realized.

Russell Levine
May 14, 1995