Smoking, is just not cool.........anymore.

Holy Redeemer Church, PCE School and former site of the playground for good school children. I made a bad decision to skip recess one day. Bless me Father for I have sinned!

Snapped this while on my tour de Portsmouth, apparently some things never change in P-town.

While an eighth grade student at Portsmouth Catholic Elementary, which by the way was a result of the merging of St. Mary's and Holy Redeemer, I decided to take up smoking. Not a good idea! Sinful in fact as I found out!

One very cold winter day, while the good school children were outside playing during recess, five of us decided we were just a little too old and a little too cool to spend our time playing kickball. So we snuck inside to the girls restroom and lit up a cigarette. In our defense, we lit just one for all five of us. And there we were, leaning against the wall in the back of the restroom, sporting our totally un-cool plaid uniforms, and passing around a Marlboro. This restroom was large, big enough for ten little Catholic school girls to potty simultaneously. And then, we heard the door open and in a very strong Minnesota accent we heard four words that haunt me to this day....seriously!!

" Girls, I smell smoke". Repeat that slowly and heavy on the accent so it sounds like this:
"Girrrrls, III ssssmell smooooke".

First we tried to hide (obviously) in the stalls, you know standing on the toilet like we weren't really in there. But we were no match for St. Monique! And next? Lots of sobbing once cool girls in the principal's office, calls to parents, more sobbing, parents arriving to pick up sobbing girls......except me. Oh no, my parental call was met with "you can walk home". Did I mention it was very cold that day!! So I walked home, freezing in my uniform and crying the entire way. Just for the record, no one else had to walk!!

The aftermath: We were suspended indefinitely, I was grounded for a very long time (unfortunately this was the start of a grounding pattern that stayed with me through high school), and my mom got her one and only speeding ticket the next day which was totally my fault somehow. I think the story is she went to pick up my sister (Perfect Pat who never even thought about smoking) from college and was in such a dither about the parents of delinquent school kids meeting that night with Monsigner to determine if the sinning smoking girls were going to be allowed back to PCE that she was speeding. Do I have to take the blame for everything?? Seriously, this was a HUGE deal and fortunately completely nipped my smoking habit in the bud.....and for that I am thankful!

Trivia: Guess what song came out that year?