Sunday, Jul. 08, 2018 - 10:46 p.m.

Talking to my mom this morning about the Thai soccer team trapped in the cave. Thinking what their parents could have possibly felt, expecting to see their children after a day of work, only to find out they are trapped and then not being able to see or touch them in person for weeks. Crazy.

The conversation reminded my mom of the time I went "missing" in elementary school. Feels like I've written about it before but I want to make sure to get it down before the memory goes completely away.

So in 2nd or 3rd grade, school had ended and I was headed to meet up with my aunt, since she worked at my school. It was just before she would be able to leave for the day. As I walked down a row of classrooms to meet her, one of the classroom doors opened. Ms. Morrison, the school's drama teacher, poked her head out and told me to come into her classroom to practice a skit.

**Got almost to the end of this story and realized I left out a key piece: Ms. Morrison was a lesbian. Now, this was 1988/89. Homosexuality was not the part of society it is today. It was stigmatized by HIV/AIDS during this time period. Furthermore, Ms. Morrison was a masculine lesbian. I always remember, she had a basketball player's physique and a high-top fade. Okay, back to the story.**

Initially, I refused because I knew my aunt was expecting me and I didn't want to be late or make her late. However, being well-known by Ms. Morrison for my lil acting capabilities, she insisted it would be a good opportunity to practice and wouldn't take long. I wasn't necessarily comfortable with the whole thing but there were two or three other students in the room and she kept insisting, offering that it wouldn't take long. Of course, my memory of this is limited but I feel like she may have even said my aunt would either know where I was or, if she was looking for me, would know to knock on the door. Something like that.

Anywhoo, I go in the class and Ms. Morrison is acting off. The other students, I remember their eyes being a little wide. She seemed to be making stuff up as we went along and I do recall feeling like this "rehearsal" wasn't as necessary as she'd made it seem. She was being erratic and just not the person I was used to. More importantly, a great deal of time started to pass.

I vaguely recall being agitated about the time that was passing (from childhood, I've had a certain anxiety about time and the passing of and limit to it) and that I kept requesting to leave. The other children were just going home on their own to wait for their parents to come home. But I knew that my aunt would be looking for me so I knew I had to get out of there.

Eventually, after us kids got hip to her antics being irrational, pressing upon her that we needed to go, knowing we would get in trouble for not being where we were supposed to be when we should, Ms. Morrison let us leave the room. I hurriedly made my way to where my aunt would have been. She wasn't there. I searched around parts of the school for her but she wasn't there and no one else was, either.

My cousins and I never had to walk home alone because my aunt was always at the school. But that day at that time, I was by myself and scared. I figured it just made sense for me to go ahead and walk home alone. We only lived 4 blocks from the school but I was sure to walk on the main road for visibility, rather than be on the back road we took with my aunt. I walked as fast as my little legs would carry me.

The first person I remember encountering was my agonizing grandaddy, who yelled at me in frustration and relief about scaring everyone in the family half to death. I remember feeling sad that he was angry with me and upset that he thought I would just go missing for no reason or, even worse, for attention. The next person I remember was my mom who hugged me and cried. I tried to tell her what happened but she told me I didn't need to explain, that she was just happy I was home. I felt a little better from getting yelled at by my grandaddy but also a little frustrated that nobody would let me explain that the whole thing wasn't my fault.

At some point, I told my family the story but my aunt made it out like I was lying. She said she had knocked on Ms. Morrison's door and there was no answer. Now, I clearly do not recall hearing my aunt knock on that door. But I also recall Ms. Morrison elevating her voice at certain points and for a long time, assumed she'd heard my aunt knocking and covered it up on our side of the door by yelling over the sound. Us kids were so confused by what we were a part of that I can see us being distracted enough to not hear the knocks. I don't know if anyone believed my story at the time.

A few years later, years after Ms. Morrison had stopped working at my elementary school, word came that she had committed suicide. By then, it had come out that she was a lesbian and, from various accounts, the revelation of that information was something that was difficult for her. Even though by then, it was the early 90's, homosexuality was still not socially acceptable.

As soon as I heard about her suicide, that episode when I was in elementary school made sense. I imagine that the mental issues she had been dealing with - which would have explained the psychotic episode that occurred that day - in combination with the treatment she may have endured as a lesbian during that time was altogether too much. It hurt for me to hear she'd taken her life. I think hers was the first suicide outside of Kurt Cobain that I knew of; the first person I'd personally known. I remember when my aunt told me about Ms. Morrison's suicide, we talked about that incident from elementary school and how it all made sense.

That was a crazy situation that happened in my life. Something I don't want to get lost. So now, it's here.

Praying she continues to RIP.

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