Volume CXXXII, Number 6 October 25, 2002 f

Scared speechless in 4th grade
ACADIA SENESE
COLUMNIST

I embarrass myself daily. From stepping on the sparkling clean, mirror-like boots of a Marine nice enough to hold open the door for me to turning fire truck cherry-red at the hint of a faux pas, there is never a dull-or should I say unnoticed-moment in my life.

My embarrassing moments started at a young age, and it was not before long that I realized I was never meant to be an orator. Kindergarten show-and-tell was the first indicator that speaking in front of a group was not going to be my elementary school forte. I only wish now that my fourth grade teacher had realized this before she nominated me to be my town's student "Veteran's Day" speaker.

November 11 will be a day of infamy. I was given a poem to memorize, and at our town's ceremony was to recite it in front of an overwhelmingly large crowd. I was up to the challenge, and determined to overcome my fear of public speaking. Diligently I memorized the poem, and practiced day after day. By the time Veteran's Day rolled around, I was well and ready.

The ceremony began quite uneventfully, and I scanned the crowd for familiar faces as I sat on stage. Our town veterans proudly wore their medals of honor, and my entire school, as well as most of the community, gathered to honor them. American flags blew in the wind, and I sat rehearsing my lines.

Before long, I was called to the pulpit. It was at that moment, that adrenaline rushed through my body as if I was being hunted by a saber tooth tiger. My hands began to quiver, my mouth dried, and my eyesight blurred. But I still believed I could deliver the poem. I meandered to the pulpit, took one scan of the crowd, and froze like that same saber tooth tiger caught in the ice age.

I was paralyzed. I couldn't move, I couldn't talk, I couldn't even whisper. No sounds of any nature could escape my mouth. A mime would have been more audible than me at that moment. I knew I had to talk, or remove myself from the podium. Cold, cruel stares pierced me from the audience, and fear froze me like I had never been stunned before. My mind was racing, and my body couldn't react. I was utterly mortified.

And so, after a long, excruciating pause in front of the entire crowd, my school's principle-out of pity, out of sympathy, out of a necessity to get my sorry 4th grade butt down from the stage-came to the podium, whispered some remark to the audience about my IQ ranking amongst the extinct Dodo bird, took my hand, and removed me from the stage. It was the last time a teacher ever nominated me to speak in front of a crowd. They should have asked me to lead a moment of silence.

But as with any weakness, I confronted my fear of public speaking head on. I forced myself to forget the paralyzing fear I felt in front of a large crowd, and throughout high school continued to push myself to speak in front of others. While I no longer despise public speaking like I once had, I still have plenty of other embarrassing moments to mull over. And if there is one certainty, it's that I will still turn bright red on the drop of a dime, especially if I just left my clumsy muddy footprint on the spotless shoe of an attractive Marine.