Mrs. Teabody Greets the Day

Spending six weeks studying Shakespeare in Stratford- upon-Avon was Mrs. Teabody's first great adventure as a fully-fledged adult, and she never looks back on that time without recalling her now far-flung friends who added so much to her life then and who continue to do so all these years later. Travel along, Dear Reader, to Stratford-Upon-Avon in June 1989 and imagine meeting the very first of the fourteen other teachers selected for this honor : Naomi Usprich of New Orleans. Towering at close to five full feet in height, Naomi had a mouth to match her wit and a gentle side to embrace. She was single, fiery and fierce; she could also be kindness incarnate. Clutching a rough map of the tangle of streets that is SUA, Naomi led Mrs. Teabody along in her wake, pushing her way through the crowds that thronged the sidewalks commenting about the inappropriateness of anyone's visiting SUA who was NOT a Shakespeare scholar. “Does that include or exclude us?” Mrs. Te...

Mary and Teddy 1968 To ask a contemporary readership to imagine life in a women's dorm in the 1960's is asking almost the impossible but suffice to say that prior to the sexual revolution, college officials took the term in loco parentis VERY seriously and on-campus housing meant girls had limited freedom and were expected to be safely locked inside their dorms, house mother in attendance between the hours of 11:00 P.M. - - - make that 10:00 P.M. week nights! – and 7:00 A.M. Furthermore, no woman left her dorm unaccompanied after 7:00 P.M. and her destination for the evening had to be shared on her sign out card. Yes, I could go to the library for the evening but not without a friend accompanying me, and her sign out card had to say exactly what my sign out card said. These cards were placed in the “out” box and that was the house mother's index for our comings and goings. We were expected to return to the dorm together at which time our card was signed with o...