My Room But Not My Room

This room is where I lived in 8th grade. If this room had looked like this when I lived in it – I can’t imagine the unspeakable horrors that would have been unleashed on me by my peers, squad leader, platoon leader, company commander, etc.

And if an alumnus saw it in such condition? Well, I don’t think anyone would have thought any cadet capable of such an abominable atrocity.

What’s worse is, there were lower school rooms in far worse condition that day. I don’t know what these kids faced that day but I can assure you that in 82/83 this room (let alone anything worse) would have at least lost this cadet any privileges that involved leaving the dorm.

The setup of this room is exactly as it was for every lower school room in my day – except for the two-cadet rooms. Footlocker to the left (you can see it behind the door under a laundry bag), bed and desk to the right.

I was really lucky. My Dad could build or restore anything and he bought and refinished an antique footlocker for me so I didn’t have the same cheap looking ones everyone else did. I supposed they weren’t cheap looking … just compared to mine.

Those rooms look so small now.

Here’s the view from “my” window:

It’s blurry because of the screen on the window. The building isn’t actually that blurry in real life. The building in question is the Lower School Academic Building. Note the railing the right of the door – that’s a stairway to the study hall and downstairs classroom.

Facing the room from this POV, if you went to the next room to your right, that would have been Cadet Strong’s room – he was the first cadet I ever spoke with at Howe other than the two I mentioned in My First Day At Howe. Next was Cadet Gross (yes, these are real names) and, last but not least, Cadet Flesch. I’m trying to figure out where Forbes-Watkins lived. Maybe … he switched with Gross at some point. And I thought that Hamilton lived between me and the hallway to the academic building, too, but there were only like three rooms between me and that hallway.

Both Hamilton and Flesch had older brothers at Howe in the upper school. I seem to have a vivid memory of Hamilton’s older brother giving him a hard time about something.

I’ve never won a fight in my life. In public school, I got bullied all the time – I was that kid … the one bullies gravitate toward and find via a sixth-bully-sense … maybe it’s not a sixth sense … maybe it makes up for the other senses they lack … anyway … somehow, I got into a fight with Hamilton while he had a broken arm in a cast … and I still lost.  It’s worth mentioning that in my three years at Howe, I never witnessed any … ANY … cliques or bullying. You had your dorm cultures, athletic teams, and such … but nothing exclusive or abusive. There was authority and respect but, again, nothing that was actually abusive or harmful.

The Varsity H club and the Rangers were considered elite and involved a lot of initiation, etc. but they didn’t treat others badly. They were proud to be a part of their groups, to be sure, but all that crap that goes on in other schools simply didn’t happen at Howe.

Rooms At Howe Military School

Every room in every upper school dorm at Howe Military School has the same layout. In the previous entry, Abuses of Power, I posted a couple pictures of my room in Echo company. Here are some more so you can see every part of it. As I said, every other upper school room looked just like this one. Once upon a time, 30-50 years ago, every bunk in every dorm was full. Now, at least two upper school dorms (including Echo) are empty and – to my knowledge - every student has their own room.

These are two wardrobes – one for each occupant. They’re not called “wardrobes” but I don’t remember what we called them. Note the towel racks on the side. You had to have your towels folded and hanging just so, or it counted against you during room inspection. Each student had a desk chair and a more comfortable chair. You can see a “more comfortable” chair lying on the bottom bunk and next to the wardrobes.

Here’s a detailed close-up of the inside of a wardrobe. You have a rod to hang your pants and shirts on and shelves to neatly organize everything else. Remember in A Few Good Men when Tom Cruise runs his fingers across Lance Cpl. Dawson’s clothes hanging neatly in his locker? That’s how your clothes had to look. Your socks, underwear, t-shirts, and everything else had to be displayed just right.

Your shoes had to be aligned beneath your bed (see previous entry for pix of bed). This is the mirror hanging between the door and the wardrobes.

I took a walk through the dorms last Alumni Weekend and was absolutely aghast at how … not just sloppy, but downright filthy some of the rooms were in the lower school dorm.

When I attended 1982-1987 the school was amazing and it is mind-boggling to know that, as great as it was, it was still far from its hey-day. I wish I could go back in time and see it even 30, 40, 70 years before that.

Clean Your Room

I think my obsessive-compulsive neat-freak roots began at Howe Military School. Our rooms were inspected each day. On Saturdays, the entire  battalion stood for the hours between breakfast and lunch to have the rooms, bathrooms, floors, bathrooms, nooks & crannies, bed springs and bookshelves checked for dust and wrinkles.

Friday nights were a campus-wide cleaning party.