I started grade 8, for the first time, at a Catholic High School. It was brand new and really big. My family had moved into that neighbourhood and since I was a Catholic, I attended it.
The previous year, Grade 7 at Miller Park Elementary School (which was a public school) was a great year for me. Mostly due to my best friend, Sacha Barrie. We had a total riot! Plus, I also attended Miller Park Elementary with a couple of my younger cousins. It was wonderful. But, my family moved and I had to said “Good-bye” to my best friend, Sacha, and start Mailllardville Secondary School, in Coquitlam at the beginning of grade 8. That was not a great time!
I interrupted drug deals in the bathrooms, got the ‘crap’ kicked out of me several times (which makes it difficult to make friends) and finally got thrown down a flight of 30 cement stairs. Three stories straight down. After the fall, as I looked up into the faces of the girls who had pushed me, their only comment was “The B**** will die next time”.
Needless to say, if I was usually a scared person, being at that school didn’t exactly motivate me to embrace life. My Fears became Terrors.
My Mom and I went to see the vice-Principal AND school counsellor, who both claimed I was a liar and that all their students were nice, Catholic girls and would NEVER behave like that.
I couldn’t stand the constant fear and beatings anymore, so in May of that year, I quit Maillardville Secondary School just 6 weeks short of the end of the year.
The next year I tried the public school. I had to take some grade 8 classes, but then I was going to be bumped into grade 9 classes because I had gotten such high grades for the first 3 semesters at the Catholic school.
But I had my eye on a little, Christian School I had read about in a TV Guide. Yup. The local edition of the TV Guide. I had become a Born-Again Christian a couple years earlier, and when I heard that there was such a thing as a “Christian School” (that wasn’t particularly a Catholic School), I wanted so desperately to go there.
A few weeks and a few miracles later and I had an interview to apply to go to "Vancouver Christian Secondary School" (V.C.S.S). This meeting was with some ‘big-wig’ people, that I had No idea who they were. Even though my family was “officially” still Catholic, AND my parents were Divorced, they let me in.
(*NOTE: Even though VCSS was interdenominational, it was mostly Baptists and Christian Reformed, who adhere to strict Christian codes. So my still being a Catholic and my parents being Divorced were big obstacles to my acceptance)
There was another big problem, since VCSS was such a small school, they didn’t have semesters. If I attended, it would mean taking ALL of grade 8 over again. But even though it meant an extra year of school, I knew God wanted me there, so off I went to my first day at Vancouver Christian Secondary School.
At the other high schools I had been given identification numbers and was told to “NEVER forget your number or the computer wouldn’t know who you are”. But nobody from VCSS had given me my number. They just told me to start on a certain day and go directly to the school office upon arriving at the school.
The three days leading up to that my thoughts untamed:
“That’s it! Go to the office? No more information? Who do I talk to? I had never been in that school before, what if I can’t find the office? Maybe I could ask another student where the office is? What if another student isn’t around? What if the student I ask decides to hate me? What if on the way to the office I get beat up? Will they think I started the fight? They don’t know much about me. Will I have to leave this school too? I’m starting this school weeks late and it’s not the first day of school and I won’t know what classes to go to. Nobody gave me a class schedule. How will I know what class to go to? Who do I talk to about getting a class schedule? How will I explain that I’m a new student? What if they kick me out before I can explain I’m new? What if they find out I’m not a Protestant? I’ll just explain that I love Jesus and maybe they’ll still let me stay. What if they want to talk to my dad and I have to admit that my mom is divorced? How will I prove I was accepted into this school? I don’t have a receipt or acceptance sticker or anything. I don’t have one piece of paper saying I was accepted. I don’t even remember the name of the man who phoned and said I was accepted. I can’t even remember the name of anyone who was at my interview. Maybe Mom remembers the name of someone who was there. I could call her at work, but I’d have to go to the office to use the phone (*NOTE: before cell phones invented). But if I have to ask to use the phone in the office, I’m back to square one again and trying to find my way to the office.”
And on and on my mind rolled. The same thing it’s been saying and the way it’s been behaving for 42 years. The manic fear and worry that never gives me a break or a rest. Never a day off, never a holiday for 42 years!
I did arrive for my first day of school and I did find the school office. I went in the door and a pleasant lady said, “You must be Laura-Lee. We’ve been watching out for you.”
I blurted out, “I’m terribly sorry. Am I late? Nobody told me exactly when to be here. They just told me school started at 8:45am. I hope I haven’t caused any problems.”
She responded, “Oh. No, no, no. It’s only 5 minutes after 8:00. There’s lots of time. I just meant I’ve been looking forward to meeting you. I’ve heard a lot about you.”
I thought, “Oh no. She’s probably heard that I’m a trouble maker that gets involved in fights in bathrooms.”
The lady continued, “My name is Mrs. DeVries. I’m the secretary. Mr. Van der Kamp is in his office waiting for you.” Then she pointed at a shut door.
I had to walk around a counter, past her desk and then thought, “I hope I’m allowed to be behind this counter.”
I paused outside this Mr. Vander Something’s door, but didn’t know what to do next because it was shut.
“What should I do? Should I just go in? Should I knock and then go in? Should I knock and wait to be asked in?”
As I was debating all these options, Mrs. DeVries said, “you don’t have to knock. Just go right on in. He said to send you in when you came.”
Well, that problem was solved. On to the next …
I opened the door a crack and peeked inside. A dark haired man with a strange beard/gotee type of thing, looked up and saw me. He got up from his chair, came from behind his desk, shook my hand and motioned me to a chair. Then I remembered him from the night of the interview.
At that interview he had barely said two words the entire time. He had sat 2 chairs to my right and just watched me with his dark eyes. He looked like he was trying to analyse me or maybe read my mind. It had made me feel very queer. Now here I was stuck in a room with him and, apparently, he was the Principal of Vancouver Christian Secondary School.
He said a few words of greetings and small-talk and I figured he was probably trying to put me at my ease. Even without massive Fears, anyone’s first day at school can be a bit nerve-racking.
Then he sat up in his chair, laced his hands on his desk and looked straight into my eyes and said quite seriously, “Something of a mistake has been made!”
I thought, “Oh oh. Here it comes! He’s going to give me the boot. They had probably gotten my application mixed up with some good kid’s application and the mistake has just been discovered. Now they’re leaving it to Mr. Van der KAMP to tell me I have to leave”.
I felt so bad that I wouldn’t be allowed to go to this school that it almost physically knocked the wind out of me. But I can’t say I was totally surprised. That’s the way Life is: You think you’re up and then, BAM, you’re down.
Did I really think they would let ME go to this school: Homicidal father, Divorced parents, 'Sort-of' a Catholic, Born Again while watching a Religious TV Show, Not even Baptised yet, Couldn’t get past grade 8? It would have been a miracle just to have been allowed on the property. Of course they wouldn't accept me.
I decided I would make it easy on Mr. Van der Kamp and just quietly leave. After all, it wasn’t his fault they had made this mistake. He was just the guy who had to do the ‘dirty work’ because he had the misfortune of me sitting in front of him in his office.
Before I could get up to leave he said, “Apparently I forgot that your class is going on a field trip today. So there won’t be regular classes. Did you bring a lunch with you? Well. No matter. I’m sure someone will share with you.”
I sat there for a minute just blinking my eyes. I couldn’t get my brain to process what he was saying. “No classes? Field trip? Lunch? A walk in the woods? University of British Columbia? A car full of girls?” The man was making no sense at all. What did that have to do with me being kicked out?
He looked at me and could tell something was wrong. He said, “Don’t you want to go on the field trip, Laura-Lee?”
Now, to my credit. I did recognize my name. But when my mind shuts down I do a very strange thing. I blurt out the truth. He wanted to know if I wanted to go on a field trip at that moment so I answered, “No! I want to go home.” And believe me, at that moment it was the ABSOLUTE TRUTH! One minute I thought I was being kicked out and the next I’m going on a field trip.
Mr. Van der Kamp looked very concerned and leaned over his desk even closer towards me. He paused for a moment and did that “analysing/mind reading thingy” again and said, “What’s wrong? Why don’t you want to go on a field trip? I thought that’s what all students live for. You can tell me what’s wrong.”
To put it quite frankly, I was not used to anyone being that nice or straight forward. Especially not a stranger. I figured that if I didn’t get out of there soon I would make a bigger fool of myself by bursting into tears. And also, the sudden knowledge of going on a field trip with a bunch of kids I didn’t know and to a place I didn’t know sent my fear level right off the Scared Scale. I really, really did just want to go home. To be somewhere peaceful and quiet and try to get my Fears under some sort of control, because they were bursting out all over the place!
But instead, I gently replied to Mr. van der Kamp, “Oh, there’s nothing wrong. I just said that because I was nervous. Of course I want to go on a field trip. Sounds like a wonderful way to start at a new school.” (so much for blurting out the truth)
I stayed at Vancouver Christian Secondary School for 5 years of my life. Those teachers and kids that were so scary became like family to me, including Mr. Van der Kamp.
Five years later, only weeks away from graduation, my class startled me with a little Birthday surprise at the beginning of May. (with presents too!!) We sat around for a few minutes talking and the topic turned to my first day of school. My classmates had remembered it because I came a few weeks after the first of the year AND it was the Field Trip to the UBC Endowment Lands.
Ben (Kocsar) said he thought I was a new teacher. We all laughed at that. I asked him, “Why did you think I was a ‘teacher’?!”
He responded,“Well. You were wearing that blazer. I’d never seen a kid wear a blazer before.”
Karen (Ydenberg) said after seeing me that first day she started bugging her Dad to allow her to wear make-up, because I was wearing make-up.
There were still many people in my class who had been there on my very first day and to hear their first opinions of me was both funny and enlightening. It made me wonder if people really know what others are thinking about them. I don’t think any of my classmates knew how terrified I was on that first day with them. Or even that at the moment while we were remembering it, I was still living with all my massive fears.
Five years of your life is a lot to share with people, and we had shared it all with each other. Somehow we had gone from being fellow students to friends to family members to eternal family members. That only happens while travelling down a long road with many twists and turns, together.
The miracle, at that time, was not that the walls of Fear had fallen (because they hadn't), but that I had been able to love and be loved in spite of them.
My Prison of Fear fell only in 2009, yet it didn’t stop me from experiencing good things in the years before. Maybe that’s what it means to be a Christian and to know Jesus and have him in your life.
In Heaven, we expect everything to be great, to be peaceful, to be joyous. But if you know Jesus while on earth, then you don’t have to wait. He doesn’t take away all our obstacles but simply slips past them to give you tastes of what’s waiting for you. And the Eternal things are worth waiting for … even if you have to wait while in prison. Some Prison walls will fall here, while on earth. But others might not fall until we are out of these earthly bodies (which can also be prisons) and in our Heavenly Homes, ... Forever.
“ So if the Son sets you free, you will be free indeed. I know that you are Abraham’s descendants. Yet you are looking for a way to kill me, because you have no room for my word. I am telling you what I have seen in the Father’s presence, and you are doing what you have heard from your father.”
John 8:36-38 (NIV Bible)
