Article January 19, 1981 Issue

THE STANDARDS ARE WORTH IT

Lona Ingwerson

I remember that day like yesterday. I was twelve or thirteen, which I'll admit was not the happiest time of my life. I wanted very much to be popular, but I always felt so "out of it." I thought my clothes were a disaster; I never knew just what to say, especially to boys, and I was sure everyone thought I was a square. Once in a while my mom would remind me that these were the happiest days of my life and that I should enjoy them. I thought, "If these are the happiest, I'd hate to see what's coming."

On that particular "happy day" I'd forgotten my gym clothes, so the athletics instructor made me play baseball with my school dress on. It was pink and blue, a fact I would have forgotten long ago, had it not been for Barbara. As I turned the corner at third base, I heard her holler from the side, "Look at the pink and blue elephant!" That was it. I felt rather elephantine and clumsy anyway, so her comment hit home.

"What do you do about something like that?" I asked myself. "Smack her in the mouth?" No. I pretended I didn't hear it and just kept running. I then did a bit of soul-searching. Why didn't I go back and tell her off? I couldn't. Why not? It wasn't the way I had been taught to handle petty meanness. I had gone to a Christian Science Sunday School since I was a toddler and had been reminded time and again that when people say or do unkind things, you turn the other cheek. That was what Christ Jesus had told us to do,^{See Matt. 5:39 .} and Christian Science had taught me to follow his teachings. So, I turned the other cheek. (It was just as red as the first one.)

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