Rogers Hall School - Splinters Yearbook (Lowell, MA)

Page 13 text:

. M Does Mourning Become Electra? ,C,,3,4r It's been two years since I moved to my modest flat, just another dark niche in the New York flatsarium. My only achievement in this dreary duration has been the loss of ten pounds-the result of seven flights up and limited food rations. 3 TNT- 'f reef- 'jiwupdj My name is Electra Osborn. Cnce upon a time I wal- lowed in opulence. Now I earn every morsel of my un- lovely livelihood. Each day I push through the milling sidewalkers like a checker staggering from square to square in an ingenious move. My destination: my job at Schrafft's where I'm employed as a waitress. This particular February day was bitterly cold, and as I gathered my light flannel coat about my neck, I felt as if this underprivileged state I was in was choking me. I was lonely and unhappy. The silver platter routine suited me far better when I was on the receiving end. The morning rush was the usual English muffin. Then one o'clock came. The fashionable luncheon crowd arrived. I went to the table at which two stately women were looking over the bill of fare. Filling the water glasses, I caught their excited talk of debutantes. My guess was that they were patrons. As I waited for their orders, the odor of a familiar perfume pricked my memory. It was the same perfume I had worn that last summer of opu- lencef' -Nostalgia struck- -Here come the tennis players walking across the green, green, oh so grmn grass courts. They come to my table to brag, oh so subtly, about their prowess. Vlfhat mar- velous men! Good set, Peter. Bravo! Bravo! Thank you. I play my best on Sunday mornings. Another balmy summer evening-splashy silk dresses-unpretentiously silk. The young set speaking wealth unpretentiously. Young men in madras jackets unpreten- tiously posed for the New Yorker. This is a typical evening on this planet of unpreten- tious prestige. Electra, may I interest you in a collins and my tales of mountain climbing in Chile? I'd love the collins. CBut do I have to have Chile with it?D But, of course, I listen because this is unpretentious climbing. Tea dances, balls, dinner parties-every time a new gown on a new date, and every idea, without fail, a CAPITAL one. Fall comes and its back to the most costly college in the East. I bid my dear summer friends farewell while my subconscious thanks them for their names. - Then everything slips away - On second thought I'll have the soup de jour. End of a flashback . . . reality . . . return to Schrafft's. The perfume took on the odor of society on the rocks. I scribbled their orders on my pad and swished through the swinging doors into the kitchen wondering if I really missed the unpretentious life . . . or had I just come down from the Chilean mountain tops? SUSANNAH OSBORN '65

Page 12 text:

The Cathedral You are standing there, dark and magnificent against the early morning sky. There is something forboding in your appearance. Are you hiding something-an unknown secret of the past? You have coolly examined all who have come here, all who have gazed at you and wondered the same as I. There you are, stiff and gaunt. Whether shrouded by mist or basking in sunlight, you are eternally the same. STEPHANIE STREET '65 Probing I-low is one able to freely express The climbing emotions of pure tenderness? How, in the presence of rule after rule, Can one become loving and loved by in school? What is love's future ln our heartless homesg While searching and futile, Within us it roams? How, in the span of the time we must spend, Can feelings root deeper than one heart can bend? How, through those long lonely cold winter days, Can love remain hidden, neath the deepest of haze? How, through the long lonely cold winter nights, Can love remain buried and still find the light? SUE BARON '66

Page 14 text:

Before the Weaver How the lovely, linen lawn, From the great, green flax is born. There in the fields it grows at dawn, But by nightfall is ready to be worn. Drenched, now dried are the inflexible stocks, Beaten and struck with interminable knocks. Then carded and combed like a maiden's locks. To the spinner next where the Fibers are drawn. Care must be taken, not a thread to be torn. Finally the one who's waited since morn, Weaves the lovely linen lawn. CINDY KELLER '66 X X 1, gf!! ' f f ,f AX ' , ' , , it yo F I ,fi A ' ,f l I -Q ? ,x ' ' V ' ff a ,ln , ffcf w f f l '- f ' 'f' ,if , ' ff ,I lf' E ,IJ l I , ' l i fl fl f if . - f' f 'I' 1 , . , 1 , f f 4 I 1. I I 1 , ' - 2 1 1 V 'M ' I 1 f 1' , V A ' Q ll lv lil ll W7 1 f lf .l'-uk' ' A, i ':