You had Miss Grant as your teacher, didn't you?' wheezed my mother. "She's just died. Look. She pointed at the obituary notice in the local paper. Suddenly it all came back to me That first day at school my mother had left me in the playground, surrounded by other children all bigger than me. A whistle blew. The noise stopped and the children filed into the school building. I did not know which row to join so I simply followed a girl with pigtails. When I entered the classroom everyone looked at me. A large motherly lady took me by the hand and said, You're in the wrong class. You'll be in Miss Grant's class. Come on, I'll show you.' Miss Grant was tall and thin, with dark eyes and sallow skin. She had high-pitched nasal voice which made everything she said sound threatening. She pointed to a seat next to a boy with a runny nose. "Sit with George. He'll tell you what to do. Children, this is Joe Green. Say hello to him." I tried very hard to please Miss Grant but somehow everything always turned out wrong. In the autumn she drew a tree on a sheet of brown paper pinned to the wall. children.