Stan Mayra
I grew up in a mining town in the west called Butte, Montana. Our community was about 50 thousand people when I was growing up. It had a reputation for having the friendliest people around, but also the “toughest” people too. Butte attracted many ethnic groups in the late 1800’s and early 1900’s that immigrated from all over the world, mostly from Europe. My grandfather was one of those immigrants who came over from the “old country” as they used to say, to work in the underground mines and raise a family. Grandma and Grandpa raised three daughters, the youngest of which was my mother, June. My folks (June & Stan) have been married for 60 years and that would be a whole other very interesting story.
Many of these ethnic groups were of the Catholic faith. Butte had eight elementary schools and one high school serving this large Catholic population. By the time that I was 15, I had gone through eight years of Catholic school and played baseball for 9 years in the local little leagues. My Dad was quite a baseball player in his day and had even played some pro ball after WWII. So, he had me out in the yard playing catch at a very early age. If you have ever seen the movie, “Field of Dreams,” the relationship between the main character, Kevin Costner, and his Dad was similar in many ways to my Dad and me. Also, I played on the St John’s basketball and football teams and had the reputation of being a pretty good student too. Much to the chagrin of my peers, I was voted Catholic boy of the year in the 8th grade. My friends knew of my darker side and found it hilarious that I received this recognition.
Anyway, after graduating from 8th grade, I was excited to go to Boy’s Central High School. This was a Catholic high school and at that time the boys and girls had their separate schools. From the time we were little guys, we had wanted to participate in sports for Central and play in the annual cross-town rivalry football game against Butte public school. Along with going into high school, I was really nervous about 9th grade initiation. I heard many rumors about some of the things that we might be required to do and I remember having great feelings of dread. I also started to notice that most of the girls seemed to be interested in a few select guys and I wasn’t in that particular group. Also, when I was 15 I failed my first class ever. I couldn’t believe that I got an F in Algebra. This was a great shock to me because I had always gotten good grades. I had to go back and get some tutoring from my 8th grade nun, Sister Mary Erna. She helped me out and got me back on track. A few years later, Sister gave up the nun’s life and married my friend Al Schumacher’s Dad. We gave Al a lot of grief over having an “ex-nun” for a stepmother, but it taught me that people could decide to make very difficult and courageous choices.
If you looked at me from the outside during this time of my life, I suppose you would think that everything was going pretty well. In some ways I guess it was. I had very caring and loving parents, good relationships with most of my peers and some success in my sports and academics. However, inside myself, I had always carried around a lot of guilt, shame and insecurity. I was always big for my age and carried extra weight. I was greatly embarrassed if I had to take off my shirt. As I was growing up, some peers, older teens and adults had pointed out my weight problem and some used those mean schoolyard sayings like “fatty, fatty two by four, can’t get through the kitchen door.” It might sound funny now, but it really hurt. I began to judge myself negatively at a very early age. I felt like I just didn’t really measure up and that I would never be as strong, fast or handsome as some of the other guys my age. I felt ashamed about other things too. There were things that you just couldn’t talk about with your parents or anyone for that matter. People that I knew then didn’t really talk much about feelings or thoughts. So for all these kinds of personal painful things, you had to pretty much keep to yourself.
I guess what I would say that being 15 was a strange mixture of excitement, guilt challenge, anxiety, humor, insecurity, camaraderie, fear, and loneliness.
When I look back, there were several people that helped me directly or indirectly at this time. I must say again, that my parents and other family members always conveyed their love and support for me. I just wished that they could have been more skillful in talking about thoughts and feelings. I had two great friends in high school that really made a difference for me too. We did many things together including sports and clubs. We also did our fair share of laughing and clowning around both in and out of school. Having good friends that accepted you was very reassuring and made some of my internal pain easier to cope with. In addition to my friends, I had several teachers that were supportive and encouraging. One teacher in particular that I really enjoyed was an Irish Christian Brother (Brothers are the male versions of nuns) named James Farrell. He was from New York City and was very different from many of the adults that I had met to that point. He was very intelligent, witty and had a very fiery personality. He coached our freshman football team and taught several classes in our school. He was the first teacher that really got us boys to think and wonder about things. I was in high school during the latter part of the Viet Nam war. These were very difficult times in our country, not unlike what is happening on today’s scene in Iraq. So the war and related topics came up frequently in class for discussion. He presented some ideas and perspectives that I had never considered before. I remember being profoundly excited for many reasons and sometimes greatly confused. For the first time, I began to feel that things might not be what they seemed and that there might be many ways of looking at things. There was a revolution taking place inside me, but nobody but me knew about it. I think I must have felt like people who had always thought that the world was flat when they got the news that really the world was round. Wow! What a shock.
I was very fortunate to have run into many people like Brother Farrell in the years to come. Many were teachers who really cared about their students and instilled the love of learning and questioning.
It’s very difficult to figure out what you want to do to make a living in this life. Making money is one thing, but liking what you do and still making a living is what we should all strive for. I didn’t know what I wanted to do at 15, but if you would have asked me I guess I would have told you that I wanted to be a professional baseball player. I was pretty good, but I didn’t really visualize that for myself. What I was learning about myself was that I enjoyed reading and thinking about things and that I also liked being with people and sharing my thoughts and feelings. I was able to experience a variety of work experiences in my teens and early 20’s as I continued to go to school. I worked in underground mines, open-pit mines, lumber and plywood mills, clothing stores, etc. I enjoyed these experiences, but I knew that none of these jobs was really where my heart was. I knew that I would have to work with people in a more direct, personal way. I eventually chose a helping profession and have found myself working with young people of all ages. I eventually received a degree in Guidance and Counseling and have worked in the field of drug/alcohol and violence prevention. I am excited because the things that I have always thought to be most valuable like positive relationships, caring and connection among people is now being recognized as what is really needed for our young people to thrive in their lives. In my small way, I hope that I have contributed to making the world a more caring place. This is something that all of us can do every day in many different ways. So I challenge you to always respect and love yourself, to follow what your heart tells you is right, and to never give up no matter what.
