Last night’s movie, The Man with Two Heads, was hysterically funny. Some people would have hated it for the same reasons we loved it. We laughed many times at the action, especially the chase scenes, and laughed the loudest at the ending. I won’t give it away in case the B-movie lovers among you haven’t seen it yet.

When I was in the seventh grade, I played CYO basketball. We traveled to other towns. My coach, a woman, had been a marine. She was a no-nonsense sort of coach who made us wear white high top sneakers to protect our ankles. Basketball for girls in those days meant three dribbles then pass, and you couldn’t cross the center line so I was stuck on one side of the court. I was a guard so I couldn’t shoot. It was frustrating.

On our schoolyard were two baskets. Every recess the boys played a sort of half court basketball at each of the baskets. It was an unspoken rule that the baskets were for the boys. The younger girls could jump rope while we older girls stood in groups and talked mostly about the boys. My fellow basketball players and I decided that we girls should have one of the baskets. I asked and was refused. It was a strange conversation between my teacher and me. I didn’t have a nun as there weren’t enough for every class so we had nuns every other year. Mrs. Corcoran was my teacher. She was the poster woman for teachers in the 1950’s with her modest clothes, mostly suits, and her old lady hair-dos from her once a week trip to the hairdressers. She came to my desk to explain, quietly, why I was refused. She asked if I had my friend yet. That was parlance in those days for having your period. I told her no and she went on to say that soon enough I would and probably wouldn’t want to play sports anymore after that. I was totally confused at the connection between the two. When I asked, she said it was because I wouldn’t be a little girl anymore. I’d be a woman. I was even more confused, and that’s where she left me.