Fear to Faith Part 3

We lived only six doors from the front door of the Junior High School I was enrolled in for 7th grade.  Now I had a "home room" teacher and a teacher for all the different subjects.  My homeroom teacher was also my music teacher, who quickly noted that I was a very shy student and had to be encouraged to join the chorus.  She had tested me and noted that I could hold a note on key while sitting next to a different voice type.  That was the beginning of learning to deal with fear myself, as we often had to sing a part alone so she could know we were doing it right.
Shy, I said.  I was so shy that when encountering someone in the hallway I did not know well, especially a teacher, I looked away so as not to have to speak.  Although I did not choose my friends for their looks, I very much appreciated pretty faces as was the case with my cooking teacher.  She had asked me to stay after class one day in order to speak with me.  Oh boy!  My mind searched, while my heart raced, for something I might be in trouble for, but I could not find out what it was all about until after class.  That's when I learned that teacher had been offended by my avoiding her in the hall.  When I explained it was simply because of my shyness, she was very kind in encouraging me not to be fearful of speaking.
It was much easier to get through the three years at Junior High after that incident.  It helped also to be encouraged by my music teacher/homeroom teacher, (who knew my mother).  She had encouraged me to join the Girls Chorus and also the Choir and that helped my shyness somewhat.
However, a change of school buildings when entering High School revealed my shyness was not completely gone because my music teacher, who had also transferred to the same High School in the same year, wondered why I was not in her class.  Upon finding that I did not know how to get into the class or even whether I qualified, she offered to take care of it for me and did, so again I was in both the Chorus and the Choir.
The rest of my classes consisted of the usual Readin', 'Riting and 'Rithmetic' - English, History and Math along with Shorthand and Bookkeeping.  I had wanted to be a teacher or a nurse but my mother said Daddy wanted me to be his helper and I should take business courses to prepare for that, and I did.  But Daddy died in my senior year and my first job was as a dental assistant for $25 per week.  And it was not long after that I did end up in the business world where I have been most of my life.
This is about fear and its affect on my life.  More to come.