9 Months Chained to a Desk

 

Of course, I’m talking about school. I’ve already dealt with this subject more than once, but with things starting up again, I started thinking about the positives. Not about Junior High or Senior High (AKA Junior Hell and Senior Hell) but about elementary school.

 

I never enjoyed or looked forward to school. Except for the libraries. Elementary, Junior and Senior all had good libraries. Books were my drug, my solace, my escape. And I did have a couple of friends I liked being with.

 

The best days of grade school were the first day and the last day. The last day is pretty much self-explanatory.

 

The first day was prepared for by buying new school clothes. I liked that part. Wearing those new clothes for the first weeks or so was nice.

 

First day meant a new box of crayons. Nothing beats the smell of new crayons. We also got a pencil and the new (to us) reader for the year. I loved the readers! We’d put our names in the front under the name of the last one who had the reader the previous year. Whether we read through the whole book in that year didn’t matter. I read the whole book on my own.

 

The first few days of the school year weren’t bad. The rot hadn’t set in yet. Days that included the teacher reading us a book or story were great. Doing art projects were great. The breaks for recess and lunch kept me alive. The teachers were fine. Never had a bad one in grade school. I’ve already written about the sainted Mrs. Vanderley and the sainted Mrs. Malloy.

 

And that’s about it. I will admit there were a few (very few) positives about Jr. and Sr. High. But not nearly enough to erase the mental scars. My 50^th HS Reunion is coming up next year. I haven’t decided yet if I really want to attend. There are some people I would love to see again. I have reconnected to a few on FB. We’ll see…

 

I wish with all my heart I had been as happy as those kids in the picture look.