Things Change
Another item came off the “bucket list” this past week. It wasn’t one of the “big ticket” items, but it surely fit the criteria for the list. To be fair, this item was not on the list prior to last week because I did not realize it was possible.
I was born in northern Colorado. I attended one elementary school starting in Kindergarten and continuing through 6th grade. I attended one junior high school, grades 7th through 9th. I attended two high schools. The two high school thing was not because of anything my family or I did, the town opened a new high school my senior year and shipped me over there. If you think that’s crazy, I can name 5 other people that were with me every step of the way. Some I am still in contact with weekly, today.
I could possibly think of more, but that would become too tiring and I need to write this darn story.
I walked, (or rode my bicycle) to school until one of my friends was old enough to drive. It was about a mile to my elementary school, 3/4 of a mile to my junior high school and two miles to my high school. My senior year high school I drove to get to school.
Kids today ride busses to school, or their parents drop them off. (Ivy is screaming at me now. She walked to school, also. She opened the gate in our back yard and was on school property She thinks it was a rough, ”Back in the Day”. “Back-in-the-Day” translates to “the Olden Days” in my generation.) The only time I rode a school bus, was for field trips. You know, like to the state capital or something like that.
I really don’t mind not having ridden the school bus much. It seems to me the seats were hard and the driver was always yelling for the kids to “sit down and be quiet.” Now that I think of it those bus rides might have been my introduction to “construction language.” No, that would be wrong, Brad started “construction language”.
During my school years we had some tremendous snow storms. We walked to school in storms. It was really bad if Mom decided to take us in the car. There was no way she was going to keep me and my brothers home, Did you get that? Me and my brothers, five of us! We had very few “snow days”. This was Northern Colorado and it can snow here, and you just go about your business when it does.
NOT ANYMORE!! Here comes the “bucket list” item. School was cancelled Friday because it was too…………..HOT! Yep, here in Northern Colorado we cancelled school because it was too hot. Last spring school was cancelled because of deep snow and cold. Today’s kids are really lucky.
The district announced kids were passing out in class from the heat. If they had told my mother I passed out from the heat, she would have told them to put me back in my chair, and when I woke up tell me I was now behind in class and had better catch up!
Ok, this is a stretch to take this off my “bucket list”, but I didn’t need to help with homework or take the kids to school. Years from now when someone mentions, “Hey, do you remember when they cancelled school because it was hot?”, I’m just going to say, “Yep!”
I’m not totally unsympathetic to the kids sitting in class while it was hot. I was outside with dozens of construction workers building houses. They just drank water.
Our Crazy Lives!
Monner