School's last day

That was always a big day when I was a kid.

Of course, the Last Day of School was usually in June back then - not mid-May like it is on many college campuses. And the day before the Last Day of School was usually a day for cleaning out lockers and returning textbooks and generally settling things up so school could end. The Last Day of School was usually a half-day (or at least I remember it as being one). We did relatively little...some years there was an assembly, some years they did awards. Then, the buses picked us up and took us home.

I remember a couple of years - especially years when my route had Mr. Barlow as a bus driver - the driver would take the route in reverse. He'd drop off the kids who normally got dropped off last, first. I was usually towards the end of the route for pick-up, so that meant I was usually one of the first off, except for that last day. I didn't really MIND it - for one thing, it was something different. I got to see streets and parts of the subdivision where I normally never went.

And then there was that last bit, where he pulled up in front of my house, and the neighbor kids and I ran off with a "thank-you-Mr.-Barlow" called to him as we sped out the door. And then it was SUMMER.

Summer meant a lot more when I was a kid than it does now. I suppose that's true for any adult, regardless of whether you have a career where you work summers or not. (I'm guessing some schoolteachers and some college professors, and school support staff, are about the only ones who don't. And even then, a lot of them do part-time work in the summer).

I remember how that last day of school, summer felt like it would last FOREVER - that there were so many possibilities, so many things I could do...there was playing to do, and stuff to make, and pictures to color, and games to play with the neighbor kids....there was that wonderful magic of those first days of summer.