The cycle of life can be realized by referencing the questions:
- what grade are you in now?
- when did you graduate?
- what class reunion will you be celebrating?
We have this common bond of the experience of school. Much has been written and sung about this experience from Gary (U.S.) Bonds’ “School Is Out” to Rodney Dangerfield’s hilarious movie “Back to School.”
Well, it’s September which signals the advent of school. Do you remember your first day of school whether kindergarten, first grade, junior high, high school, or college? How was it? When you think about it, so much of our lives were determined by the fickle finger of fate derived from school.
In the author Thomas Hardy’s writings, a major theme is “Hap” which is short for happenstance. Because of some coincidence, dilemma, or just plain good or bad luck, the course of a person’s entire life is changed. Other authors employ that crossroads technique making for a suspenseful story. Even as far back as wishing on Aladdin’s lamp, we see the effects of decisions.
Edgar Allen Poe wrote a short story called “The Monkey’s Paw” that dealt with making three wishes on the talisman of a monkey’s paw. The couple wished for $500. Soon there was someone at their door informing them that their son had been killed at the coal mine. In this bearer of incredible bad news hand was an envelope. Yes, as a form of a death insurance settlement, the envelope held $500. The couple refused to make the final two wishes, throwing the monkey’s paw into the fireplace.
From the retrospect of older age, we can see clearly what our school decisions have led us to friends, trouble, glory, spouse, job, etc. Because my last name started with a “D”, I became friends with other “C”s, ”D”s, and “E”’s. No “W”s, “Y”s, or “Z”s for me! Little did the system of sitting in alphabetical order know that it would bond me with Didlake, Daoust, and Callanan during those school days. I pitied the “A”s who yearly ran the risk of having to sit in the first seat and the “Z”s who were banished to the back. Especially in the early years of school to venture beyond the bounds of the alphabet would be difficult. “Don’t get out of your seat. Stay where you are.”
“We don’t need no education; we don’t need no thought control.” Besides the obvious grammar mistake which clearly proves that they do need some education, this refrain from Pink Floyd poses the reflection of what would any of us have done without the experiences of school and especially that hallowed first day. Where have those paths begun at school led you?
