School starts Aug. 7, and for the children of Watauga County that’s probably two months too soon. While parents might disagree, it’s hard to argue with a child’s logic, especially when the child’s favorite color is ice cream. Summer rocks, and when playing is your only responsibility, no other season can begin to compare. But among the protesting, complaining, kicking and screaming that goes with “back to school,” there is sometimes a shred of anticipation for seeing old classmates, meeting new ones and testing the waters of a teacher’s patience. Good or bad, we all have memories of going back to school. Here are some of our favorites.


Frank Ruggiero: Those Darn Pants

 

If uniform pants came folded like so, one’s legs had to bend accordingly to fit.

Having attended Catholic school from kindergarten through eighth grade, which my friends say explains a lot, I grew accustomed to wearing uniforms with material and flexibility akin to particle board. No joke. Jabba the Hutt on a steamroller couldn’t flatten the creases on those pants, and a year’s worth of washing and drying did nothing to soften their abrasive texture. By eighth grade, we were convinced they were the devil’s trousers, or Satan’s Slacks, as the kids with thesauruses would say. Furthermore, the administration would not allow any comfortable imitations, and we were penalized if caught wearing Dockers, an act still punishable in certain circles.

So, summer vacation was not only a time for shenanigans and outdoorsy goodness, but also a time to appreciate the things we took for granted, like clothes that breathe and fold. Not to sound like a Jockey commercial, but we enjoyed the freedom. It was with heavy hearts and a most unpleasant chafing that we returned to school.

Cara Kelly: The Back-to-School Proxy

Cara’s addiction to back-to-school supplies proved nearly fatal when she tried to smoke a ruler.

My favorite part of going back to school every year, if I had to choose a good aspect of my beloved summers

ending, is by far back to school shopping. After attending catholic school for nearly all of grade and middle school, I entered high school and was no longer confined to hideous plaid skirts and polo shirts that did not breathe.

I went on an enormous back to school clothes shopping binge that continued every year until my senior year at ASU. In addition to clothing, I have a weird passion for school supplies. Most likely a result of obsessive compulsive personality traits, I love purchasing new notebooks, pens and organizational supplies. As anyone who has walked by my cubicle can tell you, my agenda is color coded and everything has a specific file or folder. I was so distressed after graduating college at the thought of never again going on the ritualistic back to school shopping trip, I went to Staples a few days ago and purchased a new agenda, a Rolodex and a good set of pens for my cubical.

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Melanie Davis: Hazed and Confused

The freshman in “Dazed and Confused” had it a lot worse, but Melanie still dreaded high school.

The most memorable moment in my school history was the transition to high school as a freshman. I was more than a little nervous.

To understand this anxiety, you must understand the layout of my high school. The building is situated on top of hill, with the road circling the building and down to the main highway. This created an area referred to as the “bowl.” The area was flat in the center with a fairly steep slope rising up to the school.

Freshman hazing was alive and well when I started high school. Think “Dazed and Confused” but without the paddles and ketchup. Since the school’s opening in the early ’70s, incoming freshman were often pushed over the hill by upperclassmen into the bowl during the first week of school. Grass stains and slight bruising ensued.

When I began high school in 1996, the hazing ritual had lessened among the girls, but still occurred. The guys were more often the victims and increased patrol by teachers interfered.

I will admit to being quite the nerd in school, therefore more nervous about the impending roll down the hill. Generally speaking, the “cool” kids were not often tossed by upper class men. They were welcomed more openly into the fray.

I am happy to report, though I went prepared in clothes that had seen better days, I was not pushed over the hill. It did help that at 5 foot ten inches tall, I could look down on several of the girls who might have considered the ritual valid in my case.

I was the victim of the less threatening ritual of having pennies flipped at me for venturing down the wrong hallway during lunch. Otherwise, that first week went smoothly and I eventually settled into high school sans the grass stains.

Bill Greene: The First Weekend

 

Bill and his classmates were naughty on the school bus. Very naughty.

Like many kids, I always hated the last couple of weeks before school started. It meant that my care-free days of wandering around the neighborhood looking for hideaways and objects usually belonging to someone else to incorporate into my imaginary worlds was coming to an end. Soon, there would be discipline, structure and truly awful attempts to pass along hard plastic trays of nutritious but largely unappetizing displays as lunch.

Yet all of us experienced the butterflies that first morning when you awoke to the crickets and low-lying fog that may have been missed during the summer slumbers. Instead of leaping out of bed into my tattered clothes and making short work of a bowl of Cap’n Crunch before darting out into the world, I would swing my feet to the floor and slowly trudge off to the shower. If there were highlights, they were things like finally being able to wear the crisp new clothes without my mother’s threat of bodily injury, and the smell of the brand new notebooks, and a small handful of new No. 2 pencils. Most of these things were soon lost or traded for the remaining portion of a Twinkie.

My favorite thing about going back to school was being able to see my classmates and to hear of their adventure-laden summers, as well as any other riveting lies we could come up with. In our pre-teen years, I can remember being horrified that all the giggly little girls now towered over me like they had been fed fertilizer all summer. Still, with all these wonderful memories, I have to say that the very first Friday afternoon bus ride home is still my favorite back to school memory.