First Day of School

I remember my very first day of school.  Kindergarten.  Fall of 1960.  I was four years old.  You could send a four year old to Kindergarten back then without being charged with abuse.  Ah, heck, he'll be five in January or so.

Lowell Elementary school.  It was an old red brick cube with hardwood floors polished smooth by the feet of four generations of urchins.  My mom took me to class that first day.  I recall going to the back of the room and looking at some cool things on a low, kid height table.  There was one of those little mummified alligators that people used to bring home from Florida vacations.  I thought it was so cool I picked it up and turned around to show my mom.

She was gone.

Oh well, no big deal.  So began my career in the groves of Academe.

And now 55 years later I am reliving the experience.  Its back to school for me.

My wife always used to take "first day of school" pictures of our kids on the front steps so I decided to indulge her a bit.  Since I was first off to machining class I donned safety glasses and hearing protection for the photo op.

I am happy to report that the nerdish glasses did not result in teasing by bullies.  They are standard uniform when machining.  Actually the machining class seems quite promising. A small group and mostly older mature students.  I imagine that instructors love to have a bunch of ex-military guys there to learn.  I came home to report that all the Cool Kids had tattoos and that I was considering getting some to fit in.

The computer modeling (Solidworks) class could be a little tougher.  It is a less "substantial" subject matter.  And a larger class.  My first sesssion there was mostly introductions but I had a moment of panic when I was unable to log onto my school account on the classroom computer. Now what was that damn login again?

Of course this is nothing more than a waking and updated version of that classic nightmare....you are at school and can't remember your locker combination.  But unlike most versions of that dream-horror I was, and remained fully clothed and just called home during a break to have my wife consult scribbled notes I had of course left behind.

I was able to manage a few Solidworks images.  They also looked scribbly and hard to read but we all have to start somewhere.