[Mikendebbie]

6th grade was in Jr. High and it was the first time each class was in a different room…the bell would ring and I would run to my locker to get the book for the next class. It was in the original high school building - a grand old 3-story building built in 1928 I think. I thought “I’m getting somewhere now - I’m a big kid!” I particularly enjoyed diagraming sentences in 5th period English class. I made good grades in science and math, and I still use those basics in my job for the past 40 years. I wish I had been able to take wood shop, car mechanics, welding and Ag - but my sports took up that time. I started off going out for every sport but dropped one sport per year when I figured out that I was not gifted in that area. Basketball was first victim. Did you know you have to run AND dribble at the same time? Then it was track - then baseball. I settled on football and tennis.

Lynwood’s .22 caliber story reminded me of a something. In early summer after 2nd grade, my neighborhood friends and I found some .22 cal short bullets (somewhere? Now I don’t remember how we got them). Took them to my house and I got my dads hammer, put one on the concrete driveway and I hammered down on the butt end…loud bang and the hammer flew out of my hand. That was cool - let’s do it again. We took turns until the bullets were gone. We thought it was like caps. To this day I have no idea how none of us got hurt or where those bullets landed.