School Daze
Contrary to popular belief, August is the cruelest month.
Fall clothes are in the stores, while the dog days of summer still drag on. Like Tantalus, so close and yet so far…
It wasn’t always this way. When I was a kid, August meant that school was just around the corner. No matter what the weather was like outside, by Labor Day we were back in the 68 degree clime of the classroom, starting over with a blank slate. And while for most kids that was indeed a cruel thing, for me it meant the joy of back-to-school shopping: cabled sweaters and wool skirts and knee socks (though growing up in Texas I could wear those things for a grand total of, oh, two weeks in December before T-shirts went back into rotation), plus brand-new pencils and paper and crayons (the big box with the sharpener in the back, natch). Heaven knows my last year’s crayons were barely used — and the maize and raw umber ones, not at all — but boy did I throw a tantrum if I didn’t get a new box. Come to think of it, that’s how I act when my accountant tells me I can’t get yet another pair of black Jimmy Choo knee-high boots with three-inch heels every fall!
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