I grew up in the Appalachian mountains, so in the wintertime, we never suffered from any shortage of snow. Most days in January and February had a little snow, even if it was just flurries. But some days the sky would open and we’d get 6-12” dumped on us. Which was fine most of the time, because in this area, snow removal equipment is abundant, and rarely were you stuck at home unless you just wanted to be.
And as Eric mentioned in the earlier story, there were snow days built into the school calendar. The difference between his and my childhood though is that the snow days that were figured in here were most certainly all used up by the time the winter season was over. And you know what happened back in those “good old days” when we exceeded those snow days? We had to go to school on Saturdays to make up for lost time.
While I’m sure it sounds strange to any younger folks reading this, I’m a little surprised at just how many folks my age have been shocked when I’ve told them that we used to have to go to school on Saturdays back then to make up missed days.
And let me tell you, there was never any worse feeling for us kids than having to drag ourselves to school on a Saturday. If there was any saving grace to it whatsoever, it was the fact that it wasn’t a full day…or at least I don’t remember full days. While a normal school day ran from 8:30 to 3:30, a Saturday was 8:30 to 1:00 PM if I remember correctly. There are a lot of years between now and back then so you’ll have to pardon me if I remember that part incorrectly.
Looking back on it now, it was really a waste of the teacher’s time as no learning was ever done on a Saturday school session. We kids were too busy complaining to each other about the cartoons and/or wrestling shows we were missing that day to get anything productive done. And throw in the fact that gym class was still had and lunch got squeezed into the shortened day meant that the teachers had even less time to try to teach us anything.
As I sit here writing this, I can’t remember a single thing I learned on one of those Saturdays in school. But I can tell you about something I taught on one of those days…
In January 1987, we got such a snow storm at the first of the year, and several more snows that followed, we didn’t start back right after Christmas. It was the middle of January before we could go back. My family had just gotten our first VCR in late 1986, and when the first Saturday of school was on the schedule, I spent that morning trying to teach my Mom how to record on that VCR. I was intent on not missing my Saturday morning cartoons. I even left Mom a list of times, channels, and shows and expected her to run downstairs every half hour and flip the channel to the correct one to catch my shows. And she did a marvelous job and didn’t miss a single one love her heart.
I had that homemade VHS tape for years after that, but at some point, it got gone and I’ve never figured out what happened to it. But for the years that I had it, it was the only thing good that ever came from having to go to school on a Saturday in the winter.
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