My school is back in session and I keep getting asked if it’s awful to go to class in the summer and I really don’t have a problem with it. I mean it’s not like I’d be at Great Adventure if I weren’t in school. I’d be at work like everyone else except for all my teacher friends who are off for the summer. But they probably aren’t at Great Adventure either and don’t even want to be considering it’s swarming with all the kids they waited all year to get away from.
I’m fully enrolled again after having to take last semester off due to my broken arm (see Indiana Wants Me and several subsequent entries) and I couldn’t be happier. Well, yes, I could. I had finally advanced to Group C but now I’m back in D because of my injury and also because the school added a Group E to handle increased enrollment. So technically I’m in the same place as always – the hungry bottom. Better known as Group D. I predict they will ultimately name this group after me, as in: A, B, C, OSV, E, etc. It has a nice beat but you can’t dance to it.
I know I’ve been evasive about detailing the new career I’m being trained for, but I am a big fan of anonymity and there aren’t many schools anymore that give this instruction. I’ve mentioned that it’s a very intense program that results in an associate degree and accreditation from a national association. Graduates can work anywhere in the country without having to be licensed in each individual state. Women make up 75% of its membership and it is a very old profession without being the world’s oldest profession. Hopefully, it pays as well as that one. The general public seems to think it does.
When people find out what kind of school I’m in they always have the same response. Something along the lines of, “Wow, I hear those people make a ton of money,” or “My aunt’s neighbor’s sister was one of those and she made a fortune,” or “Holy shit, you’re gonna rake it in!” I always just smile and nod and think about the fortune I would give to just make it to Group B.
Our plan is for me to be done with my training about the time Husband is ready to cut back on his work and either retire or be a consultant in his field. My school advertises that it’s a two-year program which is pure fiction in my case, but I don’t get discouraged. I keep remembering a letter to Ann Landers I read in the paper many years ago in which a reader said she was 55 and wanted to go to college but lamented it would take four years and she’d be 59 when she graduated. Ann Landers responded, “And how old will you be in four years if you don’t go to college?”
Eventually, I will get out of D. I will look back from the security and satisfaction of Group A and marvel at all the frustration I endured. And in the meantime, when people ask Husband what he plans to do when he retires, he tells them, “First, I buy a big rake.”
Daughter’s Featured Fotos showcase a Sampler of Artists
el celso
infinity
new york 221
scared wild thing