It’s late morning here in Lithia, Florida, on Tuesday, June 13, 2013. It’s a sunny early summer day in the Tampa Bay area; it’s warm (86°F/30°C) but it feels warmer, and it’s going to get hotter as the hours tick by. Today’s forecast calls for mostly sunny skies and a high of 93°F/33°C.
Today I woke up thinking that 40 years ago on June 13 – which fell on a Monday – I began my last half-week as a high school senior at South Miami Senior High School (one of the settings in both my novella Reunion: A Story and my first novel – currently a work-in-progress – Reunion: Coda). As I recall, on June 13, 1983, students and faculty members who had ordered their yearbooks during the first semester ordering period had a chance to get their copies. It was also Finals Week, so the schedule was turned topsy-turvy so that the exams could be administered during the first two periods of the school day.
If memory serves – and sometimes it doesn’t – the finals schedule for the week looked like this:
- Monday, June 13: First and Third period
- Tuesday, June 14: Second and Fifth period
- Wednesday, June 15: Fourth and Sixth period
I won’t bore you with exact details about my class schedule in 12th grade, or which finals I took on that Monday. I will say, though, that I had ambivalent feelings – about the exams, about this being the last week of school, and about the future in general. On one hand, I was relieved that, for a while at least, I wouldn’t have to wake up at 5 AM in order to get ready to catch the 6:15 AM bus to South Miami High anymore, or that I’d have to take Algebra I in Ms. Castaneda’s class ever again.[1]
On the other hand, I have always been averse to change, at least when it comes to change that is life-altering. As much as I disliked some of the subjects we were taught, or the way that some of the ones I liked (like American history) were presented to us students, I liked my predictable routine. I felt safe and secure knowing where I would be between 7:15 AM and 2:30 PM Mondays through Fridays, and as the Last Day of School neared, the sadder and more apprehensive I became.
One thing I do remember vividly about that June day in 1983 is that the weather matched my mood; the day began, as most early summer days in Florida do, with variable cloud conditions, but as the day progressed, the weather deteriorated, and by the time the dismissal bell rang at 2:30 PM thunderstorms had moved in over Dade County, making my last Monday as a high school student cold, wet, and depressing. We couldn’t hear the hissing sound of the falling rain outside, but we could – and did – hear the loud cracks and booms of thunder through the school building’s thick concrete walls.
I’m remembering this not just because the contrast between then and now is so stark (the day of the week is off by one day, and I now live over 250 miles away from what was my home in South Florida), but because since Reunion: Coda is split between two different periods of my “I-guy” Jim Garraty’s life, I must tap into the well of memories, especially in the chapters set during Jim’s high school years.
Fortunately, Chapter Ten is not set in 1983 – the last scene that takes place in South Miami High School describes events from January of that year, nearly six months before the events chronicled in Reunion: A Story – so I probably won’t be thinking about “40 years ago today” for at least another week or so.
And speaking of Chapter Ten, I need to wrap this up so I can take a short break, eat an early lunch, and do a few other things before tackling today’s novel writing tasks. So, until next time, Dear Reader, stay safe, stay healthy, and I’ll catch you on the sunny side of things.
[1] It’s not that I didn’t like Ms. Castaneda as a person; she was a young first-year algebra teacher and a distractingly attractive one at that. She was nice and tried to be accommodating to students who, like me, struggled with the subject. My problem with Algebra I was that I did not understand the material, and no matter how hard I studied or how much extra help I received from either my fellow students or Ms. Castaneda herself, I never grasped the basics of variables or algebraic equations. (It also didn’t help matters that my Algebra I instructor was young and, well, hot.)
A Certain Point of View, Too 
Comments
8 responses to “Musings & Thoughts for Tuesday, June 13, 2023, or: It Was 40 Years Ago Today…(A Tempus Fugit Story)”
My problem was with geometry. Good post.
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I never did get better at algebra. I attempted to take an “introductory” course during my first semester as a college freshman but dropped the class after the first week. After that, I tried taking remedial math twice: the first time I stayed enrolled for an entire semester…and failed. The second time I signed up for RemMath, I had a panic attack and dropped the class right after the first class.
Of course, once I had earned most of my required credit hours for my AA in journalism/mass communications, I only had NINE credits left to get my degree. They were, however, all mathematics credits. I don’t know if I could have requested some kind of waiver; I never did investigate it. But I was frustrated and worn out (I had been in college for four years.), and I suspected that I would not pass any of the three math courses required for an associate degree, so I bailed on the college experience. I’m still sad about that, because (a) I was a good student in both my major and minor (history), and (b) I still don’t “get” algebra.
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I made it through college with out taking much math. It wasn’t my thing either.
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I still feel…disappointed that I’m nine (!) credits shy of my AA degree. Back then (1985-89), to earn an associate degree in my field, “all” I needed to graduate was earn 62 credits (I have over 111) and pass the College Level Assessed Skills Test (CLAST).
To my chagrin, the few times I’ve talked about why I dropped out of college after trying so hard to get good grades and earn those credit-hours, most people will ask, “Well, why don’t you go back and take those classes now that you’re older?”
I hate that question, and the implication that maybe now that I’m 60 (!) I can understand mathematical concepts that I could not when I was 22-26. Like, do people not understand what a learning disability is, even?
“Oh, c’mon. You just don’t like math. Maybe it’s an attitude problem. Go into it with a more positive outlook.” (Actual “advice” I once got from someone who is naturally good at math.)
Um, no. I took quite a few courses I did not enjoy (Health and Nutrition, aka Phys. Ed, Social Environment, Survey of Radio and TV Broadcasting) but passed because I understood the subject matter. I didn’t hate them, mind you, but I was going to go into print journalism, not TV or radio, and I wasn’t keen on taking PE in the summer, but I did it anyway.
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I understand about your issue with math. i have the same problem. I avoided the subject.
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It’s amazing you remember the weather on your last day in high school. A thunderstorm developing. I know Florida has a lot of Thunderstorm and here in north Texas we do as well, with large hail and tornado bonuses. We’ve had a thunderstorm almost every day lately including right now. My dog Rollo is scared to death. Yesterday grapefruit sized hail fell on a Dallas suburb.
In high school I had an easy time with any type of math, algebra, calculus, but my problem was English (as a second language). I had bad grades and when I first arrived in the US as a college level exchange student I could barely speak any English. Well I struggled a bit with Swedish as well, and now I have a hard time learning French, so I think it is languages is general.
It’s a nice photo from South Miami High
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I remember that Monday 43 years ago this well because I got soaked to the bone – too long a story to tell in one comment; suffice it to say it involved a mishap with a car muffler, an attempt to mitigate the mishap in a South Florida torrential downpour, and a long, slow drive from school to my house in a friend’s car. Plus, even though I do not recall what we had for lunch that day, I do remember my state of mind.
And, actually, it wasn’t my last day of high school. It was the first day of a shorter-than-usual school week; we still had classes on Tuesday the 14th (which I always thought was THE last day of school, and that’s the day that is the main setting for Reunion) and on Wednesday the 15th. I should have read some of my yearbook inscriptions (many of which were dated) a bit more closely.
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Oh I see. Thank you for the clarification. State of mind is an important one. I’ve read we remember feelings much better than facts.
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