School is over for the summer … at least for me! My last school visit was a week ago at the Third Street School in Los Angeles. On my way home, I recalled the little saying we chanted on the last day of school:

School’s out, school’s out,

Teacher let the mules out!

No more classes, no more books,

No more teacher’s dirty looks!!!

The end of school always included a district wide school parade, followed by a day at the wonderful old Forest Park Highlands amusement park. The memories are flooding in so I’ll have to do a separate post on the Highlands. The district took it over for the day. You could buy food there or bring picnics. And if your family wasn’t going, bus transportation was supplied. It was a rip-roaring close to the school year. The Highlands are long gone and so is Reavis School.

I loved school but I loved summer, too. More time for reading, bike-riding, swimming, jumping rope, playing hopscotch, playing board and card games and building imaginary worlds.  (I had a lot of those.) But I was always glad to go back to school in the fall because I missed my friends and I did like school.

 Even though I have plenty of writing to do this summer, I hope to get more reading done and enjoy working in my new kitchen.

Carole Koneff, the librarian at Third Street Elementary, wrote an epic poem that’s a lot better than the one about the mules. What a lovely introduction!

The Seven Wonders of the World inspired a lovely book

And lots of us decided to take a closer look

About a boy named Eben who went upon a quest

To find some local wonders and try to pass a test.

His dad threw down the gauntlet and in the space of just a week,

He had to decide the things that he would seek.

He had to scour the neighborhood and overcome some fears,

And on the way must endure the teasing of his peers.

And as he delved a little further and stuck to the task,

The wonders started happening, and then came thick and fast.

A doll that saved a person, a bookcase in the rain

A saw that scared the locusts, a table helping pain

A ship inside a bottle, a blind woman’s magic loom

A perfect miniature of the town that washed away the gloom

This book of seven wonders made us smile and want to cheer

And we are very happy that Betty Birney’s here

To talk to us of Eben and delightful Humphrey, too

And now I am just thrilled to introduce her to you!