Tears and Laughter: The fine divide between learning and living

I was a student in the Thomasville City School System from the time Mama enrolled me into Mrs. Agee’s kindergarten class in 1977 until I was 16. It was the end of the first six weeks of my eleventh grade year. I left Thomasville on a Friday afternoon and by 7:30 I was at a Chilton County High School football game.

For me at the time it was a bit like arriving in a foreign land. Their blue and orange colors never did seem to fit me like maroon and grey had, just like Chilton County never felt too much like home…mainly I guess because I wouldn’t let it. I thought the year and a half I had left before graduating would not be time enough to compare with Thomasville’s lasting impression, but in the end, I was wrong.

Chilton County was a county school with a larger student body than Thomasville. There was a more relaxed attitude toward practically all aspects of behavior. You could come as you were to Chilton County, as opposed to who you thought you were expected to be.

Even with all of that freedom, I never remember any of us standing forlorn out in the hallway uncertain of which restroom we should enter, and this was during the hair band era.

Besides, back then, if any of us had been troubled about it, Mr. Miller, our stern history teacher, who claimed to know military secrets and more, would have been happy to help steer us toward logic.

There was this one girl’s room where a lot of smoking went on, but the faculty was fully aware. The principal would sometimes stand outside the door singing, “Smoke, smoke, smoke that cigarette,” because breaks only lasted ten minutes, but the average guy would have been terrified to go in there. Chilton County redneck young women did not play that way in 1988. They had their own brand of protection and justice that had served them well for generations.

It was a different time though. Boys still kept hunting rifles in the gun rack attached to the back glass of their trucks out in the school parking lot. Few of them bothered to lock their doors. Mr. Miller’s classroom overlooked the parking lot. That was our security.

We graduated, finally, on a Friday night. It was May 24, 1990. It was also my eighteenth birthday. We wore the blue robes.

They held us in classrooms before it was time for the ceremony to start. There were 232 of us, and they separated us, the boys from the girls, and no students were unaccounted for or confused in this divide. Alphabetically, the girl in front of me was sick – nerves, she hoped – and the girl behind me was crying. She wished for just one more year. Between them, I was just ready for it to be over. Ready for whatever was next.

And so is life it seems. We are either so nervous we can’t enjoy it, wishing it would last a little longer, or rushing to get it over with so we can see what’s next. I guess the goal is to live each moment fully as it happens, accepting every experience prepares us for our next purpose.  Sometimes even with careful planning, it may feel like you are wearing some other team’s colors, but keep playing anyway. Winning, often, has a lot to do with how well you deal with change and adversity.

Amanda Walker is a columnist with The West Alabama Watchman, Al.com, The Thomasville Times, and The Wilcox Progressive Era. For more information, visit her on Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/AmandaWalker.Columnist.