ℱerncrest - Crayons and Beyond

5 November, 2014
Houston

School memories are special for most people. They take us back to when things were bright and new. They take us back to when there was magic in the air!

These were the days of our innocence.

An old song said: "God bless little children, while they're still too young to hate."

Back then, before bombs, before gangs, drugs, before all too common school shootings, back before the so-called "real world" became preferable to an illusion of serendipity, we were sheltered, it seems, from life's troubles and sorrows.

These were days of innocence; Innocence is the purest form of honesty.

"The times, they were a-changing," and things were also also changing all around us, because we ourselves were: we didn't realize it back then, but we were growing and maturing.

Nursery rhymes turned into poetry.
Arithmetic became Modern Math.

As consequence of this maturation process we began to take notice of our classmates, and now looked upon them in a whole new light. They were different somehow. Little crushes and tales about who liked who ran rampant. The girls had truly gone "from crayons to perfume."

By the time it was all over, we had indeed gone a long way from "Run, Spot, Run!"

After Math, after Reading, after the books were all put away, I realized how innocent we all were back then. We walked outside and away from that school on the last day somewhat bedazzled by the brightness of the "real world." There was just so much of it to take in!

Childhood tales and biting nails gave way to the mysteries of life, and we would confront many a rough road ahead, roads that would require every bit of faith, courage, hope, stamina, and belief in ourselves in order to travel them and thus become ourselves.

The old school anthem was not just a song - it was a PRAYER: "Grant us the faith we need,
To carry forth the light,
Set burning in these halls
That we love best;
Confirm the hopes we hold:
That we will carry on
The lessons we have learned
Here at ℱerncrest!"

Imagine that: a PRAYER as a school song!

Somewhere between Fun with Dick & Jane, and Invictus we must have grown. Somewhere between milk-stained kindergartener's lips and "Teahouse of the August Moon" Eighth Grade plays, we gradually and by degrees developed those very qualities within ourselves that we needed to carry on those lessons. Our figurative training wheels came off of our bicycles, and we began to be able to chart our own separate courses through life.

In those days of innocence, we were told so many things which later we found to be untrue. However fictitious some turned out, it was not the things themselves, it was the BELIEVING in them that made a difference.

I believed; didn't you?

Between awkward first glances as very young children, and long, last looks as young adults leaving school for the last time, we began to believe not in fairy tales now, but in ourselves. Whether we developed this on our own, or whether we learned it in school, or a combination of the two, we did it.

Each of us walked away with different experiences, memories, and lessons learned, and each of us did our best in those years afterwards.

Those school days are far behind us, yet live inside us all. Every once in awhile it is pleasant to stroll down Memory Lane, and see ourselves as we once were, to remember those innocent times that all too quickly came and went.

This song sums it up!
I BELIEVED IT ALL
(Bergman / Hamm)

Jimmie F. Rodgers - 1967
The Sandpipers - 1967
The Pozo-Seco Singers - 1967

Mary had a little lamb
One and one make two
Candles on a birthday cake
Blow them out and your wish comes true
Does she love me does she not
Tell me daisy do

Oh to be a child again
Oaks from acorns grew
One and one make two
I believed it all
Didn't you?

I remember when every day began
Strawberry jam and laughter
And every story ended
With "happily ever after."
I remember feeling I'll never be safe
If I don't step on a crack
The days when the sun was up ahead
And the wind was at my back.

Mary had a little lamb
One and one make two
Candles on a birthday cake
Blow them out and your wish comes true
Does she love me does she not?
Tell me daisy do!

Oh to be a child again!
Oaks from acorns grew,
One and one make two,
I believed it all…

Didn't you?