It's that time of year already...just 10 days left of school, baseball games start this week, and the tornado sirens are being tested. The school year has gone by so fast - Sully will be in 1st grade and Tucker will be in 5th. One more year until Middle School for him - there's a scary thought!
This year will be different as the school board has decided to change the elementary schools into 'Attendance Centers'. K through 2nd in our current school, and 3rd through 5th in the other school. It means that Tucker and Sully will be separated and Tucker will go over to the East side of town for school. Nobody wanted this and they told the public in the beginning that it was to save the school district money. That was a huge lie because it's not saving any money and it's actually going to cost more money. They initially said it would reduce staff, but that's not true either as the only people leaving are those that were already scheduled to retire, which I'm glad that nobody will be losing their job. We know it will cost at least $20k more to run the buses now - possibly more. It's not that it's a terrible idea; it will help towards eliminating the whole East side-West side thing, true, but I think the bigger bite in the butt is that our leadership never listens to us, and they lie to us to forward their agenda. Yeah, I like that the 5th graders won't be able to pick on the little ones, and the bullying may be a little easier to get under control, but a bully is a bully and it will still happen. There's something to be said for having an older brother or sister around to help a little one out when they need it. I feel for the responsible adults of multiple children that will be spread all over town in different schools! Getting their kids to school will be less than fun. Not everybody likes to utilize the bus system - a lot of bullying goes on while riding the bus, and the kids learn a lot of new words. Yay! Isn't that what we all want??
We had our first tornado watch of the season last night. This morning there were a lot of trees down due to straight line winds - dodged a few of them on my way to work - down trees, that is. Yesterday was the funeral for a cousin of mine - my dad's niece. I have some awesome memories of her and my mom. They were close and always had a lot of fun together. Sandi, even though she stood a little over 5 feet, was larger than life, and as her brother said at the service, she walked around with rainbows in her pockets. (an old Elvis song) No matter what happened in her life, she kept fighting, and nothing got her down for long. Her son, Todd and I used to be really close, and then as happens a lot, we drifted our own ways and got out of touch. It was really good to see him again. Painful, yes - still pretty fresh for me, so seeing him like I was not too awful long ago, one of the walking wounded, was tough. It was like looking at myself just a little over a year ago. But still, we got to visit a little and reconnect, and it was great to have my friend again. We've added each other on Facebook, got emails, compared phones-he has an iPhone (awesome!) - so keeping in touch will not be difficult.
There's a line from the movie Sandlot that I like that makes me think of Sandi.(it could actually be a quote of Babe Ruth, but I don't know for certain) "Heroes get remembered. Legends never die." She was a hero to some of us, but most definitely a legend.
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