In my school days in my part of small-town and rural America, gender roles were set in concrete. Girls took Home Economics* (cooking in the fall, sewing in the spring) and boys took Vocational Agriculture (Vo Ag for short), even boys like me who had absolutely no interest in farming or agriculture. In our school district the "choose an elective" list was rather short. I took vocational agriculture for one year only, 9th grade, my first year of high school. I learned a lot, actually, and was a member of several teams at competitive interscholastic meets. Land judging, dairy cattle judging, beef cattle judging, hog judging, poultry judging, grading of eggs, you name it, I did it. You don't want to know how to determine whether a hen is a good layer of eggs; the answer has nothing to do with looking in the nest. I can still identify various breeds of cattle and hogs and chickens. My project for the year -- we all had to have one -- was raising a Hampshire pig whom (or which) I dubbed Lady Henrietta. At the end of the year my dad had her slaughtered and we enjoyed (if that is the right word) ham and bacon and pork for some time afterward.
*nowadays it's called Consumer Science.
After my 9th-grade year my electives included Typing, Shorthand, Concert Band, Marching Band, and Chorus. Although I wanted to take Drivers Education (my parents did not own a car), I could not because the only period Drivers Ed was taught conflicted with Band. As a result, I didn't learn how to drive a car until I was almost 22 years old; it happened after Ellie and I became engaged. I thought it would look rather strange for the bride to drive the car away from the church. Necessity is the mother of both invention and getting your rear in gear (to continue the automotive metaphor) when the occasion calls for it.
Boys never took Home Ec and girls never took Vo Ag. But boys took Typing if they wished even though most of the students were girls who aspired to enter the working world as secretaries. No boy in my school had ever signed up for Shorthand until I came along. I figured it would help me take notes in college in the days before cassette tape recorders, and I was right. What I took, in case you were wondering, was Gregg Diamond Jubilee Shorthand With Brief Forms. I can't remember if that was the actual name of the class, but it's how I remember it. I was valedictorian of the class of 1958, and the following year, when Tommy C. became the second boy in the history of the school to take Shorthand, he became valedictorian of the class of 1959. Whether there is a cause and effect there, I cannot say.
The shorthand stood me in good stead through the years, and most people seemed surprised that I knew how to do it. One of my supervisors at IBM, Jim P., wasn't surprised, though, as he had formerly been one of three male executive secretaries to Thomas J. Watson Sr., the founder and CEO of IBM. From what I understand, when an IBM executive traveled in the earlier decades of the twentieth century, it was a no-no for a woman secretary to travel with him. Hence, chaps like Jim P. were in demand.
In case you didn't notice, I'm just rambling with this post and going nowhere in particular.
Speaking of band, here's a photo of my youngest grandson, now a senior in high school, playing his trumpet with some of the members of his school's band. He looks very intense, and all grown up.
Finally, here's Mrs. RWP's latest creation, a crocheted baby blanket (it's the blanket that's crocheted, not the baby) for a young couple at our church. The color (British, colour) is not true because the photo was taken late in the afternoon in a room on the east side of our house. Although it appears to be almost lavender, it is in reality a beautiful shade of pink.
And now, for the big reveal, here it is unfolded:
Tomorrow would have been my parents' wedding anniversary, and the day after that is the day my wife's mother died in 1986 and our second grandchild was born in 1996.
I think I have run out of things to tell you.
For your reading pleasure, this post has contained nothing at all about either Aretha Franklin or Senator John McCain, which is all that has been on television this week in the good old U S of A.
See you next time.
