SUMMER SCHOOL MORNINGS

It's summer....which means only one thing around the Fuller household....summer school college classes! After each of my children finish their sophomore year of high school I have them on the fast track by taking summer school classes for college credit. English, Psychology, Religion, Math......and this year, SPANISH !

Anabeth and Ace are taking a six week summer session of Spanish I together at our local community college. They each have had some Spanish at their high school, but as we all know, college Spanish is entirely different. If taking a Spanish class wasn't bad enough, they are signed up for the 8:00 a.m. section! Anabeth is NOT a morning person in her first language so she is NOT happy in her second language...Spanish! Ace just doesn't like school, so the time of the class isn't the problem....the class is the problem.

Ace's real conflict with the class is that it is 3 1/2 hours long with only one short break. About 45 minutes into the class, his stomach starts to grumble (I am guessing that the desks were shaking and the noise was deafening). Ace generally eats about every 1 1/2 to 2 hours. He is a growing boy. He had packed honey nut cheerios in a ziploc, but break time could not come quickly enough. Which reminds me of when he was little and would come home from Vacation Bible School with a string of yarn tied loosely around his neck. Seems it was Fruit Loop Necklace day and Ace never got home with as much as Fruit Loop sugar dust on his shirt. The teacher said that, while he did eat numerous handfuls while he was stringing the fruit loops, he did manage to make a necklace. There was just nothing left of it after 30 minutes. Somehow constructing a cereal necklace to be eaten later did not appeal to a young boy who was hungry NOW.

Anabeth is fresh from high school Spanish 2 and is coaching Ace who is a little rusty on his Espanol. The funniest part of my day now is listening to the two of them exchange stories of the other unlucky kids who are taking an 8:00 a.m. Spanish class in the summer....no one's idea of fun. But misery does love company and I am hoping that they each will later in their lives draw from these experiences and determine that nothing is quite as bad as "that summer we took 8:00 Spanish."

So Ace's bag of Cheerios was the envy of the entire class and I am guessing that more students (boys) show up with sustenance tomorrow. Ace is a true leader among (hungry) men.