Autumn is to remember potato vacation. A time of one room schools neatly scattered through the towns like jubilant watermelon patches. When kids walked to school, pumped the water and filled the reservoir, swept the outhouse, clapped the erasers before pledging the allegiance to the flag and President Washington reigned over the alphabet strip.

This our invocation to education. The blackboard was actually black, if it did turn pale by the end of the day. An apprentice of education itself, that massive blackboard was our ever-vigilant mentor.

Potato vacation was not so much determined by the school board as by mischievous meteorology. If October was fair and corn still in milk, potato vacation could be delayed or skipped altogether because those potatoes could coast into winter storage without the need to interrupt the tantalizations of long division. To mention there were always some willing to be rescued from long division, if soon after potato vacation commenced they would regret that sentiment.

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