This happened in the early 1980s, so that’s why the prices I mention are dated.

I was accepted at the local state college right out of high school. A couple of weeks before the fall semester started, I went to campus, got sorted into a major, and signed up for classes. The next week was when the college bookstore opened and I could buy my books. My mother wrote me a $50 check for books, saying that if it wasn’t enough to drop by her work and get another check so that mine wouldn’t bounce. I deposited it into my account on my way to the campus to buy my books. On her advice, I kept in mind to buy used books if I could, since they were typically 25% to 50% cheaper.

At the bookstore, I was sticker-shocked by how much my books were adding up to. My calculus book itself was almost $60, and it was VERY used. As a matter of fact, it probably would’ve self-destructed if I hadn’t claimed it. Altogether, my books were $130. So, I loaded up my books and went to my mom’s work to get another check to cover the excess. (Wasn’t check-floating fun?)

Mom: “Hi, dear. I take it you need a bit more for your books.”

Me: “More than a bit. They came to $130.”

Mom: “What?! That’s impossible. Did you get used books?”

Me: “Where I could. My calculus book was almost $60, and it’s on its last legs. And my bio lab book is barely more than a pamphlet, and it was $20.”

Mom mumbled as she started writing a check for $80.

Mom: “Your sister [Eldest Sister]’s books were only $45 when she started.”

Me: “[Eldest Sister]? As in my sister who’s eleven years older than me and went to college in the early ‘70s? Between then and now, there was that thing called ‘inflation’?”

Mom: “I thought $45 was too much back then.”

Me: *Thinking* “Well, you did go to college before the invention of paper, so…”

When I was about ten, there was an air show put on at my hometown’s airport. The main attraction was the US Navy’s Blue Angels, but there were several other impressive airplane and parachuting acts. Also, several military aircraft were flown in and parked off of the runway for people to marvel at.

As I was walking around, I saw several people sitting atop one of the transport planes. I looked around and found out how they must’ve climbed up there. I then climbed up myself and started socializing with them. One of them was the pilot who actually flew that plane into the air show.

Just before the Blue Angels were to start their flyovers, a group of people shouted up to the pilot and asked if they could climb up. He turned them down, saying that everyone up there was just immediate family and close friends. I immediately felt embarrassed, since I was neither.

Then, the pilot turned to me, gave me $20, and asked if I would go get some refreshments from the food vendors. I quickly went and got him everything he asked for. After I delivered the food, he didn’t say anything about me not being family or a friend. He simply let me stay up there to get a great view of the show.

CONTENT WARNING: Injury (Child’s leg caught in bike wheel)

The summer after first grade, I spent my days with a family with a stay-at-home mom and her kids. (My mom, dad, and older siblings had jobs they had to attend to.) They lived about half a mile from my home. When my brother got off work, it was his job to pick me up and take me home.

One afternoon, [Brother] arrived not with his car but with his ten-speed bike. He explained that his car had quit working when he got home, so he figured we could just double up on his bike for the short trip. I warned him that we shouldn’t right double on his bike; bike safety had been drilled into us at school that year. He finally convinced me to sit side-saddle on the crossbar of the bike for the trip home.

Not ten yards down the street, disaster struck. My right foot hit the spokes of the front wheel. I got pulled off the bike as my lower leg got thoroughly entangled in the spokes. One of the first things I recall was seeing a telephone utility truck coming down the road right at me since I was now in the street instead of the shoulder of the road.

Thankfully, the truck wasn’t really that close and stopped in plenty of time. The driver got out and helped extricate my leg since he had plenty of tools. My leg was a bloody mess.

[Brother] went back to my babysitter’s house and explained what had just happened. She got her car and drove my brother and me to our family doctor to have my leg looked at.

And this is where Karma came into play. My mom’s job was at the reception desk of our family doctor. So, when we got to the doctor’s, in walked my mom’s oldest son carrying her youngest son. Her reaction?

Mom: “My baby!”

It turned out that my ankle was just bruised. I just couldn’t walk on it for a couple of days. All the blood was just from superficial scrapes.

I do have a distinctive scar on my right ankle. It’s been fifty years since that incident, but my brother still feels guilty when he sees the scar on my foot.

When I was in tenth grade in 1980, my high school bought one (1) computer, a TRS-80 Level II. They bought it near the end of the school year, and one particular math teacher (not one of mine that year) was put in charge of it. I heard about it and went to see it. He graciously let me experiment on it after school until he needed to leave for the evening.

The last week of the school year, I decided to ask if I could check out the computer to use at home over the summer. I thought this might be possible because they checked out expensive band equipment all the time. However, I was told no. The supposed reason was that they planned to set up a student gradebook system. (Insert eye-rolls here.) So, instead, [Math Teacher] and I boxed up the computer and placed it in a locked storage closet in the main school building.

I then went to Radio Shack and bought a manual on the TRS-80, as well as coding sheets and video design sheets. I read the manual cover to cover and wrote an extensive program to play tic-tac-toe, all without an actual computer to test out my coding.

The first week that teachers returned before the next school year, I went to school and saw [Math Teacher], who was my Trigonometry teacher for the upcoming school year. We went to see what the status of the computer was. Lo and behold, it was exactly where we’d set it in June. It hadn’t been moved a bit, as evidenced by the dust pattern around its boxes. We set it up in his new room.

Throughout that next school year, I was in [Math Teacher]’s room whenever possible after school. I’d get so involved with programming experiments that he’d just tell me to make sure the door was locked and the lights were off when I left. Sometimes I’d stay until 6:00 pm. He’d even let me program in class when I was supposed to be learning trig. (When I showed him a program that extensively used trig functions, he was satisfied that my studies weren’t falling behind.)

My experience with that computer directed me to get a Bachelor’s degree in Computer Science and Mathematics when I went to college. Computers were my main career focus for the next three decades. All because of a great teacher who trusted me with the school’s sole computer.

I worked for a fast food burger place in high school. One of our closing tasks was to filter and recycle the cooking oil used for french fries, taking the oldest oil out to collection barrels behind the store. The oil we took out to the collection barrel was periodically picked up by a service that would then use it for various industrial purposes.

When we poured out the oldest oil, we put it in a ten-gallon metal pot and then carried it out to the collection barrel. One night as I did this, I walked past the drive-thru menu board. Since the pot was made of metal, it set off the bell inside the restaurant telling the cashier that a car had driven up. As I kept walking, I heard the girl who was working the drive-thru greet a non-existent customer:

Coworker: “Welcome to [Fast Food Restaurant]. May I take your order?”

I laughed since I had unintentionally tricked her. I dumped the oil, and then as I walked back to the restaurant, I walked by the drive-thru menu again. Again, [Coworker] greeted a non-existent customer. However, when she got no response again, she looked out a tiny window and saw that it was just me messing with her. She scolded me a little when I got back to the make line.

About a half-hour later, a customer did pull up to the drive-thru menu. [Coworker] stormed out of the back kitchen and replied on the mic:

Coworker: “G**d*** it, [My Name]! Quit f****** around!”

I replied from right behind her at the grill.

Me: “Um, [Coworker], that’s not me.”

She got a shocked look on her face as she turned around and saw the customer quickly drive off, not caring for getting sworn at.