By Nicole Daughhetee
Staff Reporter

Confession: I often find that when I do the math, I am older than I think I am!

Ruminating about what I was going to write and compile for this week’s B-Front, it seemed liked only years ago that I graduated from high school. I was thinking about the palatial digs all these kids are going to high school in as they enter any one of the four majestic buildings in Central, Liberty, Easley or Pickens.

I recently had the opportunity to tour the new EHS, and walking the halls was more reminiscent of being in a museum than my old high school.

Beach High (that really is my alma mater’s name — Go Tides!) had what one might describe as an institutional feel: cinderblock building construction painted a drab sand color; dimly lit hallways; beat-up, dented-in lockers; linoleum floors that had ferreted so many dirty sneakers to and fro no amount of bleach could make them look pristine.
We were lucky if there was a television in each room, and I don’t mean the flat screen variety. I can remember feeling like I had won the lottery if selected for the task of going to our library to check out the reel-to-reel film projector and wheel it, atop massive cart, back to whichever classroom I was in at the time.

Thinking about all this, I heard my voice echo in my head “I only graduated in 1994. That isn’t that long ago. Then I started doing the math in my head and, I won’t lie, on my fingers: Voila! My 20-year reunion is just around the corner.

Yep. Not only do I feel old, but without the aid of an incredibly talented stylist, I would boast a fair amount of grey hair to prove this fact.
An old friend once told me that I was like a bottle of wine in that I only got better with age. I’ve chosen to ascribe to this theory.

While I might get older, there are still some things that never change. For me, one of those things is the excitement of Back to School.
A self-proclaimed nerd, I loved (I love) preparing for back to school. One of the neat things about having children is getting to relive exciting moments such as these with them.

Picking out book-bags, pencil boxes, binders, glue sticks, crayons, paper, and pencils was a thrill a minute. Getting home from Wal-Mart, putting all of the new supplies out on the kitchen table, organizing and packing them up always brings back fond memories for me. I wish I were going back to school too.

For the students in Pickens County, there is so much to celebrate and be excited about. In addition to new school supplies, they also have brand new high schools — Daniel, Liberty, Easley and Pickens — not to mention major the Career and Technology Center and a variety of major renovations in other schools throughout the district — as they begin their journey into the 2012-2013 academic year ahead.