Adult Education

High school in Ontario once lasted five long years, from Grade 9 to Grade 13. And so, while most everyone else on the continent was heading off to their first year of college, my friends and I were obliged for one more year to fold our gangly frames into the same seats we’d used since 13 and share the halls with children half our size. But slowly it came to us, passed around like a secret the office really didn’t want us to understand . . . the same government that kept us in school past 17 also recognized us as full-fledged adults.

The biggest thing about suddenly being an adult in high school was that you could write your own notes. Not that any teacher would’ve ever asked you for a written explanation of why you’d missed class, but it was enough to know that you could write it and sign it if you really had to. Mostly, though, it wasn’t even worth their while to track you down, and so it was with great pleasure that I checked myself into the office at noon one day and proudly announced I’d spent the morning in queue for Star Trek, The Motion Picture.