Things Sure Are Different

   Yesterday we spent an enjoyable evening with our friends Ellen and Mac. We had dinner at their home and then attended a play performed by students at a nearby high school.
   I noticed as we drove to the high school is that is was connected to a middle school and both buildings were pretty large. This was to be expected as we are in the Twin Cities area. There are a lot of people here and naturally a lot of kids.
   The last time that I had been in a traditional high school was over 30 years ago when I attended one. I don't count going to the high schools of my younger stepdaughters. They went to a performing arts high school. The minute I stepped through the door I could see that things were very different.
   The first thing I noticed on the inside was a large screen that had a welcome message crawling across it. It was like one of those electronic board you see in restaurants and sometimes in front of churches. The inside seemed clean and felt new. The school had been built about 10 years ago. We took a left and walked past the auditorium. In order to get to our seats we would need to go down several flights of stairs. The pitch of the stairs was relatively shallow. On the far wall were a lot of pictures. They were framed. They were pictures of students performing in plays and also of students that had done well in speech and debate contests. I was impressed. These were professional quality pictures. I was especially pleased to see that the number of speech and debate pictures was fairly large. Clearly this is an important activity among the students.
   It was not like this when I was in school. There was a speech team and I was on it. It was, however,not really that important. Only sports really mattered, especially football. The fact that pictures of students participating in the arts were placed in a prominent place made me feel good.
   We stopped in the ladies room. This, too, was a little different. For one thing, it was very clean. It didn't smell and there wasn't any graffiti on the stall door. No one had carved their name or any message into anything, another change from what I was used to. There weren't any paper towels either. I'm sure in an effort to keep the restroom cleaner and to cut down on garbage, there were several air hand dryers installed on one wall. Gone were the overflowing garbage cans filled with paper towels and other sorts of junk.
   Right by the restrooms were the lockers. In this respect it was nearly the same as I remembered. The lockers were newer but of nearly the same type as I remembered from all those years ago. We walked past three vending machines offering candy, sodas and flavoured waters. In my high school there was only one vending machine and it was off limits to students.
   We walked past a school office on the way to our seats. School offices look like school offices. That had not changed although I'm sure the typewriters and copiers of my day were replaced by computers and printers.
   We went into the auditorium. It was small, but very nice. I could see that it would have really good acoustics. The program we were handed before we took our seats was printed on stock paper and seemed to be professionally printed. There was a picture of a scene from the play on the front. No flimsy programs here.
   There was a note that fireworks would be used during the performance and that the technical director is a licensed pyrotechnician. The note assured the audience that the safety of the actors and audience were in mind and that all special permits and insurance had been secured. I was looking forward to it.
   The set looked professionally done. I was not surprised. There are a lot of theatre groups in the Twin Cities area. It would not be hard to find the things needed to make a set look this good. I thought it was pretty cool that these students actors would have a set this good to perform in.
   Things have changed a lot since I was in school. From what I can tell, It's for the better.