Smells like Old People in Here

The name of this blog does not in any way put down those over the hill.

Through the lobby doors separating the lecture pits from the labs in the new science building once again my nostrils were faced with a daunting challenge. Growing stronger and stronger with each passing step closer to my physics lab the smell of many childhood memories rushed into my brain. Ahhhh yess the smell of formaldehyde filled the hallways.

It was seventh grade at Woodworth Junior High School, Third hour I believe, my science teacher, Mr. Schipper stood in the front of class rambling on about some ladder of life thing. Normally I would have been bored out of my mind but that day was special, on the board drawn with special care was the diagram of a frog. Next to the board stood a TV cart loaded with a Laser disc setup, the screen read “Frog Anatomy”. See this day holds a special place in any young boys heart, the day was Frog Dissection day. Mr. Schipper continued to talk pointing out in the diagrams what it was we were actually supposed to be finding or doing. Of course I sat completely oblivious to his meaningless speech patterns, while pictures of sharpened scalpels danced through my head. Only feet away stood rows of skinless frogs bobbing up and down in the yellowing liquid. Mere minutes of waiting for my groups very own frog to dice, seemed like eternity.



We took a dissecting pan from under the stack and filled it with a little water it formed small bubbles atop the rubberized surface. Misc. Silver tools lay neatly next to the pan on brown paper towel. T-Pins clumsily poked through the limbs of foggy creating small crunching noises here and there. The class grew silent, some nervous (mostly girls of course), some anxious to make some chop suey out of our little prince we waited for that one little word ………“begin”…

Scalpels in hand we dug into our once sesame street friend, an incision along the axis of the frogs chest revealed the scapula (scissors make quick work of it), all at once the word of innards became visible. Ovaries, we had a girl frog. Yellow pin here indicating a kidney, blue pin here for the liver. The class continued to follow Mr. Shipper’s instruction taking out specific organs pinning them along side the frog corpse. Drawing diagrams iding parts. Oh man could life get any better……

The big hand was approaching the little hand as I realized it was almost time to clean up. Little did Mr. Schipper know as I wet paper towel to cover the frog for possible further reference the next day, certain parts of the frogs anatomy had gone missing………



Later on, after school, an unusual number of people found their way behind the school to the football field. some yelled out its gooooddddd! While other threw up their hands mimicking the NFL striped guys on TV……..