As school bells rang -- if they hadn't rung already -- for many this week, I started to reminisce about lunchboxes. And dividers. And Wite-Out.
You know, all those school supplies you had as a kid that, once you grew up and started working in the real world, you used ... never again. Some of the items that we "needed" to keep nestled inside our cold metal desks seem, in retrospect, completely unnecessary and borderline ridiculous. Here are 10 that may cause instant flashbacks to the third grade, especially for all you former kids of the '70s and '80s.
10. Wite-Out: A must-have back when people still used typewriters, this tiny jar of white cover-up was once a staple for many students and now is practically extinct. Added bonus: That potent, chemical smell.
9. Pencil sharpener: Honestly, when was the last time you ground a No. 2 into one of those little plastic doohickeys that was supposed to make it sharper? Exactly: Sometime around 1983.
8. The lunchbox: Most adults bring their PB&J to work in one of those sophisticated-looking totes or the classic brown bag. But some days, you know you want to pack your salad and yogurt in a Peanuts lunchbox with a flip-up Thermos. Or maybe in one of those metal classics with Wonder Woman on the front. Come on. Admit it.
7. The pink eraser: Remember rubbing these furiously to remove the mistake you made while practicing cursive? And remember blowing the speckles of pink dust off that piece of lined paper so you could attempt a better-looking lowercase "g"? Do you also remember why we needed these rectangular deleters when pencils already come with erasers on the end?
6. School box: This was exactly what it sounded like: A pseudo-cigar box designed to hold all those pencils, erasers and what not. But really, wasn't that what your desk was for?
5. Book covers: I know kids still use these. But if I wrap the novel I'm currently reading in packing paper and write "I Heart Rick Springfield" on it in Magic Marker, I think I'll get funny looks on the subway.
4. The Trapper Keeper: No three ring-binder was cooler than this baby back in the '80s. (If memory serves, mine was green, with jungle animals on it.) I have to think today's teachers are relieved that these aren't quite as popular today, and that they now make them with magnetic closures. No one needs to listen to the ripping of Velcro every eight seconds.
3. The holepunch: Some friends of mine once spent an entire class period in high school punching holes in paper, collecting the little circles, then dumping them inside another friend's car until her front seat was nearly filled. All of which is a long way of saying that hole punchers are nothing but trouble.
2. Tie -- The protractor and the compass: These help kids learn to draw circles or measure shapes or something. But when was the last time one of your co-workers turned to you and said, "Oh, man. I'm in a huge bind. Do you have a protractor on you?"
1. Reinforcements: The twisted cousin of the holepunch, reinforcements were those white sticky circles we used to protect our fragile papers from those perilous rings in our binders. They were useless then, they're useless now. And I kind of love them for that.
