When I was young, I wanted to be a number of unusual things.  While other children were aspiring to be doctors, lawyers, artists, dancers, or some form of celebrity, I once had it in my mind that I wanted to be a school bus driver.  You see, I always had a penchant for sharing candy and snacks with my friends and I figured there was no better job that allowed you to give candy to kids than that of a school bus driver.  I wouldn’t have to deal with teaching and grading like teachers do, I wouldn’t have to clean up after messy kids like janitors do, and I wouldn’t have to deal with strange cafeteria food like the servers do.  All I’d have to do is pick students up in the morning and drop them off at night.  Meanwhile, I could have a lovely stash of treats that I’d give out for holidays and in certain special times like first and last day of school.

When I was in fourth grade, my teacher had an entire drawer of delicious candy.  When we got homework assignments and tests back, we’d find nickels, dimes, and quarters stamped at the top of our page.  Depending on how well we did for that assignment or test, we would find different increments of change stamped on.  We would  then tear off the stamped image and keep it in a bag or pencil case.  Then, one glorious day, Mrs. S would open up her fabulous drawer and allow us to “buy” the candy within.  Though I thought that would be fun to do, I didn’t like the other aspects of the job, like controlling unruly young kids and patiently teaching them a variety of subjects.  So, I decided that I would rather be the like school bus driver, who would give us candy on Valentine’s Day or for the winter holidays.  It’s all the fun without the grunt work!