Tonight, we will drive 2 miles to the old schoolhouse at LakeView, Texas,  where my mother went to school as a young girl in the 1920’s when the school house was only one room.  Now the old, abandoned school house has two rooms.  The larger room will house a D.J. on one end and some benches on the opposite end, as well as benches around the perimeter.  The other room will host foods of all sorts, shapes, sizes, and kinds brought by people of the community, as well as a huge pot of black-eyed peas, boiling on the stove. I will take sausage rolls this year.

The larger room’s old hardwood floor makes a great dance floor, and young and old alike will twirl around the floor until well past midnight.  My husband and I will attend, dressed in our western boots and jeans.  There, we will visit with local friends that we have made here in the past three years, as well as the principal from the local school where I teach and his family, the athletic director and his family, and the Rodeo Association President and his family.  People will show up from Austin, Texas, 120 miles away.  Deer hunters will wander in as well as teenagers and people from the largest town in the county, San Saba, population 2666.  Babies and small children will come, and 5 year old boys will be asking 4 year old girls to dance.  If the Miller girl is there, she will win the limbo contest, as usual.

Inside the old schoolhouse, people will be visiting, reminiscing, tell tall tales, making new friends, dancing, playing dominoes, eating, drinking sweet tea and generally just having fun.  Outside the old schoolhouse, adults will be drinking a beer and checking their portable ice chest coolers to make sure that none of the teenagers have stolen any of the beer.

Hopefully, this year there will NOT be a skunk living under the old schoolhouse.  Last year, no one was aware that a skunk had made his home underneath the old structure, so every time the dancing picked up, the skunk would spray, and everyone would rush to open all of the many windows for a breath of fresh air.  Soon, the windows would slam shut because of the cold wind that soon permeated the room.

At midnight, everyone will hug, and guys will kiss their sweethearts and girlfriends and wives.  Some will go home to cook for tomorrow’s brunch, and some will, as the old song states, “stay a little longer.”