If You Went to School in Illinois, You’ll Remember This

If you went to school in Illinois, this is going to hit you right in the childhood.

I was shopping at The Scrap Jar in downtown Rockford the other day, looking for art supplies for Valentine's gifts I'm making for my sisters, when I spotted something on a shelf that immediately transported me back to grad school.  Like, nostalgia actually hit me right in the face.  I cracked the weirdest smile when I saw it.

There it was.

An overhead projector.

And instantly, I was back in math class, sitting at my desk, watching my teacher walk writing on the board... actually, sorry, on the projector.  Yes.  A projector.  You know exactly what it looks like, don't lie.

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The slightly yellowed transparency sheets.  The markers that were always kind of dry.  The hum of the machine warming up.  The way the light would flicker if someone bumped the cart.  And if you were unlucky enough to sit in the front row?  Congrats, you're now half-blind because that thing was bright.

I swear teachers had to do entire math problems step by step on those things.  Long division.  Fractions.  Algebra that nobody understood.  And lord... help us if the transparency got smudged or placed crooked, because then the whole class was tilted and we had to live with it.

Seeing one for sale at The Scrap Jar honestly stopped me in my tracks.  I don't even know how many schools still have these anymore.  Probably not many.  Now it's all Smartboards, Chromebooks, and teachers being able to pull up a YouTube video in two seconds.  Kids today will never know the struggle of squinting at an overhead projector and hoping the bell rings before the lesson makes sense.