Milk: The Story Continues

The white board at the front of my third grade classroom brightly displayed the Special Students of the week. Each Monday the chart was updated with the names of the new line leader, line ender, calendar person (who had to know the days of the week in English and in Español, por favor), and milk people.  Line leaders and enders were the envy of the class, and the calendar person got at least three minutes of his classmates’ attention each morning.  Being a milk person held no glory.  The task of the milk people was to carry the correct number of little milk cartons from a malodorous milk fridge to our classroom for lunch.  It was a thankless job, noticed only by the kid who used to drink all 8 ounces in under 2 seconds, but someone had to do it.

“Ten whites and eight chocolates” I read off the chart on the skinny metal refrigerator door. Colby reached into the chilly space and grabbed the designated number of milks, doing his best to avoid the wet cartons; a wet carton was a leaky carton.  I caught the milks in a plastic milk crate which we carried between us on the way back to our classroom. We talked a little during the short walk.  It went the same way on Tuesday and Wednesday.

By the middle of the week we had created a little game for ourselves.  Our school’s blue carpeted hallways had one rectangle of miscolored carpet.  It was as though some irreversible stain had been fixed by patching in a piece of the same carpet which lacked the wear of the surrounding floor.  We pretended that Deerborne Elementary was out of milk and that the brighter patch was a portal to an identical school where we could get the milk we needed.  Colby and I paused on the patch, closed our eyes, and were transported.

“Molly,” Colby said as we reopened our eyes and started walking toward the milk room. “What do you think we should name this new school?”

I laughed, “Um, Milk Elementary!”  We pushed open the swinging metal doors and I reached for the fridge. “They must have cleaned in here last night, it doesn’t smell so bad.”

“Maybe they actually take care of their milk room at Milk Elementary!” Colby replied, making me giggle. We loaded 18 little milks into our plastic crate and started back for our classroom.  As we rounded the corner and prepared for our imaginary trip back through the carpet squares, Colby stopped. The discolored patch had disappeared.