HELLO, UH, BIG GUY. MY NAME IS JOE -- DON'T YOU REMEMBER ME?

It's not a trip to Paris or anything like that, but there is a short trip coming up in mid-September that I'm really looking forward to.

It's a trip down memory lane.

You've been there too. But it's always fun to go back. Of all the destinations we have in our lives, none is so welcoming and enjoyable as the past. Sometimes we call these the good old days. I'm not entirely sure that the past is always good. But there are enough good parts that we always want to return from time to time.

As it turns out, plans are being made for the first-ever reunion at the one-room schoolhouse in Greenwood Valley in the hills over yonder.

You've all attended or been invited to reunions at your high school or college. Some of you even went. I've never been to a high school reunion. I've never wanted to go until recently. I think the older we get the more interested we are in nurturing the connections we have with our memories.

Shady Nook School is a special place in my memory. The name itself is delightful. Yes, there were a couple of big oak trees that shaded the school. But I think the name referred more to the creek across the road, which only has water in the wet months. There was a spot schoolchildren frequented -- when they were allowed off the playground -- that was in a bend of the creek against a huge boulder that provided ample seating. In the deep shade, there was no better place to be on a hot day.

Although there was only one room in the schoolhouse, there were two outhouses. You remember how it worked. The closest, most convenient toilet was for the girls. The one up the hill, much farther away, was for the boys. Boys tended to hang out around their privy, much the way men get together in their own special clubs and groups. The girls were less inclined to socialize at the little house, preferring to play house in the woodshed (near the pump). Or terrorize young boys on the softball field.

Actually, it wasn't anything like a softball diamond. It was an open area that, in my adult years, doesn't look big enough for a softball game. It was on a sloping hill, which meant grounders traveled a long way if they weren't stopped by an alert outfielder.

Remember work-up softball? No teams. Everybody fielded, and you took turns batting. Sometimes the teacher did the pitching, and whoever was waiting to bat did the catching. You worked up from a field position to the batting box by getting someone out. Work-up games might start before school and be continued -- with everyone assuming their respective places -- at recess and lunch.

The year I started first grade was the Baby Boomer year. The little schoolhouse had 60 students in eight grades. Sixteen of those were in the first grade. There were only one or two students in the second grade. This must have been quite a challenge for Ola Rayfield, the teacher that year, who was -- as I've told you before -- the first romantic love of my life. (She still thinks it was pretty special to find out we were in love more than 40 years after the fact.)

I don't know if I'll recognize many of my former classmates. I see them from time to time in my favorite hometown, and my mother has to remind me who they are. At the visitation for my stepfather last year, I was amazed at how many people I didn't recognize from my boyhood -- until they told me their names, and then it looked like they had never changed. Amazing, isn't it?

One of the things I like about the upcoming reunion is the covered-dish dinner. It wouldn't be a reunion with a dinner. But in this case, attendees are being asked "to pack a lunch -- like you carried when you were in school.

Fantastic! This means I can trade my Oreos for some of Mrs. Brown's homemade cinnamon rolls.

My mother is invited to the reunion too. Shady Nook was one of several rural schools where she taught while I was growing up. When my mother goes to a covered-dish event, there is always enough food to satisfy Hannibal's army. She specializes in fried chicken. I don't think anyone will starve at this reunion.

Is this going to be fun, or what? Of course, I'll give you a blow-by-blow account after the event. And if any of you have any connections with Shady Nook School on Greenwood Valley (if you do, you'll know where to go), please plan to attend.

~R. Joe Sullivan is the editor of the Southeast Missourian.