By the third Sunday in Advent, truthfully, scarcely any of us is really in the mood for what John the Baptist has to say with threats of doom and gloom, with cries for fruit-bearing repentance, and warnings of winnowing forks and unquenchable fire.

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“Will that be for here, or to go?”

These are not unfamiliar words to many of us.

We step up to the counter, we place our order.

A burger, fries. Medium drink.

And we await the expected question:

“Will that be for here or to go?”
 
But it was not the question I wanted to hear just the other Sunday morning a week or two ago when I stopped by Krispy Kremes for a dozen donuts. A dozen! 12 of them.
“Will that be for here or to go?”

Really?!

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When I was twelve years old, I attended middle school in a newly-built building which had very few interior walls.  This was the cool-and-groovy 1970’s, mind you, and rather than homerooms we had “families” and rather than classrooms, we had “areas” and the inner architecture of the building reflected this hip, new educational philosophy. If we weren’t sitting on fluorescent-colored bean-bag chairs on long shag carpet, we were sitting at round tables with other members of our “family” — aka classmates. In the sprawling wide-open classroom areas, there were only colorful 4-foot dividers which distinguished one “area” from another, and one “family” grouping from another. Gone were individual desks and enclosed classrooms, until (thank the good Lord) we commenced to high school where the educational world of rooms and classes and desks resumed.  It was a zany time and a grand experiment in education. And I understand that long since, walls have been constructed and class-rooms and desks are back. The old vogue didn’t last long.

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