Tuesday, July 25

Welcome Back!!!

Welcome back, your dreams were your ticket out...
Welcome back, to that same old place that you laughed about!

I know I'm showing my age here, but that's the first two lines from the theme song of Welcome Back, Kotter - one of my favorita sitcoms from the '70's... Remember Horshack, Freddie "Boom-Boom" Washington, Juan Epstein the Puerto Rican Jew... and, of course, Vinnie Barbarino (played by John Travolta... before he hit it big with Grease). It was a show about a teacher, Gabe Kotter, who returns to his alma-mater high school to teach a bunch of underachieving, troublemaking knuckleheads, called the Sweathogs. Kotter had once been a Sweathog himself, but rose above all that to graduate and then go on to college to earn a degree. The theme song is about the fact that Kotter's dreams allowed him to achieve what he did, but the dreams "turned around" and directed him to return to his roots... to help those who needed him most.

Well, the names have all changed since you hung around...
And those dreams that remained, they've been turned around...
Who'd have thought they'd lead ya...
Back here where we need ya?

I was wandering around the Performing Arts building at the Univ. of MD the other day (BEAUTIFUL place!), and it struck me that when I was a student there... I couldn't WAIT to get out! Not that I didn't like the school - I loved it - but I wanted hurry up and finish so that I could "make it." Here I am... 20 years later (I'm dating myself again)... back in the same territory... but for a totally different reason. :-)

Well, we teased you a lot
Cuz we got you on the spot,
Welcome Back!!!

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