FOCAL POINT

Many years ago my current classroom at school was the Faculty Room. Over the summer this room was cleaned and refreshed. Old tables and chairs were removed, and some used chairs-cum-desktops were brought in yesterday, while we await the arrival of a new Harkness table and chairs. When I arrived this morning to reclaim some books, I was amused to notice that the maintenance staff had oriented the desks towards the fireplace; I was amused, because the blackboards are on two other walls. But a fireplace is often the focus of a room; home decorators often look to a fireplace to provide focus in a living room, den, library, even bedroom. And why not? The Latin word for the day is focus, -i m. hearth, fire-place. The fireplace in my classroom is boarded up (a good idea; one year squirrels came down and had a merry time over a weekend), but the bricks and mantel provide interesting decoration, and give me another little springboard into Latin with my students.