“I’m sorry,” I said, puzzled.

“Mr. Wickersham will be your tutor. He lives at Geo C/15/37. You’re to meet him at his home at two o’clock Wednesday afternoon, and thereafter three times a week at your mutual convenience. And please, let’s not be late on Wednesday. Now come along and I’ll show you your room for first hour.”

School is for kids between the age of four and fifteen. After fourteen, if you survive, they let you give up all the nonsensical parts. You simply work with a tutor or a craft master and follow your interests toward some goal.

I was due to make a decision on that in about two years. The trouble is that except for math and reading old novels I had a completely different set of interests than I had had a year before, and since I didn’t really have a solid talent for math and reading old novels isn’t much use for anything, I had to find something definite. I didn’t really want to specialize. I wanted to be a synthesist, knowing a little about everything and seeing enough to put the pieces together. It’s a job that had appeal for me, but I never talked about wanting it because I suspected I wasn’t smart enough to handle it and I wanted room to back down in if I had to.

At my moments of depression I thought I might well wind up as a dorm mother or something equally daring.

At some point between fourteen and twenty everybody finishes his normal training. You pick something you like and start doing it. Later, after twenty, if you’re not already in research, you may apply for educational leave and work on a project of some sort. That’s what my mother keeps herself busy with.

I followed Mr. Quince to the room I was scheduled to be in first hour. I wasn’t anxious to be there at all, and I was half-scared and half-belligerent with no way of knowing which part would dominate at any given moment. When we arrived, there was a lot of sudden moving around. When the people unsorted themselves, I saw there were four kids in the room, two boys and two girls.