Because I lived on campus my freshman year, and because everything I needed was mostly in the immediate area, I didn’t do a lot of driving during the week. A lot of that also had to do with the fact that it would take me until the following weekend to find a parking space. But when I could I liked driving around to familiarize myself with other areas of campus and the surrounding community.
And the community did surround the campus, creeping up on you like arthritis, nearsightedness, or that toothless pan-handler at the corner of Central and Olive. Gleaned from historical photographs, I learned the university’s original tract of land was atop a hill north of downtown; between the campus and downtown were houses. Naturally, as the fledgling campus grew it bought nearby land and razed those houses and constructed new academic buildings or dormitories or parking lots, or, in rare cases, green areas.
Fast forward a few decades and it looked as if the college and the city butted heads along the southeastern-most edge because the houses remained standing. Apparently the owners didn’t necessarily want their houses torn down, particularly when their homes still had a lot going for them –structurally sound, kept the cold out, and so on. Because these homeowners had rejected the college’s advances it forced the campus to build elsewhere in other directions for a few years. Then a curious thing happened. The people in the houses along Union Street moved or died and their houses were up for sale.
“Hooray,” said the university, “we can finally buy that property and do something with it!”
“But,” said the comptroller, “you’ve blown a fortnight of funds in mere days and are almost in the red, aren’t you? Without funds you can’t very well do both.”
“Oh, dear,” said the university, “I hadn’t thought of that – we have the money to buy the houses but not enough to do anything with them except let them be.”
“Ah, that was easy,” said the comptroller, and for an encore he approved the purchase and installation of a half dozen telephones booths across campus only to be later smothered to death while participating in the “stuff as many people as you can into a telephone booth” fad of the time.
So the houses didn’t go anywhere and were instead passed-off as university-owned except that they looked totally out of place and unlike any other structure belonging to the university. Nomadic departments such as University Housing, Graduate Studies, Art, and others were uprooted from their modular buildings and squeezed into one of these houses with the instruction to “make it [their] own” but then that idea lasted only for a year or so.
Enter Religious Emphasis week, a five-night (later three-night) examination and discussion of the spiritual life of students, observed from the early-50s through 1972. A religious council organized the event and welcomed leaders from various denominations to speak to smaller groups each night. Space was needed for the events and all eyes again focused on Union Street. Within a few years the houses turned into denominational student centers for the Baptists, Episcopalians, Methodists, Lutherans, and Catholics (the Presbyterians hadn’t colonized yet and the one house given over to Nontrinitarianists was never used). Inside the houses were totally remodeled, oftentimes with the addition of small chapels or sanctuaries for Sunday services; the exteriors didn’t change much except that the Catholics transformed their two-story bungalow into a squatty, dwarfish cathedral through the magic of plywood and acrylic paint.
The Religious Emphasis week coordinators thought the houses becoming student centers was a good fit, seeing how Union Street was the neighborhood that evangelist “Handsel” Monday visited during one of his small-town revivals in the late Nineteenth Century. A woman who grew up in one of the houses and later attended the university told the story of seeing Monday speaking to a small crowd that had gathered under the boughs of the willow tree across the street (“...he sounded scary,” she recalled).
But I digress...
The houses still stood during my time on campus but most of the church groups had moved on. The Methodists apparently knew a good thing when they found it and appropriated for their own use the backyard of the long-vacant Episcopalian Student Center, whose members now met at the church across town. The Catholics had moved off-campus, too, leaving behind a bizarre-looking building and their long-suffering neighbors, the Baptists.
Those houses that were unoccupied were mothballed and used for storage, though it’s anyone’s guess as to what remained within their walls.
Sunday, February 15, 2009
Sunday, February 8, 2009
the one about why we should wait more than thirty minutes for dr. blanc
Behind the Media, Culture, and Society course was a man named Dr. Fredrick Blanc, a middle-aged army brat that had never married, never had kids, and never seemed to like anyone or anything. He wasn’t as rough around the edges as that may sound, but he didn’t take a lot of crap from people for too long. He did take his work seriously, be that teaching, mentoring, or researching, which he did for hours on end (weekday or weekends) in his office. He did, after all, have one of the few Ph.D.s in the department at the time and therefore found little interest in the operation of the radio and television stations that attracted so many students to the program.
Blanc was a native of Massachusetts and had never lost his accent, but had tried, he said, during his childhood years moving with his dad from state to state and from army base to army base. From this way of life must surely have developed his well-known demeanor and temperament. This attitude wasn’t meant to scare off students, though. Far from it; in fact, more often than not students found they came to have a better appreciation for both Blanc and the course in later years. And that seems to be the core reason why Blanc taught the communication history, theory, and law courses – what the students learned would be with them long after the “button pushing” in the radio and television stations had faded.
So what of this famous Blanc attitude? Everything boiled down to respect: don’t interrupt him, don’t aggravate him, and don’t belittle him of anyone else. If you could manage that, and if you participated in class discussions, then you could probably get an A or B – depending on how well you did on his tests. But the surefire way to piss him off…the fastest way, the easiest way, as if was nine o’clock in the morning…was to yawn. Honestly, if you covered your mouth and didn’t make it obvious you might still get a glare from the hyperactive guy teaching at the front of the class. But God forbid – don’t let loose with a loud, long sigh…ouch! “Hey!” he snapped in his unmistakable New England accent, “I don’t teach in your bed, don’t sleep in my class! Stop it!”
These yawns usually came on the tail end of his “screenings” – essentially a chance to watch television in class for ten or twenty minutes. I actually think he called them “screenings” to get by with showing them in class, because I remember someone asking if we were going to “watch TV” one morning and this sort of set him off. We weren’t watching television, he’d explain, we were collectively screening a culturally significant program via television. And then he’d sort of give a half-tooth wise-ass smirk. (Yes, he did smile – he was generally well-deposed.)
Another good way to piss off Dr. Blanc was call him “Freddie,” his first name. “Hey, I’m your teachah, not your friend!” he’d snap, going as far to call it impolite and rude.
One of Blanc’s memorable moments happened a few weeks into the semester. Blanc’s class met in the same room that Propel’s Introduction class had met the previous semester and since both were geared toward freshmen the room was filled with a lot of the same people. The room was abuzz of chatter that morning in the minutes before class started and, without any interruption, we continued taking until someone pointed out it was ten minutes after the hour. Dr. Blanc was tardy. Soon the talk turned to the fifteen-minute rule: how long did students have to wait for a tardy teacher? Everyone was quoting something different: was it ten minutes for an MA or ten minutes for a Ph.D.? Maybe it was twenty minutes for a Ph.D. No one could quote the rule because there was no rule anywhere to quote. And that’s when people started leaving.
I remember being torn at what I should do? It was obvious he was late and I didn’t like wasting my time. On the other hand, Dr. Blanc did say this morning we were to expect a quiz – would he postpone it for the next class? About midway through the hour someone went to the department secretary and had her call Dr. Blanc at his house. He was not happy. Less than ten minutes later Dr. Blanc stormed into the room in one of the most memorable and unfashionably uncomfortable outfits I ever saw: a gray-yellow windbreaker thrown over a T-shirt, acid-washed jeans of some color between red and blue, and tennis shoes chewed through by Cerberus. He was pissed off because of his own tardiness and more so because more than half the class had bailed on his planned quiz.
Those of us that stayed took an abbreviated version of the quiz and, I believe, we all aced it. The next time class met the remainder of the students were told they should not ever again, under no circumstances, without penalty of death or a swift kick in the arse, desert one of Dr. Blanc’s classes.
Diligently silencing all protesters, he proceeded to dump a lengthier and more difficult quiz on those that walked out and let those that already took the first quiz go for the day.
We never saw that “outfit” again, by the way.
- - - - - - - - - - - -
Tardy
(John Shiurba)
Eskimo
From the album Some Prefer Cake
1999
Blanc was a native of Massachusetts and had never lost his accent, but had tried, he said, during his childhood years moving with his dad from state to state and from army base to army base. From this way of life must surely have developed his well-known demeanor and temperament. This attitude wasn’t meant to scare off students, though. Far from it; in fact, more often than not students found they came to have a better appreciation for both Blanc and the course in later years. And that seems to be the core reason why Blanc taught the communication history, theory, and law courses – what the students learned would be with them long after the “button pushing” in the radio and television stations had faded.
So what of this famous Blanc attitude? Everything boiled down to respect: don’t interrupt him, don’t aggravate him, and don’t belittle him of anyone else. If you could manage that, and if you participated in class discussions, then you could probably get an A or B – depending on how well you did on his tests. But the surefire way to piss him off…the fastest way, the easiest way, as if was nine o’clock in the morning…was to yawn. Honestly, if you covered your mouth and didn’t make it obvious you might still get a glare from the hyperactive guy teaching at the front of the class. But God forbid – don’t let loose with a loud, long sigh…ouch! “Hey!” he snapped in his unmistakable New England accent, “I don’t teach in your bed, don’t sleep in my class! Stop it!”
These yawns usually came on the tail end of his “screenings” – essentially a chance to watch television in class for ten or twenty minutes. I actually think he called them “screenings” to get by with showing them in class, because I remember someone asking if we were going to “watch TV” one morning and this sort of set him off. We weren’t watching television, he’d explain, we were collectively screening a culturally significant program via television. And then he’d sort of give a half-tooth wise-ass smirk. (Yes, he did smile – he was generally well-deposed.)
Another good way to piss off Dr. Blanc was call him “Freddie,” his first name. “Hey, I’m your teachah, not your friend!” he’d snap, going as far to call it impolite and rude.
One of Blanc’s memorable moments happened a few weeks into the semester. Blanc’s class met in the same room that Propel’s Introduction class had met the previous semester and since both were geared toward freshmen the room was filled with a lot of the same people. The room was abuzz of chatter that morning in the minutes before class started and, without any interruption, we continued taking until someone pointed out it was ten minutes after the hour. Dr. Blanc was tardy. Soon the talk turned to the fifteen-minute rule: how long did students have to wait for a tardy teacher? Everyone was quoting something different: was it ten minutes for an MA or ten minutes for a Ph.D.? Maybe it was twenty minutes for a Ph.D. No one could quote the rule because there was no rule anywhere to quote. And that’s when people started leaving.
I remember being torn at what I should do? It was obvious he was late and I didn’t like wasting my time. On the other hand, Dr. Blanc did say this morning we were to expect a quiz – would he postpone it for the next class? About midway through the hour someone went to the department secretary and had her call Dr. Blanc at his house. He was not happy. Less than ten minutes later Dr. Blanc stormed into the room in one of the most memorable and unfashionably uncomfortable outfits I ever saw: a gray-yellow windbreaker thrown over a T-shirt, acid-washed jeans of some color between red and blue, and tennis shoes chewed through by Cerberus. He was pissed off because of his own tardiness and more so because more than half the class had bailed on his planned quiz.
Those of us that stayed took an abbreviated version of the quiz and, I believe, we all aced it. The next time class met the remainder of the students were told they should not ever again, under no circumstances, without penalty of death or a swift kick in the arse, desert one of Dr. Blanc’s classes.
Diligently silencing all protesters, he proceeded to dump a lengthier and more difficult quiz on those that walked out and let those that already took the first quiz go for the day.
We never saw that “outfit” again, by the way.
- - - - - - - - - - - -
Tardy
(John Shiurba)
Eskimo
From the album Some Prefer Cake
1999
Sunday, February 1, 2009
the one about media, culture, society, and so on
When the spring 1995 semester began I was still classified as a freshman and still eager to work in the radio station. However, for reasons I’ve never remembered, I missed the semester kick-off meeting and therefore didn’t do anything for FM 89.3 that semester, 7 a.m. newscasts or otherwise. There’s a part of me that thinks I assumed the schedule would holdover from the previous fall semester...but then if my classes didn’t even do this why would I expect a silly part-time schedule to do the same?
But I didn’t leave the Communication Building. No, that would have probably been a dumb move on my part, not taking a course in my major. Looking back, it probably wouldn’t have hurt to take another Communication course that semester. No, I still visited the Communication Building three days a week (M-days) to take part in yet another 100-level course. This one was titled Media-Culture-Society (COM-187) and its purpose, according to the instructor, was for us students to develop a historical knowledge and appreciation of media development in America. His desire, or so he reiterated more than once, was for us to never watch television the same way again.
There was a lot of history in this class. I mean, the syllabus began with the note that in 1872 James Maxwell theorized the idea of wireless communication. From there we discussed Marconi playing the mamba and listening to the radio, the rise of someone named Kent Atwater, and the role Felix the Cat played in the early days of television (...makes you wonder if he’ll show up 80 years after his first appearance to help usher in Digital Television later this month). The rise of cable television, programming syndication, and ratings were also major talking points in this class that really took its course title seriously.
Besides reading articles from the textbook about the history of radio and television, we also viewed “screenings” from the extensive archives of Dr. Blanc. Back then – and even now as I write this – I wondered how Fred Blanc managed to track down everything he did. He had memorable episodes from classic sitcoms, samples of “old time” radio comedies, and an assortment of advertising oddities. And a little bit of everything else....
One of the more memorable items was during the discussion of tobacco on television and – whoa and behold – Blanc pulls out a series of cigarette commercials, including a bizarre one featuring Fred Flintstone. That, and a montage of Old Joe print ads (playing pool and driving cars) set to something from the Miami Vice soundtrack (this was a few years before the camel’s demise). We also got an earful of Archie Bunker spew a line of racial slurs a mile long during another program – all in the name of education.
But, word to the wise with these “screenings” – don’t yawn or you’ll face the wrath of Blanc!
- - - - - - - - - - - -
Medium Cool
(Birdsall/Detmold/Kaika/Trombley)
The Reducers
From the album Shinola
1995
But I didn’t leave the Communication Building. No, that would have probably been a dumb move on my part, not taking a course in my major. Looking back, it probably wouldn’t have hurt to take another Communication course that semester. No, I still visited the Communication Building three days a week (M-days) to take part in yet another 100-level course. This one was titled Media-Culture-Society (COM-187) and its purpose, according to the instructor, was for us students to develop a historical knowledge and appreciation of media development in America. His desire, or so he reiterated more than once, was for us to never watch television the same way again.
There was a lot of history in this class. I mean, the syllabus began with the note that in 1872 James Maxwell theorized the idea of wireless communication. From there we discussed Marconi playing the mamba and listening to the radio, the rise of someone named Kent Atwater, and the role Felix the Cat played in the early days of television (...makes you wonder if he’ll show up 80 years after his first appearance to help usher in Digital Television later this month). The rise of cable television, programming syndication, and ratings were also major talking points in this class that really took its course title seriously.
Besides reading articles from the textbook about the history of radio and television, we also viewed “screenings” from the extensive archives of Dr. Blanc. Back then – and even now as I write this – I wondered how Fred Blanc managed to track down everything he did. He had memorable episodes from classic sitcoms, samples of “old time” radio comedies, and an assortment of advertising oddities. And a little bit of everything else....
One of the more memorable items was during the discussion of tobacco on television and – whoa and behold – Blanc pulls out a series of cigarette commercials, including a bizarre one featuring Fred Flintstone. That, and a montage of Old Joe print ads (playing pool and driving cars) set to something from the Miami Vice soundtrack (this was a few years before the camel’s demise). We also got an earful of Archie Bunker spew a line of racial slurs a mile long during another program – all in the name of education.
But, word to the wise with these “screenings” – don’t yawn or you’ll face the wrath of Blanc!
- - - - - - - - - - - -
Medium Cool
(Birdsall/Detmold/Kaika/Trombley)
The Reducers
From the album Shinola
1995
Sunday, January 25, 2009
the one about walking to the student health center
The Student Health Center was an unattractive one-story brick building that stood on university property south of Rex Hall. It was a confused little building that jutted out in all the wrong places, often in badly constructed angles, and sat in the middle of a sea of cracked and disheveled asphalt. One got the impression that the original intention was not to have a building this small take up a plot of land that large but perhaps something went awry in the construction phase.
I was supposed to walk to the health center once a week for allergy shots. It was a fairly quick and painless walk – the street that dead-ended outside between Bowman Hall and the Communication Building was Seventh Avenue; I walked down the hill two blocks to the intersection with Riverside Drive and then crossed the street to the health center. Five minutes tops.
But it didn’t take long for me to think twice about being a pedestrian around traffic along Riverside Drive. Yeah, I may have been too nervous to cross the street when cars were nearby. I had seen a few students chased out of the zebra crossing by cars that could not wait (driven by other students, no less). These pedestrians managed to get out of the way as quickly as possible, sometimes to the other side of the street but many times back to where they started. Therefore I remember hanging around the corner some mornings “causally waiting” for the cars to go by. It wasn’t always busy, yet I managed to always be on the scene when a garbage truck of delivery van was visiting the area.
Of course, once I crossed the street I still had a good walk in front of me through the seldom-used parking lot. Health center staff filled up about a fifth of the spaces and since the entire lot was designated for use only by faculty and staff that meant students couldn’t park there unless they wanted a ticket. So who parked there aside from the occasional campus service vehicles or University Police Department squad cars? Nobody. But then why UPD never noticed the cars running students off the road I’ll never know.
I quickly learned that the interior of the building was as devoid of common sense as its exterior insinuated. Windows stared out in most every direction (including up, as I discovered in the back of the building) and in some areas at each other (one pane of glass in the waiting room looked into one of the examination rooms, and vice versa). The waiting room was as painful as the clichés would have you think, complete with old magazines, complimentary literature on drug products, and some sort of music from an overhead speaker.
Just as cliché were the people that worked in the health center. Possibly atypical for the polite vibe that the university promoted, the woman behind the desk did little to welcome you and smiled only when she handled money. I never saw the doctor assigned to this outpost but there was a laundry list of rumors about him: that he had been reprimanded by the local hospital and worked with students as his punishment; that he was pushing 90 years of age and knew little of modern medicine; and that he prescribed aspirin to everyone for everything (a long-standing joke I heard both my freshman and senior year was that the doctor gave a kid aspirin for a compound fracture).
Huey, Dewy, and Louie were the nicknames of the three nurses I encountered and who were the only medical staff I ever saw. Each week it would be one of the three who would call me into the bowels of the building to shoot me up with serum. Then I clamored my way back to the front to sit and wait. Because there were three different people there were three totally different bedside manners to deal with.
One – the tall, Native American looking nurse – said I had to wait fifteen minutes after I got the shots but would usually let me go after maybe five or ten minutes if my arms looked okay. The downside was that she always talked to you for ten minutes or so before actually giving you the shot. Another woman – a short woman with her gray hair in a bun – went through some sort of ritual before administrating the shot (wiping down the needle, my arm, and God knows what else with alcohol pads). The major obstacle in dealing with her was that she insisted on at least fifteen minutes of waiting time after the shot. You could easily be there an hour after sitting in the waiting room and the post-shot follow-up. The third woman was certainly more pleasant but a bit younger than the rest. I tend to think she was new on staff, fresh from medical school or an internship somewhere, because she was sure to let you know how important allergy shots were and why I should also come in for flu shots and understand what happens when.... (Wow, looking back, the nursing staff might have doubled as the cast in a university production of One Flew over the Cuckoo’s Nest.)
But midway through the fall semester I started putting off my weekly walk to the health center for a myriad of reasons. Part of it was crossing Riverside Drive and dealing with the traffic. I also used the rain as my excuse. Part of it was defiance. I was at college and was going to do what I wanted to do. Assuredly, another reason was I didn’t like dealing with the various personalities within the health center. It was frustrating wanting to make a quick visit only to linger half an hour in the waiting room and then have to deal with one or more of the nursing staff with their dissimilar views on procedures.
In the long run, the only noticeable thing about not getting shots was that I didn’t seem to have any allergy problems. Heading into winter and throughout the spring semester, my weekly visits became every other week, and the nursing staff told me that I could never build up a resistance to allergens if I didn’t get the shots on a regularly scheduled basis. But nuts to them and nuts to the only thing the three of them seemed to agree about. I had received shots for about a decade up to that point and after missing a few weeks I realized I wasn’t suffering from bouts of ragweed, pigweed, pisporum weed, or all those other grasses. Why spend money to buy a serum that wasn’t really doing anything for me, anyway?
Waiting to get my shots was discouraging, yes, but so was waiting to cross Riverside Drive. If there were cars passing through the intersection when I approached, I usually turned the corner and walked alongside Rex Hall and began pacing back and forth as if I were waiting for someone. And it was here I noticed a strange segment of sidewalk. Decades ago when the cement was laid, a group of people must have walked this very path before the cement had fully hardened. Ghostly shoe prints were still visible and one could literally walk in the footsteps of former students. I was sure the shoe prints were created by students because another segment of the cement was signed by people named Jim, Terri, Sharon, and others with dates as far back as the 1960s.
I suppose there were so tired, so tired of waiting, too.
- - - - - - - - - - - -
To Our Health
(Jan Hedin/Magnus Karlsson)
Happydeadmen
From the album After the Siesta
1998
I was supposed to walk to the health center once a week for allergy shots. It was a fairly quick and painless walk – the street that dead-ended outside between Bowman Hall and the Communication Building was Seventh Avenue; I walked down the hill two blocks to the intersection with Riverside Drive and then crossed the street to the health center. Five minutes tops.
But it didn’t take long for me to think twice about being a pedestrian around traffic along Riverside Drive. Yeah, I may have been too nervous to cross the street when cars were nearby. I had seen a few students chased out of the zebra crossing by cars that could not wait (driven by other students, no less). These pedestrians managed to get out of the way as quickly as possible, sometimes to the other side of the street but many times back to where they started. Therefore I remember hanging around the corner some mornings “causally waiting” for the cars to go by. It wasn’t always busy, yet I managed to always be on the scene when a garbage truck of delivery van was visiting the area.
Of course, once I crossed the street I still had a good walk in front of me through the seldom-used parking lot. Health center staff filled up about a fifth of the spaces and since the entire lot was designated for use only by faculty and staff that meant students couldn’t park there unless they wanted a ticket. So who parked there aside from the occasional campus service vehicles or University Police Department squad cars? Nobody. But then why UPD never noticed the cars running students off the road I’ll never know.
I quickly learned that the interior of the building was as devoid of common sense as its exterior insinuated. Windows stared out in most every direction (including up, as I discovered in the back of the building) and in some areas at each other (one pane of glass in the waiting room looked into one of the examination rooms, and vice versa). The waiting room was as painful as the clichés would have you think, complete with old magazines, complimentary literature on drug products, and some sort of music from an overhead speaker.
Just as cliché were the people that worked in the health center. Possibly atypical for the polite vibe that the university promoted, the woman behind the desk did little to welcome you and smiled only when she handled money. I never saw the doctor assigned to this outpost but there was a laundry list of rumors about him: that he had been reprimanded by the local hospital and worked with students as his punishment; that he was pushing 90 years of age and knew little of modern medicine; and that he prescribed aspirin to everyone for everything (a long-standing joke I heard both my freshman and senior year was that the doctor gave a kid aspirin for a compound fracture).
Huey, Dewy, and Louie were the nicknames of the three nurses I encountered and who were the only medical staff I ever saw. Each week it would be one of the three who would call me into the bowels of the building to shoot me up with serum. Then I clamored my way back to the front to sit and wait. Because there were three different people there were three totally different bedside manners to deal with.
One – the tall, Native American looking nurse – said I had to wait fifteen minutes after I got the shots but would usually let me go after maybe five or ten minutes if my arms looked okay. The downside was that she always talked to you for ten minutes or so before actually giving you the shot. Another woman – a short woman with her gray hair in a bun – went through some sort of ritual before administrating the shot (wiping down the needle, my arm, and God knows what else with alcohol pads). The major obstacle in dealing with her was that she insisted on at least fifteen minutes of waiting time after the shot. You could easily be there an hour after sitting in the waiting room and the post-shot follow-up. The third woman was certainly more pleasant but a bit younger than the rest. I tend to think she was new on staff, fresh from medical school or an internship somewhere, because she was sure to let you know how important allergy shots were and why I should also come in for flu shots and understand what happens when.... (Wow, looking back, the nursing staff might have doubled as the cast in a university production of One Flew over the Cuckoo’s Nest.)
But midway through the fall semester I started putting off my weekly walk to the health center for a myriad of reasons. Part of it was crossing Riverside Drive and dealing with the traffic. I also used the rain as my excuse. Part of it was defiance. I was at college and was going to do what I wanted to do. Assuredly, another reason was I didn’t like dealing with the various personalities within the health center. It was frustrating wanting to make a quick visit only to linger half an hour in the waiting room and then have to deal with one or more of the nursing staff with their dissimilar views on procedures.
In the long run, the only noticeable thing about not getting shots was that I didn’t seem to have any allergy problems. Heading into winter and throughout the spring semester, my weekly visits became every other week, and the nursing staff told me that I could never build up a resistance to allergens if I didn’t get the shots on a regularly scheduled basis. But nuts to them and nuts to the only thing the three of them seemed to agree about. I had received shots for about a decade up to that point and after missing a few weeks I realized I wasn’t suffering from bouts of ragweed, pigweed, pisporum weed, or all those other grasses. Why spend money to buy a serum that wasn’t really doing anything for me, anyway?
Waiting to get my shots was discouraging, yes, but so was waiting to cross Riverside Drive. If there were cars passing through the intersection when I approached, I usually turned the corner and walked alongside Rex Hall and began pacing back and forth as if I were waiting for someone. And it was here I noticed a strange segment of sidewalk. Decades ago when the cement was laid, a group of people must have walked this very path before the cement had fully hardened. Ghostly shoe prints were still visible and one could literally walk in the footsteps of former students. I was sure the shoe prints were created by students because another segment of the cement was signed by people named Jim, Terri, Sharon, and others with dates as far back as the 1960s.
I suppose there were so tired, so tired of waiting, too.
- - - - - - - - - - - -
To Our Health
(Jan Hedin/Magnus Karlsson)
Happydeadmen
From the album After the Siesta
1998
Sunday, January 18, 2009
the one about the brief tenure of the first university president
It had started to rain again. We both froze as the man stepped forward and pulled out a flashlight. Its light shone on both Cody’s and my face and from that circle of light we could just make out his face, too. Although it was partially hidden by his hat, the man was middle-aged with huge, owl-eyed spectacles. His mouth was twisted into a frown and he nastily asked what the two of us were doing out here, where we were going, and why.
Cody was a bit more quick-witted than I was, plus he also had a bit of temper (and neither of us appreciated the threatening stance or meddlesome questions). When the man had stopped barking his questions at us, Cody irritably let fly with a response. “Listen, we’re trying out for the cross-country team so we thought we’d take a run. Is that all right with you? We were tryin’ to get over to th’ dorm but you showed up an’ all...”
Owl Eyes ran the flashlight up and down to check out what we were wearing. He then causally turned the light on the nearby University Police Department call box situated between Old Administration and the Communication Building. Cody held his ground. “Look, we’re not doing anything wrong,” Cody said crossly. “We aren’t drinkin’ or anything. An... and we could even ask you the same the question. What are you doing out here? Snoopin’ around in the dark? ”
The man’s face dropped and his attitude changed in an instant. Gone was the threatening groundskeeper he pretended to be; now Owl Eyes seemed embarrassed by his outburst and more so for being caught. He hem-hawed an apology and muttered something about running into a group of toughs during his previous research. After that encounter he said he was always defensive and edgy when confronted.
The two of us exchanged glances as if to say it was time to go. The strange, lonely owl-eyed man began pleading for us to stay, as if this would qualify as penitence for his earlier actions. We had taken but a few steps toward Bowman Hall when the man popped the question: "Don't you want to know what I was doing?" I must admit, Cody was more inquisitive than I was at the time. He turned around. "Yeah, you're casin' the joint and are goin' to end up being arrested for breakin' and enterin', that's what!"
Neither of us was prepared for what Owl Eyes said next. "Did you know this university’s first president was found dead somewhere in this area?" This was new to me and Cody, too. I knew nothing about the first president and sadly not much more about the man currently holding the position.
Cody and I stopped and listened as Owl Eyes began the brief story of Theodore Conall. He had been hired from somewhere out east – "Birmingham, Biloxi, Bedford, I don’t remember where" – where his extensive background in teaching had earned him the nickname "Magic Tad." These experiences impressed the local board of directors who saw fit to hire him for work in Grandville. Conall arrived in the early summer of 1873 (his wife and family wouldn’t arrive until late-September) and spent his first month conferring with community leaders and helping further shape the curriculum of Grandville Normal that opened that October. But over the next few months Conall changed. While he seemed as dedicated to the role of president as ever, he avoided excess attention and shied away from interviews. Once boisterous meetings with the faculty were mostly muted affairs, or so said occasional items in the Examiner-Press. Conall led opening day ceremonies on October 5 with what went down as the longest and wettest investiture speech in school history. Ten days later his body was found in the tree-lined acreage behind the red-brick Grandville Building. "Somewhere out in this area," Owl Eyes said wearily, waving a limp arm out toward the quadrangle.
Neither of us said a word but Owl Eyes knew what we were thinking. "He succumbed to Typhoid fever...or small pox. Some disease"
A disease? Well, that sort of sucked the air out of any potential mystery. We were tired. We were drenched. By this time Cody and I knew we needed to be getting back to the dorm. The rain had slowed down to a light drizzle again and Owl Eyes said a few more words and thanked us for bearing with him. With a down-turned head, he galloped toward where we had come, to the other side of the quadrangle and a parking lot just on the other side. Cody and I watched until his raincoat melted into the colors of the night. We then both agreed the best word to describe the evening – and Owl Eyes – was "weird."
We got back to Bowman Hall close to nine o’clock and immediately washed up and went to bed. It was had been a long day preparing for the rapidly approaching fall semester and now, for it to be capped off with some strange story from campus lore…well, the mind wondered about who the owl-eyed man really was and what he was doing. But those questions would have to wait for another day.
We weren’t even college students, yet.
- - - - - - - - - - - -
Man of Mystery
(Michael Carr)
Fathoms
From the album Evening in Nivram: Music of Shadows
1997
Cody was a bit more quick-witted than I was, plus he also had a bit of temper (and neither of us appreciated the threatening stance or meddlesome questions). When the man had stopped barking his questions at us, Cody irritably let fly with a response. “Listen, we’re trying out for the cross-country team so we thought we’d take a run. Is that all right with you? We were tryin’ to get over to th’ dorm but you showed up an’ all...”
Owl Eyes ran the flashlight up and down to check out what we were wearing. He then causally turned the light on the nearby University Police Department call box situated between Old Administration and the Communication Building. Cody held his ground. “Look, we’re not doing anything wrong,” Cody said crossly. “We aren’t drinkin’ or anything. An... and we could even ask you the same the question. What are you doing out here? Snoopin’ around in the dark? ”
The man’s face dropped and his attitude changed in an instant. Gone was the threatening groundskeeper he pretended to be; now Owl Eyes seemed embarrassed by his outburst and more so for being caught. He hem-hawed an apology and muttered something about running into a group of toughs during his previous research. After that encounter he said he was always defensive and edgy when confronted.
The two of us exchanged glances as if to say it was time to go. The strange, lonely owl-eyed man began pleading for us to stay, as if this would qualify as penitence for his earlier actions. We had taken but a few steps toward Bowman Hall when the man popped the question: "Don't you want to know what I was doing?" I must admit, Cody was more inquisitive than I was at the time. He turned around. "Yeah, you're casin' the joint and are goin' to end up being arrested for breakin' and enterin', that's what!"
Neither of us was prepared for what Owl Eyes said next. "Did you know this university’s first president was found dead somewhere in this area?" This was new to me and Cody, too. I knew nothing about the first president and sadly not much more about the man currently holding the position.
Cody and I stopped and listened as Owl Eyes began the brief story of Theodore Conall. He had been hired from somewhere out east – "Birmingham, Biloxi, Bedford, I don’t remember where" – where his extensive background in teaching had earned him the nickname "Magic Tad." These experiences impressed the local board of directors who saw fit to hire him for work in Grandville. Conall arrived in the early summer of 1873 (his wife and family wouldn’t arrive until late-September) and spent his first month conferring with community leaders and helping further shape the curriculum of Grandville Normal that opened that October. But over the next few months Conall changed. While he seemed as dedicated to the role of president as ever, he avoided excess attention and shied away from interviews. Once boisterous meetings with the faculty were mostly muted affairs, or so said occasional items in the Examiner-Press. Conall led opening day ceremonies on October 5 with what went down as the longest and wettest investiture speech in school history. Ten days later his body was found in the tree-lined acreage behind the red-brick Grandville Building. "Somewhere out in this area," Owl Eyes said wearily, waving a limp arm out toward the quadrangle.
Neither of us said a word but Owl Eyes knew what we were thinking. "He succumbed to Typhoid fever...or small pox. Some disease"
A disease? Well, that sort of sucked the air out of any potential mystery. We were tired. We were drenched. By this time Cody and I knew we needed to be getting back to the dorm. The rain had slowed down to a light drizzle again and Owl Eyes said a few more words and thanked us for bearing with him. With a down-turned head, he galloped toward where we had come, to the other side of the quadrangle and a parking lot just on the other side. Cody and I watched until his raincoat melted into the colors of the night. We then both agreed the best word to describe the evening – and Owl Eyes – was "weird."
We got back to Bowman Hall close to nine o’clock and immediately washed up and went to bed. It was had been a long day preparing for the rapidly approaching fall semester and now, for it to be capped off with some strange story from campus lore…well, the mind wondered about who the owl-eyed man really was and what he was doing. But those questions would have to wait for another day.
We weren’t even college students, yet.
- - - - - - - - - - - -
Man of Mystery
(Michael Carr)
Fathoms
From the album Evening in Nivram: Music of Shadows
1997
Sunday, January 11, 2009
the one about an escapade at orientation
While it was one of those Saturday “Meet and Greet” programs when I first saw Bowman Hall, it wouldn’t be until summer orientation that I had the privilege to sleep in the decades-old building. Scant memories of orientation remain, though I still remember it was a two day “festival of fun” held in late July. We were to report to campus by mid-afternoon Thursday and be ready to spend the next day walking the campus. Friday morning was spent within the core program areas (every freshman took an English course, every freshman took a history course) and the afternoon was regulated to meeting with the program area we wanted to major in. I naturally spent the afternoon in the Communication Building.
Those of us being “orientated” were housed in Bowman Hall, chosen for the three-day event because it was in the heart of campus, mere minutes away from most of the activities. It operated those days much like it would during the school year, which means that I had a roommate. Yes, while I’ve said Mort was my first roommate at college, the first person I shared a room with was Cody Marrow.
Why is it that every Cody I’ve ever met in my life – and thankfully, it’s only been two or three – insists on self-applying the nickname, “Code Man?” It isn’t funny. This “Code Man” was big – football player big. But he didn’t play ball and he didn’t talk much. We met Thursday afternoon and hit it off the best we could, though I think neither of us were the type of person we would have associated with in different circumstances. After dinner I took a brief stroll around campus and returned to discover “Code Man” had brought a television, the only accessorily relief from the vacant room.
We met up for breakfast and then went our separate ways. It was an eventful day, with me registering for my first classes and meeting with the coordinator of the Communication Department; outside the big event was the university-sponsored “picnic party” in the mall area next to the student center. That sort of thing didn’t appeal to me so I stayed away. That night tuned out to be the big dance in the ballroom, which neither me or Code Man expressed any interest in attending. The problem with that was the Bowman Hall residence advisors (RA’s), in an effort to promote unification and a new chapter opening in our lives (their words), were going from room to room to force us from the building and drag us to the party (if need be; their words). Code Man had only caught wind of this mandatory requirement during dinner so we had to act fast when we got back to our room.
There had been a light late-afternoon shower that by dinner time had progressed to a fine mist. Thinking the rain would soon let up, the two of us slipped out the backdoor of the dormitory into the night with only the haziest of plans. Since most everyone would be convening at the Student Center next door our strategy was to head off in the opposite direction, splashing and slogging through puddles and the wet underbrush washed into the sidewalks and streets. My quick tour of the campus the night before came in handy as we made our way from structure to structure, keeping close to the sides of the buildings and never straying into the halos illuminating from streetlights above. Neither of us said anything; silently I wondered if we’d get caught. Surely the University Police were out on patrol tonight what with all the guests in Bowman Hall. Maybe they were hiding in the shadows of the stoic frieze outside the Music Building or leaning lazily along the northern edge of the library at the book drop. But there was no one.
Our little jaunt lasted as long as we thought it should – over a half hour – and we covered plenty of ground on foot that evening. The mist turned to a light sprinkle through which we could make out shapeless forms darting quickly in the shimmering twilight. Cody and I were nearing the central part of campus now. This was our victory stretch, a clear shot from one end of the campus to its center, down one side of the quadrangle, and then a few clever twists and turns and we would be back in Bowman Hall.
What was that? Cody stopped short and spun around. We were dead still. Somebody – or something – was making a lot of noise on the other side of the quadrangle. What little light there was swirled in the thickening mist. It was too dark to see anything and neither of us thought to bring a flashlight. Was it following us? In my innocence I asked if it was a dog. I got the answer I deserved. Hesitantly the two of us moved on, down a steep staircase and then through a canopy of limp, leafy branches from a nearby tree. It wouldn’t be long now. Finally the close shadows of buildings and trees fell away and we reached the lane that divided the quad. A brisk walk across the quadrangle and we could see our home away from home, Bowman Hall. We stood next to an impossibly large box-like building, silent and secure. We had reached the Old Administration Building.
And standing at the side of the building, in the shadows of the old, unused outdoor staircase, was a man. He wore dark green raincoat and floppy-brimmed rain hat that kept his face dry in no way at all. The shape turned to face us and then lurched forward.
- - - - - - - - - - - -
Orientation
(Jose Padilla)
Jose Padilla
From the album Souvenir
1998
Those of us being “orientated” were housed in Bowman Hall, chosen for the three-day event because it was in the heart of campus, mere minutes away from most of the activities. It operated those days much like it would during the school year, which means that I had a roommate. Yes, while I’ve said Mort was my first roommate at college, the first person I shared a room with was Cody Marrow.
Why is it that every Cody I’ve ever met in my life – and thankfully, it’s only been two or three – insists on self-applying the nickname, “Code Man?” It isn’t funny. This “Code Man” was big – football player big. But he didn’t play ball and he didn’t talk much. We met Thursday afternoon and hit it off the best we could, though I think neither of us were the type of person we would have associated with in different circumstances. After dinner I took a brief stroll around campus and returned to discover “Code Man” had brought a television, the only accessorily relief from the vacant room.
We met up for breakfast and then went our separate ways. It was an eventful day, with me registering for my first classes and meeting with the coordinator of the Communication Department; outside the big event was the university-sponsored “picnic party” in the mall area next to the student center. That sort of thing didn’t appeal to me so I stayed away. That night tuned out to be the big dance in the ballroom, which neither me or Code Man expressed any interest in attending. The problem with that was the Bowman Hall residence advisors (RA’s), in an effort to promote unification and a new chapter opening in our lives (their words), were going from room to room to force us from the building and drag us to the party (if need be; their words). Code Man had only caught wind of this mandatory requirement during dinner so we had to act fast when we got back to our room.
There had been a light late-afternoon shower that by dinner time had progressed to a fine mist. Thinking the rain would soon let up, the two of us slipped out the backdoor of the dormitory into the night with only the haziest of plans. Since most everyone would be convening at the Student Center next door our strategy was to head off in the opposite direction, splashing and slogging through puddles and the wet underbrush washed into the sidewalks and streets. My quick tour of the campus the night before came in handy as we made our way from structure to structure, keeping close to the sides of the buildings and never straying into the halos illuminating from streetlights above. Neither of us said anything; silently I wondered if we’d get caught. Surely the University Police were out on patrol tonight what with all the guests in Bowman Hall. Maybe they were hiding in the shadows of the stoic frieze outside the Music Building or leaning lazily along the northern edge of the library at the book drop. But there was no one.
Our little jaunt lasted as long as we thought it should – over a half hour – and we covered plenty of ground on foot that evening. The mist turned to a light sprinkle through which we could make out shapeless forms darting quickly in the shimmering twilight. Cody and I were nearing the central part of campus now. This was our victory stretch, a clear shot from one end of the campus to its center, down one side of the quadrangle, and then a few clever twists and turns and we would be back in Bowman Hall.
What was that? Cody stopped short and spun around. We were dead still. Somebody – or something – was making a lot of noise on the other side of the quadrangle. What little light there was swirled in the thickening mist. It was too dark to see anything and neither of us thought to bring a flashlight. Was it following us? In my innocence I asked if it was a dog. I got the answer I deserved. Hesitantly the two of us moved on, down a steep staircase and then through a canopy of limp, leafy branches from a nearby tree. It wouldn’t be long now. Finally the close shadows of buildings and trees fell away and we reached the lane that divided the quad. A brisk walk across the quadrangle and we could see our home away from home, Bowman Hall. We stood next to an impossibly large box-like building, silent and secure. We had reached the Old Administration Building.
And standing at the side of the building, in the shadows of the old, unused outdoor staircase, was a man. He wore dark green raincoat and floppy-brimmed rain hat that kept his face dry in no way at all. The shape turned to face us and then lurched forward.
- - - - - - - - - - - -
Orientation
(Jose Padilla)
Jose Padilla
From the album Souvenir
1998
Sunday, January 4, 2009
the one about a man wearing bird shit
An ode this week to Bowman-Oates Hall and the big-talking, horn-blowing, glad-handing show-off that will be forever known to me as Bird Shit.
Bowman-Oates Hall was a four-story dormitory and where I lived my four undergrad years. It was perfect and pristine in exactly no way at all, perhaps aware that it was not long for this world. At one time it had been one of the more popular on-campus dorms, partly because it was squared away in the center of campus but also because it was coed, had its own cafeteria, and parking was a breeze (out back, in fact). I chose it for those reasons but also because it was across the street from the Communication Building, though “across the street” is a slightly misleading term; one end of the “street” had been sealed off decades before and it the narrow strip of broken blacktop served mostly as parking for Communication Building faculty and staff.
My first encounter with Bowman Hall was probably during one of the university’s “Meet and Greet” sessions held once each long semester – once in March, the other in October – to allow potential students the opportunity the chance to walk the campus, meet with instructors, and peek inside academic buildings and dormitories to see what this college thing was all about.
Whatever my first impressions of Bowman Hall were are long forgotten. My memory of this "Meet and Greet" Saturday is still fresh on my mind.
Everyone met at the coliseum by 8 AM and following the welcoming ceremonies we broke into groups of about 10 students to tour the campus with our guide. What made these tours interesting were the people – students, of course – culled to act as tour guides. My guide was most certainly a member of a fraternity and more than likely had partied the night before all the while forgetting of his commitment the following morning. He didn’t reek or slur his speech or anything immediately noticeable but he didn’t react kindly to sunlight or repeated questions.
For reasons I’ve never understood, but that still resonate clearly in my mind, my guide somehow misunderstood my name as “Greg” when we were introduced and not Martin or Marty or something along those lines (or even, as I’ve been to some, Mark). Then he thought my brother, who was tagging along with my parents and me, was the soon-to-be freshman and started asking about his major.
After the tour I dubbed the guide “Mark” – possibly in retaliation for not being able to retain my name. Mark did little more than waddle around the quadrangle and point out buildings and their contents though it was not as convincing a show as you’d expect because Mark relied heavily on reading verbatim from the signs out front the buildings.
However the real gem in our tour was the guy near the front of the crowd dressed in black. Black shirt. Black pants. Black bucks, and probably black socks but no one checked. Black hair; oily, swimming in a swamp of Wildroot or shoe polish or some other God-awful concoction. His face looked like a catcher’s mitt, wrinkled and tan. My mom said his dentures were slipping every time he smiled. He didn’t smile a lot because he talked excessively about his daughter. The girl was the smartest student to ever come out of the Montezuma school system, or so claimed the man in black. He proudly rattled off a list of her high school highlights: cheerleader, volleyball squad, wrote for the school newspaper, and was crowned Homecoming Queen, Prom Queen, and Miss Chi Chi (whatever the hell that was...) all in the same school year. I have no idea if that record has ever been beaten.
Listening to the father boast of past accomplishments wasn’t irritating enough. Her father seemingly knew that her name would be on the lips of every student within the first few weeks of her first school year. She was destined for popularity! Every time our guide mentioned something about a building – “this one houses the campus television station” or “this is the English building” – her father man would loudly announce some ridiculous claim like “you’re gonna see my baby on that television channel” or “my girl has a book of published poetry.” The girl, walking nearby as she balanced her family tree on the end of her nose, smirked and feigned interest in the tour.
Of course, the tour was thirty minutes and after ten minutes we were more than ready to jettison this man in black. And that’s about when some of us noticed the man’s shirt wasn’t really as black as the man thought.
Somewhere between the quadrangle and mall area, maybe somewhere around the Old Administration Building or Bowman Hall, the man in black walked underneath a bird. That’s when the bird let loose with its opinion on his daughter’s achievements. It was, as far as we could tell, a very large bird. Sadly, the man had neither seen nor heard the bird’s recent activity. Most everyone else in the tour did see what happened. And most everyone laughed.
It made for a memorable Saturday morning.
- - - - - - - - - - - -
Bird Shit Magnet
(unknown)
Debris
From the album Errata
1997
Bowman-Oates Hall was a four-story dormitory and where I lived my four undergrad years. It was perfect and pristine in exactly no way at all, perhaps aware that it was not long for this world. At one time it had been one of the more popular on-campus dorms, partly because it was squared away in the center of campus but also because it was coed, had its own cafeteria, and parking was a breeze (out back, in fact). I chose it for those reasons but also because it was across the street from the Communication Building, though “across the street” is a slightly misleading term; one end of the “street” had been sealed off decades before and it the narrow strip of broken blacktop served mostly as parking for Communication Building faculty and staff.
My first encounter with Bowman Hall was probably during one of the university’s “Meet and Greet” sessions held once each long semester – once in March, the other in October – to allow potential students the opportunity the chance to walk the campus, meet with instructors, and peek inside academic buildings and dormitories to see what this college thing was all about.
Whatever my first impressions of Bowman Hall were are long forgotten. My memory of this "Meet and Greet" Saturday is still fresh on my mind.
Everyone met at the coliseum by 8 AM and following the welcoming ceremonies we broke into groups of about 10 students to tour the campus with our guide. What made these tours interesting were the people – students, of course – culled to act as tour guides. My guide was most certainly a member of a fraternity and more than likely had partied the night before all the while forgetting of his commitment the following morning. He didn’t reek or slur his speech or anything immediately noticeable but he didn’t react kindly to sunlight or repeated questions.
For reasons I’ve never understood, but that still resonate clearly in my mind, my guide somehow misunderstood my name as “Greg” when we were introduced and not Martin or Marty or something along those lines (or even, as I’ve been to some, Mark). Then he thought my brother, who was tagging along with my parents and me, was the soon-to-be freshman and started asking about his major.
After the tour I dubbed the guide “Mark” – possibly in retaliation for not being able to retain my name. Mark did little more than waddle around the quadrangle and point out buildings and their contents though it was not as convincing a show as you’d expect because Mark relied heavily on reading verbatim from the signs out front the buildings.
However the real gem in our tour was the guy near the front of the crowd dressed in black. Black shirt. Black pants. Black bucks, and probably black socks but no one checked. Black hair; oily, swimming in a swamp of Wildroot or shoe polish or some other God-awful concoction. His face looked like a catcher’s mitt, wrinkled and tan. My mom said his dentures were slipping every time he smiled. He didn’t smile a lot because he talked excessively about his daughter. The girl was the smartest student to ever come out of the Montezuma school system, or so claimed the man in black. He proudly rattled off a list of her high school highlights: cheerleader, volleyball squad, wrote for the school newspaper, and was crowned Homecoming Queen, Prom Queen, and Miss Chi Chi (whatever the hell that was...) all in the same school year. I have no idea if that record has ever been beaten.
Listening to the father boast of past accomplishments wasn’t irritating enough. Her father seemingly knew that her name would be on the lips of every student within the first few weeks of her first school year. She was destined for popularity! Every time our guide mentioned something about a building – “this one houses the campus television station” or “this is the English building” – her father man would loudly announce some ridiculous claim like “you’re gonna see my baby on that television channel” or “my girl has a book of published poetry.” The girl, walking nearby as she balanced her family tree on the end of her nose, smirked and feigned interest in the tour.
Of course, the tour was thirty minutes and after ten minutes we were more than ready to jettison this man in black. And that’s about when some of us noticed the man’s shirt wasn’t really as black as the man thought.
Somewhere between the quadrangle and mall area, maybe somewhere around the Old Administration Building or Bowman Hall, the man in black walked underneath a bird. That’s when the bird let loose with its opinion on his daughter’s achievements. It was, as far as we could tell, a very large bird. Sadly, the man had neither seen nor heard the bird’s recent activity. Most everyone else in the tour did see what happened. And most everyone laughed.
It made for a memorable Saturday morning.
- - - - - - - - - - - -
Bird Shit Magnet
(unknown)
Debris
From the album Errata
1997
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