Many of us enjoyed and profited from our college years... to a point. But it’s hard to understand how some people who go to a school, any school, just can't let go.
As the football season approaches, look at the people who come to the games. Middle aged and older guys and gals in RVs with banners in school colors, gathering to watch a bunch of knuckle draggers dragging their knuckles into combat that's not nearly as exciting as a low level video game, and waaay more expensive.
But it's not just the football crazies. It's the frat boys and sorority girls who never let go of their I Phelta Thi sweatshirts and microskirts.
They all look like the "before" pictures in the Nutrisystem ads. They come on crutches and in Hoverounds, dragging their mascot flags, their dogs and their grandchildren behind them.
The hierarchies and cliques they either joined or formed as kids are still the templates for the ways they relate to the "outside world."
And then there are the ones that later get jobs at the school. They run for seats on boards, they show off by how many buildings or events are named after their money.
They join the faculty where they serve until they're numbed by tenure and write papers that the peer reviewers review and no one else reads.
They put out books no one buys except their students who have to and which are published by the (insert the name) University Press.
Later in life, what makes them think anyone will care where they went to school 50 years ago? Oh! I went to Michigan State or Harvard or the London School of Economics or that great medical and baking school in France, the Sore Bun?
No one cares because you’re same schlump now as when you entered the class of 61. But you don’t have to act like it.
Sure it’s nice to reminisce about the good old days of beer pitchers at Ye Olde Watering Hole and arguments about capitalism v. socialism and cutting class to be with that “special someone” or studying like mad eight hours before the Lithuanian Literature 134 final.
It is said that the “great universities” are where future leaders and forward thinking are formed. If so, how’s that working out for us?
SHRAPNEL:
--The US Embassy to Israel has moved to Jerusalem. It’s trump’s way of sticking it to the palestinians. The net gain for the US: forcing the ambassador to commute to Tel Aviv where all but the ceremonial still is done.
--Ivanka attended the ribbon cutting and all the photographs show her standing there smiling like the Stepford Daughter. Meantime, bullets are flying and blood is running in the streets. It’s hard for this space to sympathize with the palestinians, but in this case we gotta.
--Guatemala has follow the US lead and moved its embassy to Jerusalem. Huh? Who even knew there was one?
I’m Wes Richards. My opinions are my own but you’re welcome to them. ®
Please address comments to wesrichards@gmail.com
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© WJR 2018
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