Killing some time, waiting for a vendor to show up at one of our satellites. Decide to look up Flunk Day to see if there are any rumors pages I can access and stumble upon The Knox Student website. TKS is a weekly student newspaper for Knox College. They had a couple of articles about Flunk Day but nothing with a link to rumors.
So I clicked around and started reading other articles and came across one entitled ,a href='http://www.theknoxstudent.com/newsroom/article/all-plugged-knoxs-laptop-controversy/'>"All Plugged In: On Knox's Laptop Controversy". My interest piqued, I clicked through.
First off, I was shocked there is a controversy. I thought it was a bygone conclusion that laptops are everywhere and thus belong everywhere. I know in my day, laptops didn't even exist. But then again, neither did color monitors. And our printers were very, very loud. When I went off to college, my dad asked me if I wanted him to buy me a computer for school and it being 1989, I said no thanks, Dad. I'll get a word processor - that's all I need. And I was right. With the exception of a stupid Apple computer that corrupted my floppy disk right before senior finals, I rarely used much more than my word processor.
Had I been born 10 years later and entered Knox the fall of 1999, my answer would have been different, although I doubt the question would have even been asked. By that point, more than likely, I would have gone through an entire junior high and high school career using a computer and my dad would have known that I expected to do the same in college. And by that point, I may have been gifted an IBM Thinkpad 600 with a 300 mHz processor and 5.1 GB of storage. And I would have been on the cutting edge with a machine like that.
When I was a student, the only way to take notes involved ink (or graphite) and paper. Professors spoke fast so it also involved copious amounts of unreadable scribbles stretching across the lined sheets in front of me. The process of going over those notes later for a test inevitably ended in headache.
It seems a little odd that Knox is having this controversy now. Laptops have been in students' hands for over a decade so I have no doubt they have been in the classrooms just as long. Why carry a 4oz notebook when you can haul a 6lb laptop from SMaC to CFA?
Of course, the answer is Facebook. And Twitter. And old fashioned email. “We’re starting to get a generation of students who have always been multitasking ... What a lot of students are weak on now is the ability to focus.” How times change. And how I stay the same. I have always had a problem with focusing - clearly, I was born 20 years too soon. I am of the wrong generation and now know why I have been unable to focus all my life. Facebook. Twitter. Email. It is apparent to me, I have been social networking in my head all of these years, waiting only for a machine that could provide an actual connection to real people rather than the imagined connections to no-doubt the pretend-people in my head. I am so thankful that it has finally caught up with me and given me a forum to truly be my multi-tasking, unfocused, inattentive self.
Thank you Bill Gates! And thank you, Facebook.
Showing posts with label Knox College. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Knox College. Show all posts
19 April, 2010
23 February, 2009
My Soundtrack: The College Years
It just so happened that the transition from high school to college for me and my classmates paralleled the end-transition from the 1980s to the last decade of the millennium: from glam to grunge. The hair bands stopped teasing their bleach-blond tresses and let them tangle and return to their natural color. I contemplated attending class in my pajamas. I love how the world imitates my life.
This is not to say that as the 80s turned into the 90s, I caught up to the music of the age ... that didn't happen till the 2000s and I haven't gotten there yet.
The soundtrack of my college years was greatly influenced by my friends and my weekly attendance at various fraternity parties across campus. Though I surrounded myself with people who had similar backgrounds and experiences, the collection of music that came to that collaborative table could not have been more varied despite the fact that it consisted of at least 98% rock and 2% everything else. From one end of the group, we had an obsession with U2 & REM while another person built their collection around Men Without Hats and Pet Shop Boys. Add to it my 60s retro collection-slash-Bruce-slash some few 80s MTV gems and throw in a few (several) drunken frat parties blaring dance classics such as Joy and Pain and Baby Got Back.
The songs that take me back to those days, like Joy and Pain, each have their individual memories attached so that when I hear the songs, I can propel backwards to that moment, that person, that time. I actually only own one of these songs, relying otherwise on the radio to transport me randomly.
I am not a Led Zeppelin fan. Chalk it up to being inundated with Stairway to Heaven throughout most of my high school years. I have a teeth-clenching reaction to that song and will leap tall buildings to turn off a radio when I hear those first few notes. Given this extreme reaction, I expected that I disliked all of Led Zeppelin and never bothered to buy any of their records. Until TKE.
TKE, Tau Kappa Epsilon, was a favorite frat of mine at Knox. I had been involved with TKE since freshman year when I in my yellow VW Rabbit helped kidnap 8 naked pledges and a shoe. Did I mention the yellow VW Rabbit? ... that comfortably held 3?
TKE wasn't as famous for their parties as, say, the Phi Delts were, but I enjoyed them ever so much more; I attended as many as I could which, to tell the truth, was probably all of them. At a Phi Delt party, you would hear Joy and Pain and be crushed on the dance floor while trying to keep the beer in your cup. At a TKE party, you would hear Misty Mountain Hop as you strolled through the empty dance floor from one conversation to the next, upstairs through the various rooms and eventually settle into an Indian squat up on the top floor bobbing your head the entire time.
In my opinion, Misty Mountain Hop is the finest of the Led Zeppelin catalog. Yes, the bulk of this reason is because it takes me back to TKE. That's what art is. It takes you back to something you fondly remember because you spend all of your time moving forward and you need something to take you back every now and then.
When Misty Mountain Hop comes on the radio, I am back to being 20 years old with schoolgirl crushes and little responsibility (honestly, looking back, I could have taken a little more responsibility but that's not the kind of taking me back art does for me) and a Saturday night that could go all weekend. These days, by Saturday night and the weekend being half over, I'm already anticipating Monday but back then, Monday was a million beers away.
College wasn't all classes and frat parties. Often, my friends and I would congregate in a room or a suite (or an apartment Senior year) and talk, nurse beers, listen to someone's CDs. Two separate friends owned the Billy Joel Greatest Hits Volumes 1 & 2 CDs. Often, these CDs would be in the carousel.
Coming into college, I knew Billy Joel for Piano Man, a song I don't like much more than Stairway to Heaven for the same reasons, some poppy 80s tunes he wrote after Christie Brinkley actually fell in love with him (oh to be an unattractive, wealthy man), a few songs I like very much such as Pressure and Allentown and not much else.
A favorite song on these CDs for many of us was Captain Jack. While not my favorite on the CDs - that would be Scenes From an Italian Restaurant - this is the song that takes me back to those conversations and relaxations so long ago. I was told the song is about cocaine and the lyrics bear that out. Perhaps in college, that was more akin to our lives though none of us ever strolled down that road. But the nihilism that is suggested by heavy cocaine use isn't rare among late teens/early 20s kids and with or without the expensive habit, that nihilism is what always attracted me to the song and still makes me smile when I hear it now, when I am far less self-absorbed. I enjoy remembering the carefree parts of college most, I think. And if I were ever to have a kid, which is not in the plans but God has a funny sense of humor sometimes, I would insist s/he have a few of those years themselves.
The one song that I expect will always draw me back to college and I hope we play every time we reunite is Layla by Derek and the Dominoes.
Speaking of self-absorbed - we suspected, while in college and I think not entirely jokingly, that our group, self-titled Idiots, was being filmed as a reality show by aliens. Now, this seems like less of a leap these days in which 60% of the shows on TV are reality shows but back in 1992-1993, the only reality show on TV was MTV's The Real World and none of us really watched it ... television in college is both a luxury and a waste of time; I didn't own one and rarely watched until Senior year when Jen Clark moved into my room with her TV and all I remember watching is the Waco showdown.
But we were half-convinced in our narcissistic group-think that we were so fascinating, we must be television fodder to someone, somewhere. Thus, The Idiots. Thus, the theme music, Layla. Not the whole song, just the instrumental portion that is also in the Goodfellas scene where all the bodies of Jimmy Conway's former colleagues are turning up. I've always enjoyed that irony, by the way.
What that piece of music has always meant to me (besides dead mobsters in pink Cadillacs and freezer trucks) is friendship. I had some of the greatest friends in college and while there were plenty of bad times with them, I couldn't have had good times without them. Paraphrasing Aristotle, one cannot have the good without the bad and vice versa. Without bad, it is impossible to discern or define good and good relationships need bad times to be really and truly good. That pretty well sums up my college friendships and even after. And I cherish them more for it. It has been an honor to see these friends grow and learn and love and live. Layla reminds me of that every time I hear it and inevitably puts a smile on my face. And inevitably makes me sit up straighter and smooth my hair ? just in case the aliens are still watching.
This is not to say that as the 80s turned into the 90s, I caught up to the music of the age ... that didn't happen till the 2000s and I haven't gotten there yet.
The soundtrack of my college years was greatly influenced by my friends and my weekly attendance at various fraternity parties across campus. Though I surrounded myself with people who had similar backgrounds and experiences, the collection of music that came to that collaborative table could not have been more varied despite the fact that it consisted of at least 98% rock and 2% everything else. From one end of the group, we had an obsession with U2 & REM while another person built their collection around Men Without Hats and Pet Shop Boys. Add to it my 60s retro collection-slash-Bruce-slash some few 80s MTV gems and throw in a few (several) drunken frat parties blaring dance classics such as Joy and Pain and Baby Got Back.
The songs that take me back to those days, like Joy and Pain, each have their individual memories attached so that when I hear the songs, I can propel backwards to that moment, that person, that time. I actually only own one of these songs, relying otherwise on the radio to transport me randomly.
I am not a Led Zeppelin fan. Chalk it up to being inundated with Stairway to Heaven throughout most of my high school years. I have a teeth-clenching reaction to that song and will leap tall buildings to turn off a radio when I hear those first few notes. Given this extreme reaction, I expected that I disliked all of Led Zeppelin and never bothered to buy any of their records. Until TKE.
TKE, Tau Kappa Epsilon, was a favorite frat of mine at Knox. I had been involved with TKE since freshman year when I in my yellow VW Rabbit helped kidnap 8 naked pledges and a shoe. Did I mention the yellow VW Rabbit? ... that comfortably held 3?
TKE wasn't as famous for their parties as, say, the Phi Delts were, but I enjoyed them ever so much more; I attended as many as I could which, to tell the truth, was probably all of them. At a Phi Delt party, you would hear Joy and Pain and be crushed on the dance floor while trying to keep the beer in your cup. At a TKE party, you would hear Misty Mountain Hop as you strolled through the empty dance floor from one conversation to the next, upstairs through the various rooms and eventually settle into an Indian squat up on the top floor bobbing your head the entire time.
In my opinion, Misty Mountain Hop is the finest of the Led Zeppelin catalog. Yes, the bulk of this reason is because it takes me back to TKE. That's what art is. It takes you back to something you fondly remember because you spend all of your time moving forward and you need something to take you back every now and then.
When Misty Mountain Hop comes on the radio, I am back to being 20 years old with schoolgirl crushes and little responsibility (honestly, looking back, I could have taken a little more responsibility but that's not the kind of taking me back art does for me) and a Saturday night that could go all weekend. These days, by Saturday night and the weekend being half over, I'm already anticipating Monday but back then, Monday was a million beers away.
College wasn't all classes and frat parties. Often, my friends and I would congregate in a room or a suite (or an apartment Senior year) and talk, nurse beers, listen to someone's CDs. Two separate friends owned the Billy Joel Greatest Hits Volumes 1 & 2 CDs. Often, these CDs would be in the carousel.
Coming into college, I knew Billy Joel for Piano Man, a song I don't like much more than Stairway to Heaven for the same reasons, some poppy 80s tunes he wrote after Christie Brinkley actually fell in love with him (oh to be an unattractive, wealthy man), a few songs I like very much such as Pressure and Allentown and not much else.
A favorite song on these CDs for many of us was Captain Jack. While not my favorite on the CDs - that would be Scenes From an Italian Restaurant - this is the song that takes me back to those conversations and relaxations so long ago. I was told the song is about cocaine and the lyrics bear that out. Perhaps in college, that was more akin to our lives though none of us ever strolled down that road. But the nihilism that is suggested by heavy cocaine use isn't rare among late teens/early 20s kids and with or without the expensive habit, that nihilism is what always attracted me to the song and still makes me smile when I hear it now, when I am far less self-absorbed. I enjoy remembering the carefree parts of college most, I think. And if I were ever to have a kid, which is not in the plans but God has a funny sense of humor sometimes, I would insist s/he have a few of those years themselves.
The one song that I expect will always draw me back to college and I hope we play every time we reunite is Layla by Derek and the Dominoes.
Speaking of self-absorbed - we suspected, while in college and I think not entirely jokingly, that our group, self-titled Idiots, was being filmed as a reality show by aliens. Now, this seems like less of a leap these days in which 60% of the shows on TV are reality shows but back in 1992-1993, the only reality show on TV was MTV's The Real World and none of us really watched it ... television in college is both a luxury and a waste of time; I didn't own one and rarely watched until Senior year when Jen Clark moved into my room with her TV and all I remember watching is the Waco showdown.
But we were half-convinced in our narcissistic group-think that we were so fascinating, we must be television fodder to someone, somewhere. Thus, The Idiots. Thus, the theme music, Layla. Not the whole song, just the instrumental portion that is also in the Goodfellas scene where all the bodies of Jimmy Conway's former colleagues are turning up. I've always enjoyed that irony, by the way.
What that piece of music has always meant to me (besides dead mobsters in pink Cadillacs and freezer trucks) is friendship. I had some of the greatest friends in college and while there were plenty of bad times with them, I couldn't have had good times without them. Paraphrasing Aristotle, one cannot have the good without the bad and vice versa. Without bad, it is impossible to discern or define good and good relationships need bad times to be really and truly good. That pretty well sums up my college friendships and even after. And I cherish them more for it. It has been an honor to see these friends grow and learn and love and live. Layla reminds me of that every time I hear it and inevitably puts a smile on my face. And inevitably makes me sit up straighter and smooth my hair ? just in case the aliens are still watching.
30 August, 2008
Still Thinking About Tomorrow
Fitting that my last post on this blog was about the Olympics - when they ended last Sunday night, I had but less than one day to wait for yet another uber-hyped, televised event that would hold my attention for the week. Of course, I am talking about the Democratic National Convention, normally an event I would pay little-to-some attention to with sparingly doled-out enthusiasm.
Not. This. Year.
This year reminds me of November 3, 1992, my senior year at Knox and my first eligible presidential election. I had voted by absentee ballot already as my voter registration resided in California; but I went with my friends Mel and Peter to vote that day near school. It had been a first for them as well.
That night, we gathered in Mel's apartment (perhaps in our PJs, my memory is fuzzy there) and we danced along to Fleetwood Mac's Don't Stop Thinking About Tomorrow as the Reagan-Bush years came to an end and a new era stood onstage, arm-in-arm, smiling ear-to-ear. Bill Clinton engendered idealistic visions with an unstoppable imagination for what America, and we by extension, could be. Gone were the days of the rich getting richer and faulty-thinking trickle-down economics and on the horizon would be the days of Progress and Equality and an end to Poverty and all things bad. Or so we thought. Those were my younger, greener years, before I realized that all successful politicians are intrinsically the same but with different talking point priorities, though the talking points always seem to be, also, intrinsically the same.
The night of November the 3rd, 1992 was the first time that I felt I could actually use my vote to better my life as well as the lives of other Americans. I didn't have the cynicism I have now, I didn't read as much as I read now and I hadn't yet entered the real world so I hadn't yet realized that national elections don't have much of an effect on middle-class day-to-day life. Rooting for a favored politician is little different than rooting for a favored football team. You are elated when your favored politician/team wins but a few days later, after the enthusiasm has abated, life goes on as normal. Perhaps if our lives were able to be viewed as a curve on a grid, we could see the effect varying policies and laws and environments have upon our lives as a whole but, while we can do that for historical figures, we do not have that ability for our own selves.
* * * * * * * * *
Fast-forward to today, August 30, 2008. Nearly 16 years have passed, I have by now entered the real world. And while I've done everything in my power to avoid wholly committing to this part of life, the full strength of my power is nothing in comparison to the almighty dollar and the conveniences and necessities it affords me. I have become a real world-er now. I, along with the rest of the world, have endured the leadership of a former C student, which we all know means merely competent, and come to find out, he's not even that.
While my day-to-day life is little-affected by the whims and vagaries of the highest position in the country, I have nonetheless felt the bite of the housing crash, the recession and the invasion they call a war. I have been enraged for days on end by this administration and drank away my sorrows on the night they got re-elected with the lowest approval rating in an election year. I have entertained thoughts of leaving America but the reality is, American education is so abysmal, I am limited in the countries I could move to because English is the only language you need to sufficiently know to graduate high school. (I did well in both high school and college Spanish but not nearly well enough to just up and move to a Spanish-speaking country and expect to be able to communicate efficiently from Day One.)
I have looked forward to this election year for the last 4 years but with the caveat that I do now understand that all successful politicians are intrinsically the same and that the best I can hope for is a successor with a better mastery of the English language, a little more compassion for people not yet burdened with an official presidential nickname and the knowledge that diplomacy can sometimes be a solution in and of itself and not just a necessary step to be accomplished by whining and kicking and screaming.
In walks Barack Obama.
As a current Illinoisian, I know Obama. He's my senator, along with Dick Durbin. They're both Democrats and generally, vote the way I want them to vote. Which is good. I, along with all the other Illinoisians, am their boss.
But I am especially proud of Obama. He speaks the English language rather well - he uses big words properly. He carries himself with dignity and manages to show a general respect for all those around him. And he appears to know much about this country, its ideals and the hopes and dreams of its people. In fact, Hope and Dream are two catchphrases he uses often and with great effect.
He has been my candidate from the day he declared his intent to run. I don't give my vote easily. I researched him and the other candidates, both announced and expected to soon give intent. I appreciated many more of his views and stances than the others and I was bowled over by his speaking ability. Speeches have more power in policy that many candidates (generally those who don't speak well) want to believe. The ability to effortlessly speak can often change stubborn minds and get things done without anger or tension or war. A great speaker could provide us the diplomacy these last 8 years sorely needed. Thus, he passed the test where others failed. And I have been an enthusiastic supporter from that day onward.
He had a tough primary season. He was up against Fate. Hillary Clinton - in my opinion, the lesser of the two Clintons - wanted to, was fated to, put another Clinton in the White House. Before Bill's last term was up, she quote-unquote moved to New York in order to be qualified to run for the open senator seat coming up in 2000. This practice is known as carpetbagging and put my first checkmark in the negative column for Hillary. As I've said, I understand that all successful politicians are intrinsically the same but sometimes, some of them forget that some of us understand that fact. This move was completely transparent and I am one of those voters who prefers to be blindsided by political motive. At least then, I have a few exultant days of hopes and dreams before reality crashes down.
The other checkmarks in Hillary's negative column appeared one by one during the Primary season as she displayed what I consider to be True Colors once she realized Fate wasn't necessarily ironclad. I do realize that the never-objective media played a significant role in many of the negative aspects of the Democratic Primary season so not all the checkmarks belong to her but she and Bill played what I consider to be a nasty game brought about by desperation and that too was utterly transparent. I prefer to believe for at least a little while that my candidate is running for the good of the country and not for him/herself. With memories of carpetbagging dancing in my head, at no point did I believe that of her.
Eventually, Obama won through. Fate jumped ship and the Obama voters breathed a long-awaited sigh of relief. Hillary suspended her campaign - that was no less transparent. But for the time being, Obama remained alive and free from debilitating scandal and so long as that status quo remained, her campaign remained suspended.
The Democratic National Convention began Monday, August 25th. I tuned into only two speakers that night: Edward Kennedy, in the midst of a fight for his life and yet insistent that he add his thoughts to the proceedings, and Michelle Obama, speaking about her husband, at that point still referred to as the presumptive nominee. Personalizing Barack Obama to an audience acquainted with his abilities at lofty speech but not yet fully introduced to the man behind the words, Michelle Obama told the story of her completely normal upbringing, the achievements that both she and her brother sought and accomplished at the insistence of their parents and the man she met and fell in love with and what she saw in him that led her to believe that he is the right man to lead us. She is an easy person to like; unlike many actual and potential First Ladies, she is not drop-dead gorgeous (she leans more to girl-next-door pretty), she is intelligent but not snobbish and she is independent enough to cloud visions of Laura-Bush type First Ladies. Her story makes me feel like Obama actually fell in love with the woman and not the woman’s potential. I hope a lot of the fence-sitters walked away from Michelle’s speech with a more fully-drawn, positive picture of Barack Obama.
The next night, Tuesday, Hillary Clinton addressed the crowd. I know a lot of breaths were held for this night. Would she fall in line and be a good Democrat or would she come out bitter and resolved to walk a fine line in order to create her chance for the 2012 elections? I held my breath as well. My opinion, in the end, is that she spent the first half of her speech using the words I, Me, My and Mine a lot and mentioned Obama’s name not a lot. She spoke of her own campaign and her own campaign promises and the people who approached her campaign and told their stories to her in order for her to tell them to her supporters. Like that. She had some great lines, don’t get me wrong (“No way, No how, No McCain”, “Sisterhood of the Traveling Pantsuits”) and she did attack the McCain campaign plenty but it took her until the last 5 minutes, I’d say, before she turned the speech to Obama and to his campaign and to the need for a Democrat to win again. Once that happened, then she fell in line. She made comments that were clearly designed to pull her till-now reluctant supporters in line as well. All-in-all, I appreciate her efforts although I think she undercut them in the first several narcissistic minutes of her speech.
Obama’s running mate, Joe Biden ended the DNC that night with a rousing speech that took the fight straight to McCain’s doorstep. Biden’s role is clearly to be the attack dog for the Democrats this election which I think is a smart move. So far, Obama has played a high-road hand and the second he takes the low road, the media outcry will deafen any explanation he may have for doing so. The outspoken Biden will be the perfect vehicle for that undertaking.
Then, two days ago, Obama accepted the nomination and was crowned the champion of the Democrat party in a massive celebration at Mile High Stadium in Denver. Estimates from 70,000 to 85,000 people witnessed this particular History in the Making in person. Millions more witnessed it recorded live. I became a part of the couch as he spoke, my drink on the table beside me and my laptop on my lap. Through IM, my friend Danielle and I were able to comment to each other real-time without the hassle of having to shush ourselves to hear, though periodically, Jason would shush me for tap-tap-tapping on the keyboard.
Nevertheless, I listened intently to the entire speech and at the end, I felt a little November 3rd, 1992 surge through me - that this man just might be far enough removed from the Establishment that he can separate himself from the rest of the successful politicians long enough to fulfill some of his semi-utopian promises. That he also, is still thinking about tomorrow and hoping that he can be the driving force to returning a little glory and honor to a nation that has been fed on fear and incompetence for what seems like an eternity now. And, I know it won’t happen, but I kind of hope to hear a little Fleetwood Mac at his acceptance speech on November 4th, 2008. Not as a show of respect to the last great Democrat in office but rather as a reminder that progress means never stopping thinking about tomorrow.
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