That time of year has once again descended upon us. The fall semester begins August 22. Not long after that the leaves will begin to change color, a cool breeze will begin to blow, and footballs will be flying through the air like a new species of bird. Somewhere, I’m sure; a small animal is chasing another small animal around a pumpkin. Assuming, of course, that summer does not give fall and winter a break and skip straight into spring.
While a change in the weather is good, and the return of football is great, this time of year is recognized for the return of another creature: the Jaded Senior.
For those of you not in the know, the Jaded Senior is an animal unto itself. They have seen things that no human being should see, they know things that no one should know (just ask about the “Spot the Mossad Agent” Game). The Jaded Senior carries years of intellectual accruement that would burden down Einstein, God rest him. No man is an island, but the Jaded Senior has dug himself one heck of a moat.
Achieving the level of Jaded Senior requires putting in far too many hours for either your major or your minor. The look is disheveled to the point that some Jaded Seniors are mistaken for professors. The mental fortitude required to be a Jaded Senior rivals that of the Zen Buddhist monks of
You never want to be near a Jaded Senior when their last nerve is stepped on. I point back to the perfect storm, the moment when Carl, Robert, and I simultaneously imploded like a cluster of neutron stars, spewing acidic vitriol at each other as the very strings of time and space rent and tore themselves around us, forming new dimensions where the squigglies were straight and the straights were squiggly, the rights were lefts and the lefts were rights. It was a thing of beauty made possible by a simple comment about who was the better driver.
I drove up to Dahlonega the other day, mainly because I don’t trust the US Postal Service to carry a check that will pay for the next four months of my life a mere sixty miles. So, into the truck I hopped and in a scant forty-five minutes I found myself in God’s country, at least if God were moving his library, building a parking deck, re-routing the streets of gold, and somehow raising admission prices to pay for it all.
My first thought as I pulled into the scenic main campus of
I made my way to the business office, and quickly found myself a thousand dollars lighter. Having gained the relief of paying for school, but somewhat dreading the burden of returning, I went over to the Public Safety office to get my parking permit. It was here that I learned the NGCSU’s Public Safety has an anti-handicap agenda.
To get a parking permit students had to climb a flight-and-a-half of stairs to the back door, and then go in. On these stairs was posted a sign saying that handicapped students should use the front door of the building. I’ll admit to a bit of laziness here, in that I really didn’t want to climb those stairs in the 100-degree heat. I walked around to the front door, in the shade the whole time, and when I got there, the door was locked. Back around I went, up the stairs, and through the door. No mention was made of the front door being locked, but I was struck with a morbid curiosity of wanting to see a wheelchair-bound student conquering the stairs to get a parking permit.
Standing atop the Public Safety steps, I looked out over the panorama that is NGCSU. The parking deck construction carries on with the pace of a snail on valium. When construction first began it was deemed wise to close off an area in front of the student center where students liked to congregate, or merely hang out in the shade, even though no work was going on there. The resulting Picasso of chain link fence made the entrance to the library look like one of those black-and-white photos you see of the old concentration camps. Now, from what I hear, the inside of the library looks like FEMA has declared it a disaster area. The whole top floor is closed off, with the exception of a pathway lined by tarps leading you to the stairs to the first floor. I’ve always wondered what it is about the gates of hell that compels people to wander into ‘em.
The incoming batch of freshmen should provide hours of entertainment. I’ll be watching on day one, hopefully from a good vantage point to see which unlucky kid stops beside the cannon during retreat. I’m waiting to hear some innocent voice proclaim that Dr. So-and-so is assigning too much homework. My favorite is the young student who begins to sweat and cry because they have an eight page paper due in a month.
Come back to me when you’ve finished an upper level history class, or a 2000+ level English class, then we’ll talk.
1 comment:
Holy crap, it's been too long since "Spot the Mossad Agent!" When are the next Olympics? Next year? Damn!
You know, I had almost managed to convince myself that the Jaded Senior was simply a byproduct of us Three Musketeers spending entirely too much time hanging out together. But, after seeing Roberts reaction to the vet clinic, your reaction to returning to school, and my own reaction to that red and khaki Abyss of Suffering known as Target, I've decided that the Jaded Senior is, in fact, a part of us all.
May God have mercy on our souls.
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