Archives:September 10-
September 16, 2006
September 10, 2006
The bouncing sound begins just past 10 a.m. , waking me, and, seconds later, Chang. It's the familiar sound of foam on plastic, on net and on the floor. Mike's awake.
“Little early isn't it?” I ask, stepping out of my room.
Mike bites from a bagel in his left hand, before taking another shot at our little plastic hoop with his right. “It's almost noon .”
“Two hours to go, compadre,” Chang says, taking a long sip from his water bottle.
“I don't know what you guys are complaining about. When did you guys leave last night?”
“One, maybe?” I estimate. “Had our fill by then—unlike the beer pong wizard.”
Mike shrugs. “It's what I do,” he says, with a mouth full of bagel.
“Didn't see Dave when we left,” Chang says. “He with you?”
Mike shakes his head, tossing in another shot. “Last I saw, he was getting into it with that green-haired girl. Didn't come home last night either”
I lost sight of Dave almost as soon as we arrived last night, and spotted him throughout the night with different groups. Now that Mike mentions it, I did see him throwing darts with his girl who had her hair dyed neon green.
“That girl was kind of weird,” Chang says. “I didn't know Dave knew her.”
“Probably didn't know her before last night,” Mike says, letting the ball roll on the ground after a shot, pausing to drink from his glass of orange juice.
“Not a bad looking girl, though,” Dave says.
“She was all right,” Mike agrees.
“Had trouble getting past the green hair myself,” I put in.
“Gotta think outside the box sometimes,” Mike says. “Wonder if Dave went back to her place last night.” He shakes his head. “Damn, TJ and Perry know how to have a party.”September 11, 2006
I step into Simmerman Auditorium, expecting to find plenty of space to sit. To my surprise, the place is packed. There are 500 seats, and every one is full, besides the crowd lining the aisles and stairways inside.
I'm here to report for The Window. This is one of two events on campus tonight, to commemorate the 5 year anniversary of the September 11th terrorist attacks. One is an SA organized candlelight vigil on the quad. Lean Left, a liberal-minded student group organized this event in Simmerman, and it's basically a lecture and question and answer session. You wouldn't think this would be real popular happening, but then, Professor Jones is the speaker.
Jones sits up front in a black button down and black slacks, perched on a stool as more people file in. I lean against one of the walls to look down.
Jones stands. In a second, the room falls silent. It's kind of amazing, the way this guy can command a room. He turns on his lapel mic and begins. “To start, I would like to thank Lean Left for putting this event on, and to thank all of you for taking the time to come out here.
“For those of you who don't know, my name is Jones, and I teach with the English department. I'm here tonight to talk about September 11 th . Before I begin, I would like to ask for a moment of silence out of respect for everyone who suffered a loss that day, or as a result of that day.”
The room is quiet for a few moments, before Jones reclaims his seat. “Okay. So those who know me know that I don't really like to lecture. As you can see, I didn't come here with any notes, or any visual aids. I'd like hear what questions you have, or what you have to say. Yes, Tom, you start us off.”
Tom is sitting in the front row, in a Lean Left t-shirt. “I think we all appreciate the immensity of what happened five years ago today. So many people died, and the New York skyline got changed. And then there were the wars in response to it, and the changes in the way we live our lives—changes at the airports, and changes in personal rights with the PATRIOT Act. And beyond all that, for our generation it was such a wake up call. I mean, from my own experience, it's the thing that really got me paying attention to the news, and questioning what I heard—thinking about alternatives. It got me realizing the sort of things that led terrorist attacks, and how we've got to change the way we're living.”
Hands are up all around the room. Jones raises his own hand to quiet the chatter that's rising. “How do you propose we change the way we're living?”
“Well we stop exploiting smaller countries, and start respecting their cultures.”
“And how do we do that?”
Like any class session I've had with Jones, he's not about to settle for an underdeveloped response.
Another guy speaks up shortly thereafter. “What September 11 th showed me is why America is the greatest country in the world. You knock us down with the biggest terrorist attack in history, and we come back swinging. Five years later, we've set people straight in Afghanistan and Iraq and we're thriving, strong as ever.”
Jones asks about how the US set things straight, and he doesn't have much to say, or at least nothing specific enough to draw approval from Jones. Jones goes on to ask him about how the US is thriving, leading him to talk about the economy, about national security and about international relations. The guy doesn't have a lot to say, but does take a stand about military efforts. “If you want to protect your way of life, and want to help other people, you have to fight for what you believe in. You have to make sacrifices.”
Jones doesn't get to voice his next question, as another guy starts up, “My brother's in the army, serving in Iraq . Part of why he got in was for the money for college and all that. But the other part was that he wanted to fight for his country—all that stuff that guy was talking about. But when I talk to him, it's not the same any more.”
Jones is back on the stool, perched, his elbows on his lap, hands under his chin. “Tell me more about that.”
The guy talks about how the army extended his brother's term of service. He talks about losing sight of what they are trying to accomplish, and how all he thinks about now is how he's going to keep himself and his friends safe while they're there.
“And what about what our friend over here was talking about?” Jone asks. “What about sacrifice—fighting for your rights.”
“But it gets harder to see the connection. It's almost like they're just a different kind of people over there, with all their own beliefs and way of life. And it makes you think—what if we had people from some other country changing the way we do everything. We would hate it, and we would have to fight back. And I get to thinking maybe that's what the whole issue is. That it's just different people with different beliefs, all getting mixed up in each other's business. And how are they not gonna fight when that's going on?”
Jones nods.
The conversation goes on, back and forth, sometimes into a circle before Jones ushers it in another direction. Nearly two hours have passed before someone asks Jones, point blank, what he thinks.
Jones leans back slightly in the stool. “You stick around in this world long enough, and keep your eyes and ears open—you'll see a lot of horrible things. I'm not a pacifist. I think wars and military interventions, and occupations have their place. Hell, I would argue that a terrorist attack could be justified.” There's some chatter, to which Jones raises his hand. “Anyone remember the Boston Tea Party?
“Now with all of that being said, I can support violence to the extent that it is working toward a peace. I do not support violence for the sake of revenge, or financial gain. In my philosophy, achieving peace and enlightenment are the two ultimate ends—what I'm always, on some level, working toward.
“Now, I don't have all the answers, and I can't tell any of you what's wrong or right, because we're each coming from a different point of reference—American citizens, visitors, liberals and conservatives, people with different stakes in what happens here and abroad. But what I challenge each of you is to decide what matters to you. What sort of goals do you have for yourself, for your peers, and for the global community? Think about that for a second. What matters to you? When you can answer that question, you'll know where you stand.”September 12, 2006
“And of course then, after this amazing discussion, I've gotta run around the auditorium getting everyone's name and class information so I can quote them in my article.
“Ah, the life of a reporter,” my brother Ray says across the phone line. “Rushing to spread the word, no time to digest what it all means.”
I pause, thinking about what Ray means—whether it's a criticism or just an observation, and the implications of living that way. There's not much time to dwell on it, though, as he goes on, “It's cool that you had a professor like him do something like that, though. It gives mean to something when you really stop and talk about it.”
“Yeah, it was a good thing,” I agree. “So what's new with you, Ray?”
“Same old deal out here in Cali ,” he says. “I've been writing more lately. Thinking about getting to work on the great American novel.”
“Is that so?”
“Figure it's about time it gets written. That, and I'm starting to figure out that the movie business might not be my thing.”
“Why do you say that?” I ask, pushing open the doors to the Student Center . After a long night of writing up my article, I have a long afternoon and evening ahead of me in the Window office, editing and laying out my section.
“I guess it comes down to me loving movies for all the wrong reasons—or just different reasons from these people. I like getting lost in a story, or finding myself in a character. Everything here's so technical. There's a correlation—we're always working on evoking that feeling I like so much. But it's like going to Disney Land , and seeing the workers climbing out of their costumes. There's a lot less magic when you know how things work.”
“I can see where you're going with that,” I say, coming to the office door. It's full house with editors on their computers, copy editors scribbling through pages. I hang back in the hallway for a second. “All right, I gotta let you go. Time to go behind the magic at the newspaper office.”
Ray chuckles. “Okay, little brother. I'll talk to you later.”September 13, 2006
“What do I owe you Sam?” I ask as he counts out some bills for the Chinese delivery guy.
Sam waves his hand. “Don't worry about it.” He hands some bills to the guy, they nod to one another and Sam comes back to the big table at the center of the office, plastic bags in hand.
“Thanks Sam,” I say, taking a seat kitty corner to him as he sets out my tin container of General Tso's chicken.
“Don't mention it,” he says. “And you're welcome too, Teri.”
“I didn't say thanks.”
“I noticed.”
“Just makes us even for when I had to foot the bill for dinner last week.”
“Touche.”
It's a little past ten, and relative to last week, we're in pretty good shape for putting out the paper. Stopping to eat isn't going to help matters, but once Sam suggested ordering out, there was no way getting around it. Teri drives her chopsticks into her little white pint of lo mein, while Sam opens up a container of beef and broccoli. In an instant, the office smells like a Chinese restaurant.
“So tell me again why this isn't serious,” Sam says.
Teri shrugs. “Pete's a great guy and all, and we have stuff in common. But there's just no chemistry.” She pauses, scooping some noodles into her mouth, ducking her head low to slurp one up. “It's just that—it's almost like every conversation we have feels like the first time we've ever talked. There's no common ground, no bond.” She shrugs. “I don't know. Everyone has relationships like that, right?”
“All of my relationships are just passionate love affairs,” Sam says. “Then uncontrollable circumstances drive us apart, and I move onto the next one.”
“Is that so?”
“You're telling me you don't remember?”
Teri smirks.
“Hold up a sec,” I say. “I never knew you guys were a thing.”
“Hardly a blip on the radar,” Teri says.
“Interesting version of history you're writing there.”
“Oh please.” She rolls her eyes. “Sam and I dated for a couple weeks. Just long enough for him to sucker me onto this staff.”
“And then uncontrollable circumstances drove us apart,” Sam says.
“Those uncontrollable circumstances being that Sam here can't handle commitment.”
Sam shrugs, taking a bite from his egg roll. “Can't control it.”
Teri mocks his shrug. “Your loss.”
Sam chuckles. “So Presto, any new ladies in your life.”
I smile. “Nothing to speak of. Think I'm done with girls from The Off Beats, though.”
“Couldn't be all bad.” Sam says. “I would think singers can scream pretty good.”
Teri hits his arm.
I shake my head. “I'm just saying that Emma and Veronica are in my past now, and I'm looking to keep them there.” I push around a piece of chicken with my chopsticks. “Not like I have any new prospects, though.”
“We'll find you somebody before the year's over,” Sam says. “We'll lure her into the office, make sure things go nice, at least for a little while. Then, worst case scenario, we'll end up with one new staff member.”
“Very practical,” I nod, smiling. “Who knows? We'll see what happens.”
September 14, 2006
“All right, so I've got a confession to make,” Sam says, sitting back down at our table at Luigi's. “I asked the guys behind the counter to sing happy birthday to you.”
I wave my hand. “I told you not to do anything like that.”
“Well, it's good that you feel like that, because they wouldn't unless I tipped them 50 bucks.”
Teri leans back to look at them, “Real businessmen over there.”
“Eh, who cares. We can do it better ourselves anyway,” Sam says. “Come on guys, one, two, three!” With that, the two tables we're eating at launch into singing happy birthday.
I think about past birthdays—how I would have parties when I was a kid, and we'd have a big family dinner. Then there were the last couple years of high school when I'd hang out with Matt and our crew and go out for wings or something. I think about what birthdays meant—spending time with people I've known forever, celebrating the fact I was one year older. I've always had a late birthday, so it was cool to finally be 10, or a teenager, or 16.
And then I think about today. For the most part, it's just an ordinary day. I've spent a little time thinking about getting older—about adulthood, and how this is my last teenaged year. I've had friends and family calling me here and there. But most of the people I've known forever aren't anywhere to be seen.
It's a little embarrassing hearing everyone at the table sing, and watching as everyone in the pizzeria turns to look at us. But then I look around, seeing The Window staff, out not just for the ceremonial post-meeting dinner, but also for me. It's kind of nice. It almost feels like home.
September 15-16, 2006
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