College – Regular Guy

No Common Cents

brian — Thu, 24 Jul 2014 19:15:08 +0000

A Pennsylvania bank made a critical error 25 years ago this summer. I want to peg Mellon Bank as the culprit since I lived in Western PA at the time, but I can’t be 100 percent sure.

Whoever it was, they screwed up big time by giving me a credit card.

I can remember getting the unsolicited offer in my college mailbox. Remember, this was 1989, about the time these companies realized they could mine a whole new set of customers by sending them cards out of the blue.

At least I think it was out of the blue. I didn’t remember signing up for a credit card offer, but who knows at this point?

The card came around the end of my junior year in college. I had a trip to Ireland with my sister set up for the very end of the summer. I really needed to work so I could make money to pay for the trip.

But I really didn’t want to go home and shake lemonades at my regular job in Baltimore’s Harborplace. I had worked at the same place for five years, starting there in high school and returning every time I came home on break. I liked the place, but just needed something different.

With no plan to go home and find a different job, I ended up deciding to stay in my college town for as long as I could. A handful of friends were taking summer classes or doing something to prepare for our senior year so I would have company.

The people at the bank had no idea that they sent me a credit card right before my first summer without a plan for making money since I was 16, but they should have a way of figuring these things out. They should also know that I was going to live in my fraternity house right across the street from a grocery store with an ATM that could give cash advances on the card.

Thankfully, I had not yet turned 21 so I didn’t really have the ability to go into a bar and buy everyone drinks using the card. Some places in town turned a blind eye to underage students during the school year, but they were more wary of us during the summer.

If this had been some sort of experiment, I would have proved that the average 20-year-old college student without a job needed somewhere around 45 days to max out a credit card with a fairly small limit. My brother-in-law drew the short straw to come and get me right around the time Wimbledon concluded – I remember watching the men’s final as I waited for him to get me.

I had fallen into a routine of getting cash from the grocery store ATM for food and to pitch in for parties while I spent much of my time reading and watching TV since I didn’t have a car to go anywhere.

I loved every second of it. The reading I started that summer led to the topic I researched for my senior thesis. Plus, I ate a ton of chicken wings.

Maybe the bank didn’t make a mistake after all. I should probably look into thanking them at some point.

The Right Fit

brian — Fri, 09 May 2014 15:55:22 +0000

When I first saw the message, I felt a rush of excitement. A college friend contacted a few of us to make sure we would help with our reunion next year since she had been named as co-chair of the event.

I don’t get to see my college friends much at all even though I keep in touch with many online. We have all spread out and just don’t have many chances to get together with work and family. So an impending reunion made me happy.

Then I did the math. This isn’t just any reunion. This is our 25^th reunion.

How could I get excited about planning the event when I had to deal with a reality that I try to ignore as much as I can? I’m old.

A 25^th reunion means my post-college experience is older than I was when I graduated. I have managed to deny this fact even though I know some classmates have kids in college and the movies and music we loved back in the day have celebrated all kinds of anniversaries that remind me that the late 1980s were a long time ago.

So if we get together, the images I have in my head of all of us in our 20s may have to fade into the background. It’s bad enough that I think many classmates look like the past 25 years treated them better time treated me. Now I have to see it in person.

I didn’t intend of making those memories at Allegheny College. I had another school in mind as my top choice. Allegheny sat on my list with a couple of other schools under the heading, “OK, I Have to Pick One of These if Plan A Doesn’t Happen.”

The news that my top choice put me on their waiting list hurt until the next day when I went to work and got an amazing pick-me-up lecture from a friend.

“You will do better at Allegheny,” she told me. “It’s a smaller school so you will be able to get more involved, and you will love it.”

She and I have lost touch so I don’t know if I ever got the chance to properly thank her for the best advice I ever received.

College played an important role in my life. I didn’t have the most vibrant social life in high school and used the next four years to take advantages of all the opportunities I had previously let slide by.

That’s why the rush of getting a chance to play a role in an event which will help re-kindle those memories outweighs anything that reminds me I can’t run around with my shirt off like I used to or that I may need to take a pill to make sure I don’t get heartburn from a night of reckless eating and drinking.

The passage of time does have some benefits. If I manage to exaggerate some of my exploits during reunion weekend, I can simply accuse anyone who tries to correct me of having a bad memory because we’re getting older.

Feeling Quite at Home

brian — Mon, 05 Aug 2013 12:40:41 +0000

I felt right at home inside the bar. Now that might sound like old news to people who know me well, but this situation had a different element.

The bar in question was in Cambridge, Mass., and I had never visited the place before. When I exited the subway station, I had to walk down the block a bit to make sure I was in the right place. But things felt familiar once I stepped inside.

This had nothing to do with the décor or the beer selection, although I found the latter quite impressive. I felt at home because I hadn’t seen the bartender in close to 20 years.

When I found out I would go to Boston for work in late June, I did the same thing I did whenever I start planning a business trip – I try to figure out what kind of fun things I can do in my free time.

Sure, I looked forward to giving my first presentation at an important industry conference on this particular trip, but the chance to explore Boston and maybe catch up with some friends really took priority.

I spent a lot of time hanging out with Jeff in college. He ranked as one of my closest friends during that time. I wouldn’t say we caused a lot of trouble, but so many of my great memories from that time period involve Jeff (and maybe an adult beverage or two).

We stayed in touch for the first few years after school ended. He graduated a year before me and managed to visit a few times. We saw each other at a few weddings, including my own in 1995 when he enjoyed razzing me as I waited for the ceremony just to see if he could make me more nervous.

But I hadn’t seen him since that day in October 1995 until I walked into the Boston bar where he works. When the planning for my free time started for this trip, visiting Jeff took precedence over everything else.

I have entered the time in life when I start to get extra sentimental over things like my college experience. Everyone experiences this, but I think it affects me more since I rarely see people who made such an impact on that important part of my life. Sure, we stay in touch via Facebook (which is a lifesaver in this regard), but nothing beats sharing a drink and some memories with someone who was there as you developed into the person you are today.

That’s why I felt at home walking into that bar. I knew I would have a good time regardless of any outside influences. The fact that he had to work while we talked didn’t matter. The band which played later merely added to the story. The other people who wanted to bend his ear just reminded me why I always had a good time with Jeff.

Nothing exciting happened that night, but it ranks as one of the best days of the year for me. Now I just need to re-kindle many other friendships. I know I can do it, one beer at a time.

Post Office Memories

brian — Fri, 15 Mar 2013 17:35:33 +0000

I loved my college years for many reasons. I didn’t have a lot of responsibility, I learned a ton of things, plus I made some of the best friends you could ever imagine.

But one benefit of those four years at Allegheny College which I don’t always appreciate is my familiarity. This came back to me recently when the alumni office reached out to people like me.

The building which housed the campus post office underwent renovations in recent years to become a new alumni center. We recently received an e-mail giving us the opportunity to win the door to the post office box we had in college.

The contest carried no guarantees since many people obviously had the same box number. But I emerged victorious and now own the door to box 2057. I also came away with a second box as a reward because part of the 2057 was damaged.

I find it hard to explain how much this whole process excited me. At first, I felt embarrassed, but then I saw posts on Facebook from college friends expressing similar levels of curiosity about this project. The shared post office nostalgia made me feel better.

When I told my wife and daughter about this, I began to understand how my college experience may have differed from many others. Maria told me that Millersville had two post offices, each located in a dining hall on the opposite side of campus.

At Allegheny, Cochran Hall, which housed the post office, sat pretty much in the middle of campus. On the small campus, you always stood just a short walk from Cochran and were probably with someone who had to go by “the PO.” Or you hoped to run into someone there. Or you just wanted to see if you got anything in the mail, this being in the late 1980s after all.

When I opened the door which I now have in my hands, I could have found a note telling me to pick up a package from my parents or a flyer about some event on campus I might want to attend. I might even find a handwritten note from a girl. That’s the precursor to text messages, kids.

But the PO served as more than a place to pick up mail. The large entry hall had chairs for relaxing, tables to sit and hang out and, most importantly, a bank window where you could write a check out to cash so you could get $20 to go grab a few beers that night since you didn’t feel like going by the MAC machine.

The upstairs also hosted classrooms and offices for the English department so I spent a bunch of time up there. I sweat through the defense of my senior thesis – Allegheny requires all seniors to complete this requirement – on the upper level of the PO. I also visited friends doing their radio show in the campus radio station studio on the same floor.

When I heard the news that the school planned to change Cochran, I felt a twinge of regret. I understood why they did it and appreciated that they turned such an important building into a special location for alumni, but I selfishly (and foolishly) wanted one of the hubs of my experience to stay the same.

I knew that would never happen so appreciate that I can now keep a piece of that history for myself.

The Great Hamloaf Rebellion

brian — Wed, 02 May 2012 19:47:21 +0000

Due to circumstances out of my control, I will be attending a meal at a friend’s house this weekend where the main course will be hamloaf. To say I’m not excited about this is the understatement of the millennium. I think I’m going to smuggle a sub or pizza in or something.

Anyway, I have received much sympathy for my plight. I have to admit, however, that I have never had hamloaf. My whole disdain for the food comes from a natural reaction to thw rod hamloaf and a traumatic event I experienced in college.

My fraternity had its own cook. We lived in this house, which was far too nice for a bunch of college guys. Anyway, we had a full kitchen at our disposal and were served lunch Monday through Friday and dinner Sunday through Thursday.

One night during my junior year, I came home with a bunch of other guys from lacrosse practice and we went right into the kitchen. Ernie, our cook, told us he had made hamloaf for dinner.

We went right back into Ross’ Bronco II and headed for Burger King. After eating, I changed and headed right up to the library because I had a paper due or a test the next morning.

I studied until probably 10 or 11 before coming back to the house. The place was deserted, which was unusual. This was a Tuesday night or something so people were generally around.

We had about 40 guys living in the house (and another dozen in their own houses or apartments) and only a half-dozen were to be found. It was weird.

Well, at some point, the phone rang and I answered. It was one of the seniors, and I could tell he was in a bar. He told me to immediately come down to Two’s Company, a place we went to ocassionally. Everybody was there, he said. We had taken over the place and I had to get down there.

Oh, I also needed to bring a blank check from the fraternity.

Apparently, everyone else had the same reaction to the thought of hamloaf for dinner that my group did. But the rest of the guys all ended up at Two’s, which didn’t card anyone that night. It was something insane like nickel wing night so they all ate and drank a lot. Someone got the idea of starting a tab and one thing led to another.

I never made it down there as academic responsibility – and the realization that I had missed the real fun – set in. And I don’t remember how they settled up the tab.

But like all great historical moments, you don’t need the facts to appreciate The Great Hamloaf Rebellion. It’s the thought that counts.

By the way, Ernie never made hamloaf again. Thank God.

Costume Conundrum

brian — Thu, 03 Nov 2011 19:49:24 +0000

When I saw the kids in the costumes on Trick or Treat night last week, I felt a little envious. Not of the candy because I knew I would dip into my daughter’s stash when she got home. I envied the costumes.

I don’t get much of a chance to celebrate Halloween anymore. We’re really not the “dress up in a couples costume” kind of folks. We do have a party at work, but I just don’t have the energy to go all out for that.

That hasn’t always been the case. I did have some fun costumes at my old job, but once the person who lived to organize Halloween parties got a new job, the excitement kind of wore off.

The reality is that I don’t remember ever really having an outstanding costume. I probably had some cool ones as a kid, but nothing really stands out in my memory.

I do remember going as “The Unknown Comic” to a school event in sixth or seventh grade, but apparently no one else watched “the Gong Show.” I spent the whole night trying to explain why I had a bag on my head and why people should find it so funny.

Maybe that influences my current attitude on Halloween costumes. I wouldn’t mind dressing up, but don’t know if it’s worth the hassle. My favorite idea would take way too much time to explain.

As a freshman in college, I could not wait for Halloween. We had heard about legendary parties at fraternities across campus. I didn’t care that I didn’t have a good idea that fall. I just wanted to have fun.

A few days before the weekend, everything started to unravel. I don’t know how the rumors started, but they spread like wildfire. For a little while, it looked like no one would get to celebrate Halloween on my western Pennsylvania campus in 1986.

I remember the main details – a man dressed as Little Bo Peep was going to show up on a college campus which shared a name with a mountain range, a county and a river and massacre students at a Halloween party.

People reacted in many different ways. Some went home for the weekend. Some put on a brave face. In the end, the parties went on, the rumor turned out to be one recycled from other colleges in the past and people dressed up like normal.

Of course, that included a few smart alecks who actually dressed up as Little Bo Peep. I don’t remember seeing any at the parties I attended, but I did see one running across campus that weekend yelling something about lost sheep.

I never even thought about wearing that costume, but have wanted to ever since. I don’t think I considered it the rest of my college career and would have been too chicken to do it if the idea did cross my mind.

I have the gumption to do it now, but really don’t feel like explaining the whole story every time someone asks me why I chose Little Bo Beep. I don’t even have one of the “I Survived Bo Peep” t-shirts that cropped up on campus that weekend 25 years ago.

So I’ll just drown my sorrows with a Reese’s Cup I snuck out of my daughter’s stash. She can deal – she had an awesome costume.

Can’t We All Just Get Along?

brian — Mon, 03 May 2010 15:49:53 +0000

Back in 1986, I returned home from working on a Friday night in the spring to news I had hoped I wouldn’t get. My first-choice college, William and Mary, had put me on the waiting list for the fall semester. I knew getting in there was not a slam-dunk, but I hoped to sneak on in. So I was bummed.

I couldn’t wait to see if I would make it in so set my mind to attending Allegheny College in western Pennsylvania. I liked the place, but it wasn’t W&M, which I fell in love with several years earlier when my brother attended there.

The next day at work, a friend said something I will always remember. She told me the news from Williamsburg would be the best thing to ever happen to me. She said the smaller student body would give me a better chance to reach my potential. She said she knew I belonged at a school like Allegheny.

I wish I hadn’t lost touch with her because she was right. With all due respect to my wife, daughter and family, the four years of college were the best of my life. I discovered so much about myself. I also learned how to interact with so many different kinds of people in so many different situations. Allegheny taught me to succeed in life.

I bring all of this up because of a recent column from the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette about a report released by Daniel Shea (no relation), a faculty member at Allegheny. In short, the report says that the things which pervade American politics the most are the things people like the least. We desperately crave for more civil discussion even though we seem to support people who can’t say anything nice about people with any ideas different than our own.

Passionate, respectful politics is not an oxymoron. Unfortunately, we found strong evidence that most Americans believe the tone of politics has declined in recent years. Things have gotten bad.

It’s sad we need a report to uncover this information. It’s obvious that the notion of a gray area simply escapes far too many people. Nuance is a lost art. Far too many issues turn into a contest for who is more outraged than an opportunity to discuss and debate.

I don’t know if I have the answers. I guess part of me is just proud that the things I learned in college were not just an accident. Allegheny really does represent the notion that we can be thoughtful, engaged, respectful people. I just wish spreading this to the rest of America was as easy as writing a report about it.

April Fool’s Fun

brian — Wed, 01 Apr 2009 10:15:30 +0000

You don’t see too many good April Fool’s pranks. You really need good timing, the right people and a believable story line to pull it off. My sophomore or junior year of college, everything came together perfectly.

A little background – my fraternity had a bad reputation. We weren’t that bad, but we skirted the rules without putting pledges in serious danger. One of the pledge responsibilities was to wait tables during lunch and dinner. One time, however, the foursome waiting tables were taken outside and handcuffed to the fire escape. Don’t ask me why – I don’t even know if I was there when it happened. No one was hurt. It was all just the product of a brother or brothers who were bored and had access to handcuffs.

Again, don’t ask me why.

That took place a few days before April Fool’s Day. We must have just returned from Spring Break because we were on trimesters and the break between second and third term was usually from around St. Patrick’s Day to around April Fool’s Day. So I guess the handcuffing was someone getting rid of pent up energy from break.

Anyhow. We had announcements on April Fool’s Day at lunch and the pledges were sent out of the room like they always were for announcements. At some point – I don’t remember whether it was right away or after the mundane announcements – our president stood up.

Here’s where having the right people is important. He was a pretty serious guy, but he looked really pissed when he stood up. He demanded that the guys behind the handcuffing take credit for it because he spent the whole morning in the Dean of Students’ office, and we were in deep trouble.

That was believable. We were always teetering on the edge of being in trouble, mainly because we did things like that – something that sounded horrible, but in reality was just a prank. He sold it perfectly.

Here’s where the other “right person” came into play. Except he wasn’t in on the prank – he took the bait perfectly. He was the pledgemaster, who was in charge of all the pledges and pretty much responsible for things regardless of who did them. He was kind of high-strung and took things way too seriously at times. As the president went on about responsibility and not getting others in trouble (PA had some pretty serious anti-hazing laws we were always threatened with), the pledge master stood up.

In tears, he demanded that the people who did it take responsibility because he wasn’t going to get in trouble for something he didn’t have anything to do with. He had a high-pitched voice so that made this even funnier. Admittedly, he might not have been actually crying, but it makes the story better.

Things got real quiet for a minute before the president spoke again. He sheepishly looked around the room at the stunned faces and said, “April Fool’s.” At this point, we attacked him, stripped him naked and threw him in the pond next door.

Again, don’t ask me why.

Yahtzee!

brian — Tue, 06 Jan 2009 14:59:06 +0000

I learned a lot of things at college.

My academic program prepared me for a career as a writer. Playing a varsity sport provided many lessons about hard work and dedication. My social and leadership activities helped me learn how to work effectively with many different kinds of people.

But in my free time, I learned one other valuable lesson. I learned the importance of strategy in the game of Yahtzee.

For a while, I thought this skill would go to waste. I thought all those hours of rolling the dice and trying to figure out the best possible play would be all for nothing.

Enter Santa Claus. The jolly old guy brought us a new Yahtzee game as a family gift for Christmas. I saw a great opportunity in front of me.

I don’t know why I needed a new game to try and teach Bridget all that I knew. We have dice and scoresheets somewhere in the house, but just never brought them out.

Instead of regretting my prior inaction, I decided to call on my past training to benefit my daughter.

When we first sat down to play as a family, Bridget didn’t really know what to do. We explained each of the different options available to her, then let her try and figure out some things on her own.

After a few rounds, I could see things click in her head. That’s when I started to get misty for my college Yahtzee days.

Back then, we didn’t have video games like kids do today. One guy got an old-school Nintendo for Christmas my junior year, but we didn’t get a ton of time to play with it. He graduated that year so we had to figure out our own fun during my senior year.

I don’t know how we settled on Yahtzee. All I remember is quickly figuring out that I needed to devise proper strategy in order to beat my friends. Then there was the thrill of getting a Yahtzee.

We lived in a fraternity house and saw a unique opportunity. When someone would get a Yahtzee, they would have to go to the most public place in the house and yell “Yahtzee!” as loud as they could. Even if we happened to be playing at 3 a.m. Not everyone appreciated our pursuit of Yahtzee glory.

I have held those lessons deep inside my brain for many years. Whenever I find a Yahtzee knock-off game on a video game machine at a bar or restaurant, I sit down and try my luck. For some reason, I never thought I’d get to share my knowledge at home.

Now, a whole new world has opened up to me. I can teach Bridget the right way to use her Chance and the best combinations to shoot for with your Three of a Kind. I can even teach her the right way to announce to the world that you have rolled a Yahtzee.

I don’t think we’ll be trying the 3 a.m. yell anytime soon. Something tells me Maria won’t find that as funny as I do.

Look at That Body!

brian — Mon, 24 Nov 2008 12:05:53 +0000

Once upon a time, I had motivation that went beyond trying to win football games on the Playstation and staying up later than was reasonable for someone my age.

I actually worked out. A lot. I had to because I wrestled in college and needed to stay in shape and keep my weight under control since I was in the 118-pound weight class.

That’s right – 118 pounds. If you don’t believe it, I have found some photographic proof. I was at the web site for my alma mater Allegheny College recently checking out info on my reunion next spring. In addition to some of the big milestone reunions, they have “generational reunions.” My class – the class of 1990 – will get together with the two classes which preceded us.

They have a slideshow of activities from those years on the reunion web page. I couldn’t believe my eyes when I got to this picture. Look at the tough guy. And, yes, I am the guy winning this match.

I wish I could remember when this took place. Judging by a few factors I will not bore anyone with, I believe it to be from my first two years, probably in a non-varsity exhibition match since I only started a handful of matches my sophomore year and don’t remember any of them being at home.

I could be embarassed by how much weight I have gained since then, but since I found this picture right as wrestling season gets ready to begin, it put a spring in my step. The only downside is that you won’t find any current Allegheny wrestling photos since they dropped the program in 1993, something which still bothers me. That doesn’t change the fact that, at one point, I could kick some butt.