i am not cut out for this
Vol. 4, Issue Six
Sometimes at night, after the kids are in bed and we are still decompressing from the day, my wife and I like to wind ourselves up and discuss our children's futures. She has wine, I do not, as we both reopen our childhood wounds and talk about how our parents tried to destroy our dreams. "We will not do that!" she says. "No fucking way," I say. We always make the same promises.
Our children are still very, very young–babies, really–so we're still under the delusion that we will celebrate their career choices no matter what: Accountant. Waiter. Writer. Astronaut. History professor. Musician. Assistant volleyball coach.
(Well, neither one of us want them to have murder be a job requirement. That's reasonable, right?)
Or maybe their job doesn’t need to make them happy–maybe their job is just a job. That’s okay, too. Life can be good for many reasons.
This future talk inevitably forces us to talk about college–do we want them to go? We had different experiences, although very similar ones, in that our parents had way too much input. But at least she went to a four-year school far from where she grew up and took classes that aligned with her interests. I'm envious of her college Experience. I never had The Experience I wanted, and I'm still ashamed of it. If someone asks me, "Where did you go to school?" I clam up sometimes. Here's why.
*****
I went to La Salle University, located in the Olney neighborhood of Philadelphia, and it was 14.8 miles from my childhood home. Because I'd done so poorly my senior year of high school, my parents said they'd pay for one semester's tuition, but not for housing. BUT–if I studied hard and acclimated to the academic pace, we'd revisit the idea.
It was a 32-minute commute to the parking lot near campus–long enough to be annoying but never far away. Some days I'd have one class at 10:30 and then another one at 4. On those days, I'd hang out in the Commuter Lounge–a drafty separate wing near the cafeteria mainly used to store AV equipment. There was a normal-sized refrigerator to keep your lunch and a coffee machine. There were a few tables where some people studied. There was also one mid-size TV on a rolling stand, where all the other commuters and cafeteria workers would watch soap operas on break. General Hospital. Days. Guiding Light.
(I dug GH.)
I should point out that as much as my parents derailed my Experience, it's not like I had that many options. I went to a huge public high school, and my class ranking was around 350 out of nearly 800 students. My SAT scores were despicably low–I don't think I even cracked 900. My extracurriculars were meh–JV this, JV that. I joined the "Key Club," whatever that was.
Most of the not-so-bad schools I had a shot at waitlisted me. I had the option to do a summer session to prove my viability, but I wasn’t interested in losing part of my summer. The only other options that were appealing to me were La Salle–and the University of Tampa.
Tampa was the frontrunner because it was hundreds of miles away. We made a family trip to southern Florida over Christmas break, during which my father begrudgingly drove me the 200 or so miles up to the U of T(ampa)’s campus for a visit. It certainly wasn’t the prettiest college in America. It had temporary freshman dorms that were mobile homes and a small football field with one bright neon goalpost. One.
I still wanted to go. Badly. But it was almost $26k per year for out-of-state kids, and my father laughed in my face.
La Salle was my last option.
*****
Most days, I'd get home around four or five, and my mom would be there and ask me about my day, just like she did when I was in elementary school. Sometimes she'd leave a shopping bag full of erasable pens and notebooks on my bed. One time she bought me an expensive study lamp. "Do you think you'll need the atlas? It's packed away in the basement." My mother never went to college, so she was very excited.
It was hard to watch television in the same room with them, especially my father, who always seemed annoyed that I wasn't spending more of my free time studying at night in the school's library. "We're paying for access to that library."
Even by the second week in the first semester, I hadn't bought all my books yet. I skipped so many classes, especially the late afternoon ones because I hated that goddamn commuter lounge.
By October, I knew I was failing at least one of my classes, and I was barely getting C's in the rest. I didn't care. I spent some mornings hiding out in my car in the campus parking lot, listening to Howard Stern, chainsmoking, and daydreaming about a different life. On days I'd ditch class, I'd hang out with some of my old burnout friends and smoke weed all day. One time we smoked hash out of an old gift-wrapping paper tube. That was a good day.
On weekends I bussed tables at a place called the Mill Race Inn a couple of towns over from where I lived. I think it was locally famous for its prime rib. Sometimes the owner would give me free vodka tonics after the shift, and then he'd try to kiss me when it got real late. I’d book out of there, drive home drunk and embarrassed. Sometimes I'd fall asleep in the driveway to sober up before my parents got up for breakfast. Eventually, I quit the job after the owner called the house drunk one night and asked me out to the movies. It was all bleak.
When some of my high school friends came back for homecoming weekend, I sank into total despair. They all seemed so different. They were all free, confident as fighter pilots, and I was trapped. But they were not that different–they were just away.
*****
One of the final breaking points came right before Halloween when I received a letter from La Salle informing me that my GPA was below 1.8 and I would be placed on academic probation if it wasn't above that by the end of the semester. On the day it arrived, the sky was gray and orange when I pulled into the driveway. There were leaves on the front yard and hard mulch in the flowerbeds. Probably a small pumpkin on the porch–my mother loved small pumpkins.
When I was stoned I tried to time it so I had at least an hour before my parents got home, that way I could house a peanut butter sandwich and drop some Visine into my smoky red eyes. But they were home early, and when I walked in the door, my dad was wearing a full-sized Winnie the Pooh costume. He rented it for a Halloween party so he wanted to try it on beforehand. My father was more than six feet tall, so this was a giant Pooh.
I have hazy memories of sitting down to dinner that night, still pretty zonked, and him holding the warning letter, his eyes rage-filled and his fork making loud noises on his plate. But I also remember Pooh's head was sitting on the kitchen island. I would try to avoid eye contact with my father while he was upbraiding me but then I’d get distracted by the big yellow bear head and then snap right back. I couldn't tell who was who – was Winnie the Pooh threatening to no longer pay for tuition? Or was it this angry guy with the poofy hairpiece and the mouthful of chicken cutlet? Man, I was totally baked.
Or maybe I remember this differently now because it was one of the only funny parts of my freshman year. I can't say for sure.
I actually was put on probation. So I spent the second semester taking two classes at Bucks County Community College–and commuting to Northeast Philadelphia three days a week to attend outpatient rehab for drug and alcohol addiction. I wasn't an addict yet–I was just severely depressed and lost, and rehab was better than another semester commuting to La Salle.
I left the clinic after three months because one of my urine samples turned up hot. One day, I just got tired of pretending I was a real-deal addict and smoked dirt weed out of an empty soda can. That was it. None of the counselors seemed too worried that I would go out and overdose or die from alcohol poisoning or some other misadventure. I think they knew I was full of shit. This was just another place I didn't belong.
*****
"That's really sad. You never told me that Winnie the Pooh part before." My wife shook her head. "Yeah, I'm sure there are more demoralizing moments I've completely repressed," I said.
For some reason, after all that drama, I went back to La Salle, and I eventually graduated–a year later than I was supposed to, but I got it done. And I did end up living on campus for a couple of semesters, but my father, that fucker, made me take out a Stafford loan to do that. It wasn't all bad–I made some friends (what’s up, Dom!) and did some college things. And guess what: The La Salle alumni page on Wikipedia lists my name as a notable alumnus. That’s so stupid!
I have some good memories. It just wasn't the right place for me.
In 15 years or so, I don't even think our kids will have the same options as we did. Won't colleges be obsolete? Or pointless? Maybe trade schools will still exist. Medical schools, of course. Law schools, unfortunately. TikTok schools probably. Whatever it is, I look forward to not making that decision for them.
– AJD
