More than a Little Off The Top
January 10, 2014
Stopping Ain’t Gonna Happen, No Way, No How (Silverton Style)
February 7, 2014
This week’s essay relates to a very enlightening six days we had at the Teller House Hotel hosting a group of under-grads last week. Has it really been over thirty years since I graduated from the People’s Republic of Boulder? Guess so..
Word Count: 805
Not Quite Like It
Used To Be
So just how much has the college experience changed in the past thirty-two years since I graduated in December ’81? You may be asking yourself, why did he graduate halfway through a calendar school year? Maybe he was so smart he got his bachelors in record time? Hardly sports fans, more like the opposite. I forgot to petition to graduate in the fall of ’80. Ignominiously ended up stumbling my way through an extra semester due to a bit of clueless ness on my part.
Last week I had a chance to see firsthand just how different the world of the undergrad has become. The hotel I manage hosted a group of geography students from UCCS-University of Colorado, Colorado Springs for a week. While they were here I took advantage of the periodic downtime they had and carried out various conversations with a few of the guys and gals. Only casually mentioning that I was a writer, and secretly doing a bit of research for this essay. Basically none of these people knew I’m more obsessed with being a wordsmith than most couch potatoes are with that bag of chips on their coffee table. In other word, my strategy worked perfectly to my advantage.
Right off the bat the boss had me read the riot act to the group when they first showed up on Sunday afternoon. Don’t put bottles and cans out on the windowsill of their rooms, quiet time after 11:00, no fighting, don’t move furniture from one room to the next in an attempt to construct a monument to your new god. General house keeping things. Did it work? Apparently so since the students were pretty much on their best behavior during the week they were with us.
Also, did my talk influence the responses the group gave me during the course of the week? Maybe, but we’ll never know and I can guarantee you I won’t lose any sleep over the matter. I doubt that any one else will either.
So what earth shattering revelations did I come away with from my talks with the students? First off, I noticed that things are slightly more serious than they were back in my college days. Case in point: One of the older students told me that he doesn’t want to accumulate so many student loan payments that he’ll be buried in debt for a long time. Nightmarish visions of simultaneously making that last payment and receiving his AARP (American Association of Retired Persons) application in his snail mail on the same day.
Seems that back in the early ‘80’s, college dazes were more relaxed. Mommy & Daddy were paying the majority of costs for most of us (including myself), and we took things with a lackadaisical attitude. Granted a lot of my fellow students (including myself) did study hard. Particularly when a test was heavily breathing down our necks the very next day. In the back of your mind though it was somewhat reassuring knowing you weren’t going to have to pay for any of it. The outlook was more laid back (almost too laid back actually).
Most of the students weren’t too concerned about recycling their bottles and cans. Did this really matter? Probably not, and maybe I’ve become so obsessed with doing that because I’m getting closer and closer to the Grim Reaper’s icy embrace? I’d like to do my part and all that good stuff. In theory at least I want to leave things slightly better for all those little Rug Rats out there. I’m figuring most of these students feel the same way too.
Access to technology has definitely improved. All of the students had to write a final paper dealing with some scientific aspect of their week here in Silverton. During those final two days as all of them were composing those self-same essays, I definitely noticed a heavy reliance on the laptops. Lost count of the number of times I observed just how much they accessed the information contained on those mini computers for composing their papers. Sure wish I had access to instruments such as these during my under-graduate career. Then again if wish fulfillment were possible all the time most psychiatrists wouldn’t be working in their chosen profession.
So what’s the most prominent observation I came a way with from the week? I’m pleasantly surprised to tell our readers that when I mentioned I’m a writer, more than a few folks in the group commented about this being a very noble aspiration. One of them telling me he admired my fortitude in the face of so much rejection and disappointment. Always nice to get some confirmation you’re on the right track with your career. Even if he is 100% correct in his somewhat grim assessment.
