Observations
Loyalties to my sixth grade social studies project:
I think it is odd that because I did a project in my sixth grade social studies class on Norway, or on Lebanon, I will choose those two countries out of a random list almost every time because I feel like I have some sort of loyalty or duty to them. Assuming, of course, that France or Morocco, or some other country on which I have lately been fantasizing, is not on the list, in which case my Scandinavian or Levantine loyalties would come second.
My very eighties sweater:
I have a knitted sweater that is bright pink with bold black and grey abstract designs on the front that is rather outrageous and outdated, but that I nevertheless like to wear out sometimes. I also have a class with these two utterly annoying freshmen girls who always sit right next to me. They are high school hipsters with an inflated sense of knowledge and self-identity. They remind me of these two kids I knew in junior high. I despise them. And yet, on Friday I very consciously and purposefully wore my pink sweater to class for the sole intent of eliciting praise from these classmates because I knew they would like my sweater. And they did. And I went right back to despising them.
Size isn't everything:
I need to expand my life. I think I've said before that it's too small and comfortable. Which leaves too much room for error.
The Socioeconomics of Minority Groups in Low-Diversity Areas:
Though the vast majority of students are white, Catholic, and from St. Louis, the university attempts to varnish it all with a thin veneer of "diversity." I remember, when I was living with a black girl, hearing complaints about the African American community here. "Just because I'm black, and you're black," she would say, "doesn't mean we have to be friends." Now I'm getting the same complaint from my gay roommate: "Just because I'm gay doesn't mean I have to be friends with all the other gay people on campus." How did I end up in a town where one can go to the movie theater to see "Stomp the Yard" and encounter every single black person in the whole county?
I think it is odd that because I did a project in my sixth grade social studies class on Norway, or on Lebanon, I will choose those two countries out of a random list almost every time because I feel like I have some sort of loyalty or duty to them. Assuming, of course, that France or Morocco, or some other country on which I have lately been fantasizing, is not on the list, in which case my Scandinavian or Levantine loyalties would come second.
My very eighties sweater:
I have a knitted sweater that is bright pink with bold black and grey abstract designs on the front that is rather outrageous and outdated, but that I nevertheless like to wear out sometimes. I also have a class with these two utterly annoying freshmen girls who always sit right next to me. They are high school hipsters with an inflated sense of knowledge and self-identity. They remind me of these two kids I knew in junior high. I despise them. And yet, on Friday I very consciously and purposefully wore my pink sweater to class for the sole intent of eliciting praise from these classmates because I knew they would like my sweater. And they did. And I went right back to despising them.
Size isn't everything:
I need to expand my life. I think I've said before that it's too small and comfortable. Which leaves too much room for error.
The Socioeconomics of Minority Groups in Low-Diversity Areas:
Though the vast majority of students are white, Catholic, and from St. Louis, the university attempts to varnish it all with a thin veneer of "diversity." I remember, when I was living with a black girl, hearing complaints about the African American community here. "Just because I'm black, and you're black," she would say, "doesn't mean we have to be friends." Now I'm getting the same complaint from my gay roommate: "Just because I'm gay doesn't mean I have to be friends with all the other gay people on campus." How did I end up in a town where one can go to the movie theater to see "Stomp the Yard" and encounter every single black person in the whole county?
posted by Emma at 9:48:00 PM
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