The First Year

fiferguy

            It started like any other college career, or so I thought.  I was 18, setting out on a new life—one away from my parents, old friends, and old, humdrum existence.  I arrived at Knickerbocker University in August, ready for a fascinating new year.  I came with all the stuff that a student needs—a backpack, a calculator, and a thirst for knowledge—and several things that one rarely uses in college—my parents and kid brother.  I was a music student, there to study flute performance.  I had been very good in high school, and thought I’d give it a try as a professional musician.  I was (and still am, by the way), planning on becoming an orchestral musician, and playing in an orchestra somewhere for a living.

We arrived early in the morning on one of the several move-in Saturdays, and I got in line to get my assigned room with all the other wide-eyed freshmen.  When we got through the line, I noticed that I didn’t have a student ID yet, so I went back to the line to find out when I’d be getting that.

“Excuse me,” I said to the pimply faced person sitting across the table, “Y’all forgot to give me my ID.”

“You should’ve gotten that during your orientation,” he replied.

At this point, I got a little scared.  I was afraid that I’d forgotten to do something important.  “What orientation,” I asked.

“You got a mailing over the summer that said that you would have to attend an orientation and ‘Learn the City’ seminar.”

“I never got any mailing.”

Well, to make a long story short, I found out that there was a 2 day class of sorts that I was supposed to take.  In the class, I would get my ID, enroll in classes, and meet several of my professors in the music building.  I would also get taken, with a large group of people, on a tour of the city.  I hadn’t received this mailing, though, so I was in trouble.

Well, my fears weren’t really warranted.  They signed me up for one of the classes that would happen the next Thursday afternoon and Friday morning.  They told me that I should go to the ID office and see if I could get one.  After we moved my stuff into my dorm room, we went in search of the ID office.  Of course, it being a Saturday, it was closed.

Well, no big deal.  No ID means that I had no meal plan.  My dad gave me a hundred and fifty dollars for food for that week, and anything else that I would need.  By the afternoon, they were gone, and the adventure had begun.

One of my roommates, John Deerman, had been asleep when I first brought my stuff up.  Not a big deal, as it was still early in the morning when we came up, and he didn’t have any place to be that day.  When I returned to my room to get unpacked, he was gone.  Not a problem, it meant that I wouldn’t be disturbing him while I unpacked.  The dorm room was small, only designed for two people.  Yet there was a housing problem at Knickerbocker University, and there were three people assigned to my room.  John already had all his stuff unpacked, and had taken the bottom bunk.  That left the either the top bunk of John’s bed, or a platform bed over one of the desks in the room for me.  I chose the top bunk, as there was a bookshelf next to the bed I could use as a night stand.

I finished unpacking, and just rested for the remainder of the day.  The next day, I decided to explore the city.  Slapout was a great town, with over 7 million people in it.  After I got back to my dorm room, I decided to practice some.  Being a music major, I’ve gotten used to it, but normal people don’t know that much about it.  Practicing for a musician is a way of life.  We do it all the time.  Sometimes we practice instead of eat.  Sometimes we practice instead of sleep.  During my college career, the most credit hours I’ve ever been enrolled in is fourteen.  Yet, I have class 5 days a week and I start at about 7:00am and go till 10:00 or 11:00pm.  Why?  I practice, and most of my classes only get one credit.

But at any rate, I was practicing when my other roommate showed up.  James Colcannon. He and his mother started to bring up his stuff.  They didn’t say anything to me, just started moving stuff in.  Well, his mother scowled at me, but that was it.  There was something about him that I just didn’t find right.  An aura about him, if you will, that made me be suspicious of him.  I knew, however, that first impressions can be misleading, so I decided to keep my eyes open and observe for the time being, and make a decision about him later.  Well, later that afternoon, I had just lain down to take a nap.  He came in the room, and made a phone call.  I don’t know who he was talking to, but who the conversation was about was quite clear.

“Yeah, he just sat there holding his flute.  Didn’t help or anything, even after we asked him to several times.”

I couldn’t believe it.  Here he is, not having said anything to me at all—not even to say hello—and he’s bad mouthing me over the phone to someone that has never met me, and that I don’t even know.

But I didn’t worry about it too much.  I was only in that dorm temporarily, until they could find another space for me.  I figured I’d just have to put up with him till then, and that would be the end of it.

            Well, for the first week, everything was fine.  I called home several times, as freshmen are wont to do.  My money held out till Thursday when I got my ID, and my class load looked very manageable.  However, the first week of school, that all changed.

            John started staying at friends’ places.  I don’t know where he was, but from the time that I got there to the time that I left the room, he only spent about 3 nights in the dorm room.  He wasn’t the problem though.  He seemed like a decent enough guy, and was nice to me whenever I saw him.  My other roommate, however, found himself a girlfriend.  Actually, girlfriend is too strong of a word—it implies an emotional content.  Fuck-buddy would be a better description of what she was.  Anyway, he came in one night, drunk as hell.  In tow was his fuck-buddy, Angela.  Now this is all fine and dandy, that he’s getting laid.  But I just happened to be in bed asleep when he came in.  Perhaps it’s time for another rant.

            I am a music major.  Music major is a lifestyle.  Since I have classes that start early in the morning, I have to get up early in the morning.  I also like to practice some before classes.  So that means I’m usually at the music school by 7:00am.  Now, in order for me to have time to shower, get dressed, eat breakfast, and walk to the school, I usually get up around 5:00 or 5:15am.  Now that being said, I go to bed early, around 10:30 or 11:00 every night.

            James came in, so drunk he could hardly stand up.  In tow was Angela.  And they started yelling at each other.  Then they had sex.  That’s all fine and dandy, but remember I was asleep when they came in.  I wasn’t when they finished.  So I didn’t sleep well that night.  I figured I’d talk to him and he’d let me know when they were going to stay in the room again, and I could figure out somewhere else to stay.  Well, I talked to him about it, and he basically blew me off.

            Suffice it to say, his coming home drunk and having sex happened every night after that.  I stood it for about 2 weeks, then I quit.  I wrote a letter, in which I detailed what was going on, and demanded that I be placed into another room, either temporary or permanent.  I sent this letter to the Residence Director.

            Well, within two days, I had been moved out of that room and placed into a permanent place.  The roommate that I had this time was nice, albeit a little bit quiet.  It turned out to be a very good arrangement for the two of us.  I didn’t get in his way, he didn’t get in mine, and we had a peaceful, if not friendly, relationship.

Even while all of this was happening, my school life was going along.  I was taking flute lessons from Brunhilda von Hoppenscotch.  For a music major, especially one looking for a performance career, your lesson teacher is very important.  You’ll spend only an hour a week with him/her, but their name is a badge of honor for some people.  It’s like a rock climber saying he’d been taught by Sir Edmond Hillary, or an explorer saying he’d been taught by Meriwether Lewis.  It is also approximately 80% of a performance major’s education, learning to play his instruments.

Well, Brunhilda was a piece of work.  Every time I would come in for a lesson, no matter how much or how hard I’d practiced, she would always tell me that it wasn’t good enough.  And then she’d have me play it again.  No matter what I did, or how many times I did it, it was never “good enough.”  Yet, for all that, she would never tell me what I was doing wrong.  Or how to fix it.  Finally, I’d had enough.

I went and spoke with Janice Asman, the head flute professor of the school.  You see, Knickerbocker was a large university, and had three flute professors.  The third was never there; in fact, I only saw him once on campus during the whole time that I was at the school.  Someone said that he only took one student, but I think it was a lie.  At any rate, Janice said that I was stuck with Brunhilda.  So off I went.

Knickerbocker was a school based on the quarter system.  That means, instead of having two semesters with a summer school, there were four quarters in a school year.  Three of the quarters made up a school year, and the fourth was used for summer school.

Towards the end of the first quarter, the flute studio learned that Janice was going on sabbatical to record a CD.  She was bringing in two temporary flute teachers to fill in for her while she was gone.  The two flute teachers started coming to our weekly flute meetings, and I soon became friends with one of them.

So I asked him directly if I could take lessons from him.  I quasi-explained the situation to him, how I wasn’t learning anything about flute playing from Brunhilda, and he said that if I could get the OK from Janice, he would teach me.  So I went back to Janice, and told her that I’d already gotten his permission, if she would let me switch studios.  She finally relented, and let me switch.

This was the best thing that happened to me that year.  For one quarter I actually learned, and made some progress on my playing.  Then Janice came back for the final quarter, and my good flute teacher left.  I was concerned at first, since I was sure that Brunhilda had been telling her things about me.  However, she treated me like any other new student, and we set off.  I thought that things were fine and dandy, and I was learning from her.  Albeit, not as much as I was learning from Jim Goodman, but still learning.

I should point out that by this time, I had already applied to another University.  I had applied, and been accepted with a scholarship to Knickerbecker University, in another state.  In the United States, there is an organization called the National Association of Schools of Music.  This is a club of music schools throughout the country, and they have a set of rules—well, mutual agreements—that all its members follow.  One of these rules is that no school can require an answer from any accepted student before May 1.  This gives all the schools a chance to get their acceptance or rejection letters out to the student before they make a choice, and allows the student to make a more informed decision.  Well, I accepted the scholarship and admission at Knickerbecker, intending to leave Knickerbocker University behind.  I sent the letter on April 30^th.

On May 7, 2002, all hell broke loose for me.

On that Tuesday, I was called in to the Assistant Dean of the School of Music’s office, Dean Tyrant.  I went in and sat down as I was bidden.

“We have received reports that you are carrying several large hunting knives around school.  Tomorrow, you have a required meeting with the Dean of Students.  He will discuss this problem with you.  That’s all.”

That was it.  Before I could say anything, I had already been told to leave.  Now to be clear, and I want this point crystal clear:  I have NEVER carried a hunting knife of any kind into any school.  I carry a single pocket knife.  No more, no less.  No place that I know of in the United States will usually say anything about carrying a pocket knife.  There are several places around the country that have laws that can be used against you for carrying a knife if you are caught doing some more serious crime.  I have no problem with these, because they are designed to help police keep criminals off the street.

Well, at my meeting the next day, I told the Dean of Students this.  I don’t know if he believed me or not, but all he said was that if I was caught with a knife for the rest of the school year that I would be expelled from school.  I figured that was ok; I was being punished for something that I didn’t do, but I was only going to have to live with it for about six weeks, then I was out of that school for good.  Well, at least I thought that was all.

The next Tuesday, more bad things happened to me.

I showed up on Tuesday afternoon, May 14, 2002, like I always did for my weekly lesson.  Well, the appointed time came and went, and Janice still hadn’t showed up.  I figured that she had car trouble or was stuck in traffic or something.  So I went to the desk and got a key for the flute office and went in to practice.  Well, I practiced for a couple hours in there with no interruption.

Later that night, at our weekly flute studio class, I asked Janice if we’d had some sort of miscommunication or if she’d had car trouble or something.  I also asked her if we could reschedule my missed lesson for some other time.

“I will no longer be teaching you,” she said.

I was shocked.  I was thinking that things were going so well, and here she is dropping this bomb shell on me.

“May I ask why?” I said.

“I think you know.”  She said.  By this time, a man, who I assume was her husband, came up behind her.  I figured it was time to leave, so I grabbed my gear and left.

The next day, I was once again called into Dean Tyrant’s office.  She basically told me that Janice refused to teach me, and that I was being assigned to the Director of Bands for my private lessons.  The director of bands was a clarinet player.  He turned out to be pretty good.  Even though he didn’t know much about the flute, he knew a lot about music, and how to practice, and I still use some of the methods that he talked about.

At this point, I was just continually saying to myself the number of days that I had left before I could leave hell.  I didn’t realize that I wasn’t finished yet.

On Tuesday, May 21, 2002, I was once again called into the Dean of Students office.  When I got to his office, there was the head of Knickerbocker Campus Security and a Slapout police detective in there as well.  Someone had turned me in for reportedly saying that I was going to bring a large knife into school and cut up a bunch of people with it.  Someone said that they had overheard me saying that I was going to bring a Ghurka Kukhri knife and cut up a bunch of people.  At this point I realized what had happened.

The day before, I had been sitting in the School of Music lounge looking at a knife catalog.  One of my friends came up, and started asking me questions about some of the knives in the catalog.

Now, I don’t do anything half way.  When I started making knives about 5 years ago, I started learning about all the different kinds of knives, the metallurgy behind the steel, the different options on everything to do with the knife, as well as the history of hundreds of different kinds of knives.  One of the knives that I studied was the Ghurka Kukhri.  The Ghurka are a military sect from northern India and southern Nepal.  They were fierce warriors, and carried a large knife called a Kukhri.  This knife was used in many ceremonies.  One such ceremony is the sacrifice of a buffalo or an ox once a year.  If the head of the animal is cut cleanly from the body with one stroke, it is considered good luck for the year for the Ghurka.  I had been telling my friend about this in the student lounge.

I told this to the assembled crowd in the Dean’s office, and you could tell that the tension in the detective immediately left.  By the time the meeting was over, I had convinced them that the accusation was a lie.  The detective from the Slapout PD even said that he would like to get together sometime to talk about knives.

Later that day, I was called into Dean Tyrant’s office.  Before she or I could say anything, she led me to the office of the Dean of the School of Music, Dr. Ima Dickhead.  They weren’t nearly as understanding as the Dean of Students.  They told me that if I carried a knife, or had a book with knives in it, or a magazine, or a catalog, or talked about knives, that I would be expelled immediately.  They also said that if I elected to leave now, that I could do so with the grades that I had so far that semester, without finals.  And I wouldn’t be penalized for not taking the finals.  At that time, I didn’t accept the offer.  That night, I called my parents.  After talking it over with them, we decided that it would be best to accept the offer.  Things just kept going downhill, and I wasn’t going to be there next year anyway.

That Friday, I left Knickerbocker University for good.  I have no intention of ever going back.  As I left Slapout, I made the vow never to return.  It was like a large, heavy weight had been lifted from my soul, and I was glad to be rid of the burden.

What’s that you say? Does the story end here?  I’m afraid not.

June was pleasant for me.  I started working, and I was looking forward to the fall when I would be going to Knickerbecker University.  Then on July 1, everything came crashing down.  I received a letter from Knickerbecker, saying that they’d rescinded my admission and my scholarship.  This was due to some information that they had received from Knickerbocker University.

At this point, I decided to hire a lawyer.  After discussing this with her, we wrote two letters.  We sent one to Knickerbecker trying to get my admission and scholarship back and the other to Knickerbocker to get my official and complete student record.

When we got the replies back, I wasn’t happy.  Knickerbecker wouldn’t change their mind.  That was fine.  I didn’t expect them to anyway.

However, Knickerbocker’s reply was quite interesting.  Inside I found two things that were very interesting.  The first was a fax coversheet.  It was sent from Janice Asman to Knickerbecker University.  But the actual letter it was covering was missing.  Also in the file I found an email.  This email was the one that said that I was going to bring a Kukhri knife to school and cut up a bunch of people.  There was no name on it, but the interesting thing about it was it said something profound.

“Professor Asman asked us to keep an eye on him…”  She was having students spy on me!  I couldn’t believe it.

Well, I set my lawyer to work on the documents and began to wait.  After about a week, she concluded the following: there was nothing to be done.  Knickerbecker had discretion as to who it could or couldn’t admit.  And we didn’t have any evidence on any wrongdoing from Knickerbocker to warrant a libel or slander suit, or any criminal charges.  I was just out of luck.

The next fall, I worked full time, until I could find another college to get back into.  Having been a student at a university while I was in high school, I re-enrolled there.  And I’m still here.  Knickerbocker is still running, but from what I hear, they lost about 25-30% of their freshman class to transfers that year, from the Music School alone.

Now, just so you know.  I am not a trouble maker.  I never have been, and unless something major changes who I am, I never will be.  I am well on my way to my degree at my new school, have a 3.7 GPA, and am on the Dean’s Honor Roll.  I have a good job, a good apartment, and I still, even after 3 years, won’t ever return to Slapout.