Opinion
 

When studying, don't go to the bar

by Joshua Curry

 When it's time to study, I know exactly what to do -- go straight to the bar. Yes, that's right, I generally try not to swerve and assume I'll come out the same way. Straight, that is. Yet if I don't, same-sex marriage has pushed its way into our hearts in that week of the year couples willfully focus on the "L" word, and Boston is only a six-hour plane ride away. Maybe it will only be a decade or two before civil rights in this country don't come with loopholes.

 I'm sitting at this bar, and I love it because I can get wheat soup or a barley sandwich if I get hungry, and it's a very convenient place to adhere to the eight-glasses-a-day recommendation Mom gave me. Bars are the only places you can legally order slippery body parts. What more could you want?

 The only thing I might complain about is the studying, and in most cases that's defeated by a ranting pencil and aimless ridicule.

 Last week my roommate's car was broken into as he was "catching up" with his ex. He walked out to find his trunk and all three doors wide open (the driver's door doesn't open, he has to climb in through the window). What did the perpetrators nab? A full grazing of the docket revealed the absence of one rear speaker, half of an inspection sticker and a CD collection. He also suspects a razor was stolen to aid in the inspection-sticker theft.

 The part about the CDs seemed poetic to me. My own ex's aunt told me that the point she realized she was in love with her husband was when they combined CD collections. Speaking as someone who has had his collection stolen three times, I had an epiphany on the difficulty of finding lasting love. Music drives me. It defines me in the least superficial of ways. A record can render past feelings and interpretations while underscoring how those have changed. Music keeps me up to date on myself. The ability to trust one's self is up there on the how-to list of love.

 Of course there was also last Saturday to remind me of love, that special day of the year the corporate world decides to remove its status as a taboo and pump it for all it's worth. Surely its marketability accounts for the fact that it completely overshadows the entire month of February's celebration of black history. Note that February is the shortest month, hence devoted to one of the most persecuted groups of American citizens in terms of numbers and subtlety.

 A co-worker in my haughty home of Kingwood told me the only thing people ask which really bothers him is -- creeping over blunt eggshells -- what his race is. I had to squint to notice that his nose was slightly wide and short like Jesus.' The people who ask such questions already have him pegged as something, depending on his answer. Of course, there must be another handful of people for each one who asks who do not assume a race, keeping their judgments restricted to their beloved little social-circle jerks. Imagine how this must be for people who have no way (or reason) to shield themselves from automatic judgment.

 After World War II, FDR envisioned this great bill, known as the GI Bill, to aid the postwar economy. Veterans received all kinds of benefits, and Roosevelt wanted to help veterans become homeowners. This was made possible by home loans available to everyone, including African-Americans. Unfortunately, home loans would not be granted for African-Americans to live in white neighborhoods, so what have we got? Close to an entire race of people was pushed back into the structural poverty, and many were attempting to escape. Where in that is the American dream? I'm dying to know, and I've got this burning chunk of love ready to lob at something -- and absolutely no ideas.

Curry, a columnist for The Daily Cougar, 
can be reached at barelyafloat@hotmail.com.