So, here goes:

1. Read more books. I read a couple books in 2011, but I really would like to be a bit more diligent about diving into the stack of volumes that are whispering to me, urging me to open their covers and get lost in the pages.

2. Plan another big trip. Iceland was a surreal, magical, wonderful experience – and one that sprite and I planned mostly by happenstance. I’m not sure that this next big trip will happen in 2012, but getting the wheels in motion now wouldn’t be a bad idea.

3. Cook and prepare more things that I would otherwise buy. Often I’m in a rush to leave in the morning and don’t pack lunch. That means having to uy lunch, and the cost adds up. So I’d like to have the foresight to pack more lunches. Also, I’m a sucker for gourmet coffee drinks that I can totally make myself (e.g. espresso, Starbucks’ gingerbread lattés). For Christmas, I received an Aerobee Aeropress, and sprite pointed me to this DIY gingerbread latté recipe, so…. there ‘ya go!

4. Clean a little bit every day. The Burrow is a tiny apartment, and it’s often far from the sanctuary it should be. I’d like to rediscover the space inside by cleaning it a little each day and, like sprite, concentrate on sectors. It may mean that we’ll have guests over more often, and that would be great.

5. Let go of things. This goes hand-in-hand with cleaning, in a sense: I tend to hold onto things, sometimes to the point of obsession. This leads to messes, both literal and figurative, which leads to unnecessary stress. I’ve been working on this for a few years, and it’s a continuing process.

6. Really crush the Death Ride. It’s my big event ride for 2012, and I want to be super-strong in it! So it will involve training smartly, eating well, resting, keeping the bikes in shape and always looking forward.

7. Go hiking in both Rock Creek Park and Shenandoah National Park. One is just blocks from my front door. The other is only 60 miles from my front door. And I really haven’t hiked in either park. I love hiking, so…. let’s do it!

8. Draw more. I have a lovely set of Prismacolor pencils and sketchbooks – I should use ‘em more!

9. Post more on this blog. It’s fallen somewhat by the wayside. This will change in 2012.

10. Say “thank you” far more often. I’m often not grateful enough for the friends and family I have, and the things they do to help me through life.

Do any of you have things you want to do in 2012?

This is a post from randomduck.com. Copyright © 2012 R.D. Riet. Covered under Creative Commons.

ten on tuesday: things to do in 2012

My first computer was an Apple ][+.

And that was my first exposure to Apple. I learned to program in LOGO and BASIC on my Apple ][+, and played a lot of games of Gorgon and Zork on its black-and-white screen. I think I acquired my first copy of Gorgon from my friend, Matthew, who was in the same programming classes with me.

Good times.

The computers I used in college were all Macintoshes: a LC, a PowerBook 145, and a Performa 630 (of these, the PowerBook was the best). The printer I used with these was a StyleWriter (which was s-l-o-w). Two of these Macs went on to help friends with their computer needs. I still have the PowerBook, though I'm not sure it still runs.

Post-college, I've owned two Power Computing PowerCenters (a Mac clone), an iBook, a G3 iMac (royal blue), a G4 iMac, a PowerBook G4 (titanium case) and a Mac Mini (Intel-powered).

The PowerCenters were decent clones, if a bit ugly and with suspect power supplies, but they were affordable. The iBook was bought shortly before I left for a month-long stint volunteering at the 2002 Olympic Winter Games, and it lasted a long time. The G3 iMac was a hand-me-down that served us well when we first moved to DC.

The G4 iMac, PowerBook G4 and Mini still chug along in The Burrow - hardy machines, these, given that the newest of the lot is from 2006.

I've owned three iPhones: the original, a 3G and a 4. The first two were lost - I'm trying to keep the latest one within sight for a while longer.

Apple mice from 2000 and 2010.

I can thank Steve Jobs’ products for my job: I work with a Mac every day, and I support Macs (and Windows PCs) every day.

I can thank his focus on regular people as the ultimate users of his product for my preferences in user interface: one that works simply, is consistent, and lets me get work done. It’s programming for people, not programmers (and having worked in a Windows development company in the past, I’m keenly aware of what programming for programmers can bring: ugly UI and inconsistent operation, with nothing intuitive – a far cry from the Apple ethos).

I can thank his willingness to keep a focus on the long haul: following things to their conclusion, having a vision, ignoring the naysayers and throwing his all into his mission. It’s something I need to remind myself of fairly often these days.

I can thank him for making technology sexy. I had the good fortune to attend one of his keynote addresses (known to Mac geeks as “Stevenotes”) at Macworld NY in 2000 (the mouse on the left in the picture was the “party favor” from that speech). I queued up early with my friend, Sam, got a seat in the Javitz Center, and heard Steve talk about all of the new Apple wares. It’s said that he created a bit of a reality distortion field in these speeches, and a lot of times you’d leave feeling like the future is now, and wonder why, many months later, things wouldn’t be just as he said.

Little did I know, Steve was looking further down the road than any of us. It’s easy to see now – 20/20 hindsight is amazing.

Having Steve silenced at a young age is tough to fathom. He leaves behind a wife and kids. The halls of One Infinite Loop in Cupertino are likely far more somber these days. And fans like me, for whom Steve was a visionary and hero, are left with heavy hearts.

There are a number of appropriate quotes from Steve that ring true with me, and I’ll share them here:

“A computer is the most remarkable tool that we’ve ever come up with. It’s the equivalent of a bicycle for our minds.”

Given my affinity for the two-wheeled machine and the computer, this is fitting for me.

“Simple can be harder than complex: You have to work hard to get your thinking clean to make it simple. But it’s worth it in the end because once you get there, you can move mountains.”

Simple is good – something to remember, especially in chaotic times.

“You can’t connect the dots looking forward; you can only connect them looking backwards. So you have to trust that the dots will somehow connect in your future. You have to trust in something — your gut, destiny, life, karma, whatever. This approach has never let me down, and it has made all the difference in my life.”

“When I was 17, I read a quote that went something like: ‘If you live each day as if it was your last, someday you’ll most certainly be right.’ It made an impression on me, and since then, for the past 33 years, I have looked in the mirror every morning and asked myself: ‘If today were the last day of my life, would I want to do what I am about to do today?’ And whenever the answer has been ‘No’ for too many days in a row, I know I need to change something.”

I need to keep these two in the forefront of my mind, I think, just to keep me moving in the right direction.

“Your time is limited, so don’t waste it living someone else’s life. Don’t be trapped by dogma — which is living with the results of other people’s thinking. Don’t let the noise of others’ opinions drown out your own inner voice. And most important, have the courage to follow your heart and intuition. They somehow already know what you truly want to become. Everything else is secondary.”

So true, Steve – so true.

Cancer took you from us far too soon. Fuck cancer. But you’ve left one hell of a legacy.

And I’m very grateful for that. Thank you, Steve.

This is a post from randomduck.com. Copyright © 2012 R.D. Riet. Covered under Creative Commons.

thanks, steve

I’m dismayed that the DC Council’s monthly breakfasts tend to be lavish affairs, especially when the Council is dealing with high levels of unemployment, corruption, and whatnot. Yesterday’s breakfast had a rather flashy spread, complete with individual glass bottles of Voss sparkling mineral water. This water isn’t cheap, and it’s very sad to see such wasteful spending, especially when DC Water is promoting reusable bottles filled with DC’s perfectly drinkable tap water.

So I ask: as the monthly breakfast duty rotates amongst Council members, who went to these wasteful lengths? Hey, DC press (I’m looking at you, DeBonis, Sherwood and Suderman): let’s not allow this to simply pass us by.

(As an aside, this kind of over-the-top, lavish catering reminds me of my time on the DC Democratic State Committee, when the committee was planning its trip to the Democratic National Convention in Denver, Colorado. One of the DCDSC’s national committee liaisons spoke of “wonderful, catered breakfasts with crispy bacon, eggs, all the trimmings,” and the need for an exorbitant budget to pay for all of this opulence – for a group that didn’t really have a purpose for being at the convention, other than to cast a ceremonial nominating vote. Otherwise, the Democratic National Convention is all about networking and trying to land a political appointment – whatever. And these funds were raised through less-than-legal means, in the end – DeBonis’ write-up is a good place to start on said research. Needless to say, I was very happy not to run for reelection to such a corrupt – and, in the end, pointless – organization.)

———

Word is the Lincoln Theatre on U Street is running out of funds, and needs a quick injection of $500,000 (give or take) to continue operation. This historic building is owned and operated by the District, and I’ve seldom seen it actually host events. From what I can tell, this so-called “hybrid community-commercial venue” is mis-managed, in part by its non-communicative board of directors (who apparently haven’t directly asked the Mayor for assistance, or even a meeting to talk), and in part by its insistance on hosting “multi-cultural experiences and programming.”

Here’s the problem with the latter portion: this charter is essentially code for preserving a culture that has long since left the U Street corridor. Yes, it was the “Black Broadway of DC” in its heyday, a magnet for performers like Duke Ellington, Ella Fitzgerald, Louis Armstrong and Cab Calloway. And the majority of programs booked in the Lincoln try to preserve the historic African-American heritage of the U Street corridor, or play to international arts events.

But over the past 15 years, U Street has changed. It is no longer a neighborhood dominated by one culture, but a melting pot of urban renewal. The old guard establishments, like Ben’s Chili Bowl and Bohemian Caverns, has been joined by thriving new ventures, like Marvin, Nellie’s, Busboys and Poets, and numerous other restaurants, bars and shops. International music and theatre is embraced by performance venues like GWU’s Lisner Auditorum, Warner Theatre, the Shakespeare Theatre Company’s two indoor performance space, as well as other venues in the greater DC area. As people are priced out of the U Street housing market, they often take the culture with them to their new neighborhoods.

A quick study of how many nights the Lincoln is booked for events shows it booked an average of 30-36 days per year – less than ten percent of the time. For any performance venue, this is not an admirable record. And the few times the Lincoln hosted events that were a bit outside of their typical bookings – a LGBT film festval and fringe theatre events, to name but two – there were many obstacles that stood in the way of any perception of success. These obstacles included veiled prejudice with regard to the LGBT festival and mainstream music bookings, as well as negative neighborhood perception on the part of fringe theatre. And those who have worked at the Lincoln have few positive things to say about the management and staff at the facility, ranging from cries of indifference to non-timeliness of essential technical staff.

To put it bluntly: the place is mismanaged on many levels, to its detriment. And DC is now in the midst of renovating the old Howard Theatre, likely embarking on the same path to disrepair.

The solution? The DC government should convert the Lincoln into a stand-alone, non-profit entity. It needs to be weaned from the teat of the DC taxpayers and find its own feet. Such a quality venue, with lovely architecture and a size that’s bigger than many clubs and fringe theatres, yet smaller than places like National Theatre, would be best managed by a firm like IMP (which already does occasional bookings for the facility) or a local guild of theatre companies. This facility needs to be booked more than 65 percent of the year to be relevant or solvent, and it needs management that actually is in tune with the people who now frequent the U Street corridor.

I’m not advocating complete abandonment of the mission of preserving the history of U Street. I’m simply encouraging the Lincoln to embrace the changes, as well: to offer all of Heinz’ 57 varieties of wares, not just things that no longer resonate with the locals.

As far is the Howard is concerned: partner with Howard University and a firm like IMP now, get a game plan in place that is forward thinking in terms of the needs of the city and neighborhood, and don’t step on the toes of your U Street neighbor to the west.

———

The DC government also announced that, unless a little over $300,000 can be found in the budget, it will shutter MLK Library on Sundays, thus closing the only DCPL location that operates on said day. While I grew up in a city where the public library was never, ever open on a Sunday, MLK is a vital “third space” for the DC community.

So where can $300,000 be found? Well, Councilman Harry “Tommy” Thomas, Jr., wrongly spent approximately $300,000 of city funds on his own, non-constituent expenses. He has promised to pay them back, so why not have him pay them directly to DCPL to keep MLK open? Seems like common sense, and makes lemonade out of lemons.

(And naturally, since this makes sense, the DC Council won’t do it.)

———

And finally: I’d really like to see Tommy Wells get more aggressive within the Council. Sure, the rest of the Council let you down, and in a perfect world it would be wise to sit back and let wounds heal.

But if the culture of corruption and ineptitude that has been the hallmark of the current Mayor and Council is any indication, now is not the time to be quiet, Tommy. Get angry! Get aggressive! Carry that big stick and use it. Your constituents didn’t vote you in to be a soft voice, but to call out the bullshit when you saw it. So….

Just do it!

Hold your colleagues accountable! Point out when things don’t make any sense! Be a champion for sanity in government! Take on the mantel of moving the city into the future, while many of your colleagues want to drag it back into the past!

Seriously, Tommy, you’re one of the few – if not the only – Council member with whom I don’t really have a beef (the same definitely can’t be said of my Ward’s Councilman, Jack Evans). You’ve had plenty of time to lick your wounds and brush off the dirt from being smacked down – now is the time to get back to fighting!

Ahem….

This is a post from randomduck.com. Copyright © 2012 R.D. Riet. Covered under Creative Commons.

random thursday rant

So here are my top ten, in descending order:

1. Casablanca (1943) Possibly my second-favorite film of all time*, this is a wonderful film with great characters, excellent writing and gorgeous cinematography. So many lines of this film are part of the common lexicon these days, and for good reason: the film is simply awesome.
2. Chariots of Fire (1981) An uplifting-yet-bittersweet film about Olympic runners, beautifully filmed and acted. This is one of the first films I remember seeing and then saying to myself afterward “film can be art.” I was 8 at the time. Go fig.
3. The Lord of the Rings: Return of the King (2003) As many state, this award was likely given as acknowledgement of the triumph of the whole trilogy, and what a trilogy it is! Majestic, dark, foreboding – and yet whimsical (at times), accessible and engrossing. Peter Jackson shot for the moon, and oh how well he hit the mark. And no, I don’t miss the scenes with Tom Bombadil one bit.
4. The Godfather, Part II (1974) Coppolla’s masterwork to this day, and one of a handful of sequels that thoroughly beat the original film in terms of achievement (and the first Godfather is one hell of a film).
5. Schindler’s List (1993) Dark story matter, grippingly told by Steven Spielberg and the lens work of Janusz Kaminsky. The one shot of color – the girl in the red coat – codifies the sense that the victims of the Holocaust were reduced to nothing but numbers in the eyes of the Nazis. It’s a tough film to watch, but this is an essential film.
6. The Sound of Music (1965) Julie Andrews at her finest, songs that stick to your craw like high-quality peanut butter, and the mountains – oh, the mountains! Sure, some of the material grates (“16 Going on 17″ being the big clunker in these enlightened days), but the movie is grand and epic – to me, the best movie musical ever filmed.
7. Amadeus (1984) Another film that gripped me as art, and the soundtrack was the sound of my childhood (I didn’t get to listen to much pop or rock music as a young child, as my folks wanted me to study to Mozart). This movie always entertains me.
8. All About Eve (1950) Possibly Bette Davis’ best role. Ever.
9. One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest (1975) Ma favorite Jack Nicholson film, and a film that makes me laugh, cry and cringe every time I see it.
10. The Silence of the Lambs (1991) A taut thriller with a superb cast, deserving of all accolades bestowed upon it. Hopkins and Foster are such perfect foils – and I’ll never think of fava beans the same way again (and yes, I like fava beans and a nice chianti, though not with the kind of liver that Hannibal Lecter suggests to Agent Starling).

Sarah listed her ten over on her blog, which is a fun read, as well. And Carole will aggregate all of the entries on her blog.

* – for the record, my favorite film of all time is 2001: A Space Odyssey.

This is a post from randomduck.com. Copyright © 2012 R.D. Riet. Covered under Creative Commons.

ten on tuesday: best pic-a-tures

But not a road bike (I didn’t own a proper road bike until 2002). Nope, these were the days when I was riding – and racing – mountain bikes.

Me, my old Scott bike, the old team jersey and a lot of energy before a race.

With that, let’s go back to 1989 (at least I think it’s 1989 – the photo is a Polaroid of an Ektachrome slide that is buried somewhere in Salt Lake City at the moment). I was racing mountain bikes in the summer as part of my off-season training for ski racing. My dad and I would criss-cross Utah and Colorado to attend races. By this time, I was sharing some of the driving duties, much to his relief (or stress, it’s hard to say).

At any rate, July’s big race in the Utah Mountain Bike Championship Series was the Blue Mountain Bike Chase, a 25-mile ride up and down the Abajo Range west of Monticello, Utah. At 16, I was the youngest racer in the field by a few years, and didn’t really know what I was getting into. But I loved racing my bike, so my dad humored my request to enter this race.

The course climbs Abajo Peak: at almost 11,300 feet, it towers 4,500 feet above the farming town of Monticello. The course was a mix of paved roads, dirt roads, USFS roads and hiking trails, and involved a lot of climbing. The first 13 miles encompassed 95% of the uphill riding that would happen on the course, some of it very, very steep.

I don’t remember a lot of specific details of the course, other than I stopped to admire the view from the top of Abajo Peak after pushing my bike the last mile or so to the top, looking forward to the fast descent back to town. A couple of hikers and a county sheriff greeted me at the top, checked to see that I was OK, and cheered me on. I hopped back onto my bike, slipped my feet into the toe clips on my pedals (no clipless systems in 1989), made sure my knee pads were tight and flung myself down the mountain.

These were the days before suspension became de rigeur in mountain biking, so my arms took a bit of a pounding with all of the washboard road surfaces. But I finished without incident, some 5 hours after starting, hot, sweaty and happy. I had won the junior division (being the only entrant has its perks), and my dad was happy to see me back at the old, golden Jeep (seen in the picture).

After I cleaned up and changed clothes, we drove back to Salt Lake City. I insisted that I drive some of the route home, but my dad put the brakes on that (literally) when I found it almost impossible to keep my eyes open, so drained I was from the race.

That was a fun summer.

This is a post from randomduck.com. Copyright © 2012 R.D. Riet. Covered under Creative Commons.

wayback wednesday: racing the bike in the 1980s

1. “Candy and a Currant Bun” – Pink Floyd (from The Pink Floyd Early Singles)
2. “How Could I Be Such a Fool” – Frank Zappa and the Mothers of Invention (from Freak Out!)
3. “Black Betty” – Joe Brown (from Down To Earth)
4. “Whistle For The Choir” – The Fratellis (from Costello Music)
5. “23 Mile Ride” – Mojo Nixon (from Frenzy)
6. “Midnight Radio” – Dar Williams (from Promised Land)
7. “A Method” – TV on the Radio (from Return to Cookie Mountain)
8. “Talkin’ Bear Mountain Picnic Massacre Blues” – Bob Dylan (from The Bootleg Series, Vols. 1-3)
9. “Golden Bird” – Levon Helm (from Electric Dirt)

And since this is the first day of the meteorological winter, why not ten more songs? Seems right to me, given that winter is my favorite season:

1. “Apartment Zero” – Mojo Nixon (from Whiskey Rebellion)
2. “However Much I Booze” – The Who (from The Who By Numbers)
3. “Day Tripper” – The Beatles (from Mono Masters [from The Beatles in Mono box set])
4. “From Me To You” – The Beatles (from Anthology 1)
5. “Skiing Billy” – Ray Conrad & Rosalee Sorrels (from “The Cotton Picking Lift Tower” and Other Skiing Songs)
6. “Square One” – Coldplay (from X&Y)
7. “They Made My Dream Come True” – The Who (from Endless Wire)
8. “Birthday” – The Beatles (from The Beatles [i.e. The White Album])
9. “Let It Loose” – The Rolling Stones (from Exile on Main Street)
10. “Jesus Walking On The Water” – Violent Femmes (from Add It Up [1981-1993])

So what ten (or twenty) songs are playing in your workplace, living room or headphones today?

This is a post from randomduck.com. Copyright © 2012 R.D. Riet. Covered under Creative Commons.

wednesday random ten: winter’s arrival with a bang

1. “Run For Your Life” – The Beatles (from Rubber Soul)
2. “Christians I Hate ‘Em” – Mojo Nixon (from Whiskey Rebellion)
3. “Hung Up On Soul” – Death Cab For Maddy (from Mashups by Party Ben)
4. “Bitch” – The Rolling Stones (from Get Your Leeds Lungs Out! Revisited)
5. “Lasso the Moon” – Art Garfunkel (from Songs From a Parent to a Child)
6. “Heretics” – Andrew Bird (from Armchair Apocrypha)
7. “Satisfied” – Cee Lo Green (from The Lady Killer)
8. “Sad Professor” – R.E.M. (from Up)
9. “Where Would We Go?” – Rusty Anderson (from Born On Earth)
10. “An Cat Dubh” – U2 (from Live in San Diego, 28 March 2005)

Got your own random ten? Share ‘em in the comments.

This is a post from randomduck.com. Copyright © 2012 R.D. Riet. Covered under Creative Commons.

wednesday random ten: windy wednesday

So I’ve been listening to a lot of meditative music of late. In particular, the early solo work of George Harrison (from his All Things Must Pass and Living In The Material World albums, as well as his later Beatles songs) have proven very helpful in coping with these losses.

That said, today’s random 10 is throwing caution to the wind, letting the chips fall as they may: no skipping, no cherry-picking of songs, just what iTunes deems fit to play.

1. “For You Blue” – Paul McCartney (from The Concert for George)
2. “This One’s For The Girls” – Martina McBride (from Martina)
3. “Ventilator Blues” – The Rolling Stones (from Exile on Main Street)
4. “Yesterday” – Bob Dylan (from Possum Belly Overalls)
5. “Broken Man” – The Baseball Project (from Volume 1: Frozen Ropes and Dying Quails)
6. “Baby, Let’s Play House” – Elvis Presley (from The Essential 3.0 Elvis Presley (Eco-Friendly Packaging))
7. “The Weather” – Richard Shindell (from Reunion Hill)
8. “She Moves Through The Fair” – Joe Brown (from Hittin the Hi Spots)
9. “La Foule” – Edith Piaf (from Le Tour De France)
10. “Brain Damage” – Pink Floyd (from P.U.L.S.E.)

So…. anybody care to share the soundtrack to their Wednesday?

This is a post from randomduck.com. Copyright © 2012 R.D. Riet. Covered under Creative Commons.

wednesday random 10: through the sadness

Sutton was a wonderful person. I’d known him since we were both young kids at RHSM, and since he was always a grade ahead of me he held the enigma of knowing just a tad bit more about the world. He was on of the “faces” of RHSM: a person who you always saw around campus, and if you knew him, he was part of the unique melting pot of the place.

I got to know Sutton as a friend during my high school days, when he was part of my circle of Debate Team friends who spent a lot of time at coffee houses. He was smart, self-assured, witty, occasionally abrasive, but always caring when his friends were involved. Even though he was a serious person, he never took life too seriously: making the most of the moment was one of Sutton’s special talents.

Once we went our separate ways – college and post-college life, after all, happen – I lost touch with Sutton. Even though we both lived in DC in recent years (and in the same neighborhood, to boot), we only recently got back in touch with each other. Sutton had overcome great adversity in recent years, including the loss of his partner back in 2006. But Sutton was working hard to get back into “fighting shape,” still wore a smile and had many great friends – there would have been tons of stuff to talk about. And the one time there was a possibility of meeting up after work, I was totally wiped out and not in a very social mood.

And now I regret the self-veto of the meet-up. Every bit of lethargy, energy-sapped crabbiness and malaise would have been worth the trouble of simply meeting up again and catching up.

I’m glad that many of his RHSM classmates got to hang out with him in June, and that he’d managed to re-connect with our common friends, Heather and Matt, both of whom recently arrived in the DC area. I just wish I’d managed to make the same reconnection.

So rest in peace, Sutton. Your friendship always meant the world to me.

This is a post from randomduck.com. Copyright © 2012 R.D. Riet. Covered under Creative Commons.

regrets

1. Life is too short for cheap beer. Some of the swill I ingested in my early college days was vile. These days, I’ll have an occasional PBR or Miller, but 99 percent of the time, I’m after something craft brewed, microbrewed, or at the very least a beer with personality and flavor (e.g. Guinness).
2. It’s OK to stand up for your choices, which goes hand-in-hand with…
3. It’s possible to start over again. Originally, I was supposed to go to the University of Colorado at Boulder for my freshman year of college. I’d even paid the deposit, been assigned a dorm, etc. But a familial squabble put the brakes on that, and I started at the University of Utah – a fine school, but not where I needed to be at that time in my life. So, after two years of feeling meh at “The U,” I transferred to Connecticut College (after a 5 month stint working in Rocky Hill, CT), moved in mid-year, and thrived. And it was a college of my own choosing. And it’s where I met sprite.
4. Good fences make good neighbors. Ben Franklin was right about this. Living in a dorm with a mix-and-match population in terms of tastes, lifestyles, music choices and the like makes you value the ability to close your door every so often to get some privacy and peace.
5. Never be afraid to take risks on things you know nothing about. I think that’s something that hampered me at Utah: it is a huge school with a lot of opportunities, both in terms of academics and activities. On the academic end, I was disappointed that my original major wasn’t inspiring, and I let that set me academically adrift for two quarters, at least. I did, however, become a music reporter for the student newspaper, which allowed me a lot of access into the music and journalism worlds.
6. Be willing to admit defeat and move on with more motivation. It’s true, my original major (meteorology) didn’t pan out, but after I picked up my chin, I found my bearings and decided upon a major I loved (international relations), which provided the inspiration to move east and transfer into Conn College.
7. Never burn a bridge, but choose your friends wisely. As Carole notes in her list, the friends you make in college are often your friends for life. And I’m still close with a lot of my college friends. But there are close friends and there are folks with whom you were friendly but who wouldn’t factor in your life, post-college. And seeing as I’m a social guy, I had to learn the demarcation between the two – a valuable lesson that, if I’d known it before college, I’d have likely had a bit more fun.
8. Be spontaneous. I was never really a spontaneous guy before college, and it took catharsis (my parents’ divorce going on while living at home being a primary catalyst) to get me to spontaneity. I submitted transfer applications. I moved east without knowing whether I’d be accepted at any school to which I applied. I had no job, but landed one in a music store. I went on a madcap drive to Cape Cod to see the sunrise over the ocean on my 22nd birthday. I danced in the rain and knocked huge puddles off of outdoor tents. I went sledding on the roof of the athletic center during a blizzard. I soaked up every moment of my short time at Conn, a lot of it spontaneously.
9. Be flexible. There’s no real owner’s manual for being a college student. It’s an individual experience, dependent on the person and, even more so, the context of the situation (the particular school, the age of the student, geography, climate, etc.). And circumstances can change with the wind. Along with spontaneity comes the need for flexibility. The class you want may be full or cancelled. Your roommate may be a complete asshole. There may be a floor party in your dorm while you are taking double credits and need to study. A kitchen fire may force you to spend a night out at the diner as the local fire department clears the smoke out of the halls of your dorm. Being able to adapt makes this possible.
10. Smile – a lot.
11. ETA: It’s OK to transfer to another college. It’s often very difficult to tell whether a college will be the right fit when you’re coming out of high school, still a teenager, having not lived away from home for any period longer than a few weeks. If things don’t feel right, give the school you’re at a chance – at least a year, possibly two – just to see if things will change. If they change for the better, great! If not, remember that it’s OK to transfer to another school. (And an aside to this: make sure to get a well-rounded core curriculum done in your first two years of college, and try to do well in those classes – it makes the transfer process far less painful.)

So, folks, I turn the mic over to you: what do you wish you’d known before college?

This is a post from randomduck.com. Copyright © 2012 R.D. Riet. Covered under Creative Commons.

ten on tuesday: i should’ve known…