You mean to say it’s time to start school again? Man, it seems like summer just started, and here it is time to hit the books again.
Well, I suppose some sort of welcome to all my fellow students and to the professors is in order. I should probably say how nice it is to be back and how I hope it will be a great year. Ah, yes, I should probably extend a warm welcome to all the freshmen on campus, too. Then again, why should I?
You freshmen are in for one hell of an awakening if you get any sort of welcome resembling the one my roommate and I received. That was three long years ago, but is a vivid, terrifying, laughable memory.
From the day we graduated from high school, my friend and I lived and breathed college; that summer couldn’t have lasted any longer. Finally the day we had chosen arrived. We packed both our cars to overflowing and set out for North Dakota State University, our new world 93 miles away from home. It seemed like such a long distance then. We were going to be free of our parents at last, leading a new life full of excitement and new friends. Granted, the excitement was there, but not quite the type we had anticipated.
Our dorm assignments read “Stockbridge, 328.” If only we had known what that meant, we might have decided to stay home and forget the whole college thing. But, no, when we pulled into the parking lot west of Stockbridge, our new home, the anticipation was still with us and we couldn’t wait to move our things in and start decorating.
In we went, wide-eyed and bubbly, to find out where to get our room keys. The guy who helped us was anything but helpful. The look in his eyes, I now know, conveyed pity for the two fools he knew wouldn’t last two weeks in a jungle like Stockbridge. He directed us to the third floor after handing us each a key and said, “Good luck.”
We skipp0ped up the three flights of stairs for the first time, each with a load in our arms and smiles glued to our faces. We were ready to meet our neighbors, to make timeless friends. What we didn’t know was Stockbridge had been christened “Jockbridge” in honor of the football players, wrestlers and basketball players who ruled the place.
We turned down the third floor north hallway, gasping from all the stairs taken too quickly with heavy loads. For some reason I expected the next person I saw to offer me a hand and become my best friend for life.
Three Goliaths strutted out of a room 20 yards down the hall and started toward us, two abreast in front, filling up the hallway, and one behind. My friend and I pressed ourselves against the wall to make room for them to pass, but I guess it wasn’t enough. The closest football player put his shoulder down as they passed and smashed my friend into the wall, bouncing him like a beach ball to the other side.
“Excuse me,” muttered my friend earnestly after they had almost knocked him through the wall. That was answered by an outburst of laughter and a parting shot we would never forget –
“Fu#@ing beanheads!”
My friend and I looked at each other in shocked disbelief. Welcome to NDSU, boys.
The next morning I went into the community shower for the first time, hoping things would get better. I left convinced I would be dead within days. Everyone in there was at least twice my size, and not a friendly hello in the bunch. The room we had so looked forward to became a prison cell; we locked the door and didn’t dare peek out.
Things got better, of course, although we resented being called beanheads. We searched out others like ourselves as protection against the bulk and insensitivity that surrounded us. Our R.A. was very cool; he made sure the “knuckleheads,” as my friends and I had dubbed the athletes in retaliation, didn’t make our lives unbearable. One of the imposing forms I encountered in the shower that first day became my roommate later in the year and one of my best friends.
I suppose I even owe the big boys from third floor north a word of thanks. They and the rest of a campus full of upperclassmen taught me a few things about survival and avoidance of ridicule.
In the spirit of peace and good faith, I’d like to pass on a few pointers to this year’s freshman class. Not because I’m particularly sympathetic, you understand, but because I remember what it was like.
First of all, if you’re walking around campus alone, don’t expect everyone to be friendly and say “hello.” They’re busy and don’t have time to make you feel good about yourself.
Next, don’t paste a smile on your face. Happiness is unnatural for students with fresh memories of summer.
Don’t lug every book you own around in your brand-new book bag for the first few days. You won’t need anything but a notebook, and a full backpack is a sure sign of fresh meat.
Memorize the locations of your classes as quickly as possible. A student looking at a map in the Union is as sure a sign as any.
If you sit down in a classroom and you’re not sure if you’re in the right place, don’t ask anyone. I learned this one the hard way the second day of my freshman year. “Hey, is this History 101,” I asked the guy next to me. “It might be,” he sneered, and turned away.
If you screw up and find yourself sitting in Psychology 210 instead of History 101, don’t give up and leave. Psych. 210 is the Human Sexuality course; you might enjoy it and save yourself some embarrassment.
There is a huge urge to try and make yourself as pretty or as handsome as you can for class. Fight it. Members of the opposite sex (or same sex, if that’s your pleasure) aren’t going to notice you any faster, and the smooth threads will give away the fact that you stayed up half the night deciding what to wear.
Finally – and this may sound like common sense – don’t look both ways before crossing University Drive. It’s a one way.
Good luck to all of you. I hope you have a more tactful welcoming committee than I did. Being a freshman isn’t a crime, but the rest of us might make it feel like it is. I say “us” because I’ll laugh as hard as the rest if you have “freshman” written all over your fact, but only because I see myself in you and realize how stupid and helpless I must’ve looked.
Originally published under the headline, “Freshmen in for Interesting Experiences” in the NDSU student newspaper, The Spectrum, Fall 1989
