This is something I've been thinking about for a long time, applying to school. I thought about it so much on the way to work everyday, at the bookstore. Then, I started to read while I was at work. And I thought, not only am I learning things and talking to smart kids all day. I'm also getting paid. And to me, that was the best thing about it.
One day I voluntarily drew a map for the general manager, who often seemed confused about where the sections of books were located. It explained where every department of books were shelved, and I wrote it from memory, just to let him know that I was more familiar with the store than he was.
Amazing, I thought. He actually liked the map. Not only did she not take it personally (I believe her name was Martha MacDonald). She took it personally to the front of the store and placed it in a case. From that point, at the top of the stairs which led to the basement, there was a map which told everyone where the books were. It looked like a cross between a Pirate Map, and where I buried my Legos in Edgewood Park. I should write a song about that.
The other addition I made to the store was a website that was built into the mainframe of the computers. When I was appearing to be shelving books, or taking down ISBN's, I was actually writing web code and saving it on floppy discs.
I never stole any books or nothing. All I did was do what needed to be done. The rest of the time, I would not be forced into busy work. That was obviously a problem when the little managers started showing up. It was their game, to make it so they had as little work to do as possible, thus delegating the majority of the responsibility of running the store to the people who were paid the least. As you went up the pay scale, the accountability went down.
I was highly accountable, and way underpaid. The best part was that we were free to sign out books whenever we wanted. I used to take things home and photocopy them. I had an archive of a wealth of education in my room, at one point. It was then that I began to believe that the education was in the books, and not in the discussion.
And this is true, for some, but not all. And that's why I'm applying to school. Because I've done the reading, and now I want the discussion. I'm ready to have dialogue. I want to be taken seriously. I need to help people while there's still time, and I can't sit idly by, while the world waits in vain for Tom Waits to come back on a train.
I used to walk home in the rain, down Elm Street, back to the barn and my parent's house. I could tell you more about the barn, but quite later. Here's the thing that you are probably wondering, and I need you to have faith and confidence in this: I am not criminal-minded. What that means is that while I have done things which may be considered marginally legal (like SpacePirate, for example), the intent is never to steal. I never tried to profit from Space Pirate. The shows that I did were really hard work, and I did them because I was dedicated to the music of the past. That's why it's retrospective, I would think to myself. This was before I was even capable of making mashup music.
I had to figure that out. So at home, when I wasn't at work, I would be making songs on Reason. True to form, that software was copyrighted. I thought to myself that if I ever made a million bucks, I would turn around and give Reason their money. But the cash just wasn't there. And the software was awesome.
It doesn't exist anymore. My 2.5 discs were scratched or got lost on the floor of my room, maybe over at the barn. It's hard to stay up on those things. I used to stay up late all night, disconnected from the internet, making song after song. Sometimes I would actually get intense feelings of elation from the music, at a point of accomplishment, where I felt like the task was finished. It's difficult, with art, knowing when something's done. In that sense it's alot just like cooking. But I used to make some marvelous Beat Soup. I also used to make beats with my feets up, on the console, sometimes while eating pizza. The pizza was from Pepe's usually, and I had a little trick about that.
It seems that if you called a number over there, they would allow you to get pick-up pies ordered. That way, you showed up on time, walk right through the line, which at 5pm is straight out the door. Pick up your pie, pay for it, take it over to Wooster Sq. Park and watch people play frisbee with their dogs. Hopefully the frisbee is getting tossed the other way, and the dog doesn't mistake it for a pie.
I don't know why I think so much about the future, when life's not tough, I used to think to myself. Why should I be concerned when I have all the pizza I need? I have also the wealth to buy the pizza at a price that the piemaker can afford to sell it. In that sense, I'm all set. Right?
But we're never all set. We're looming in debt, and looking to the people who are enslaving us to save us. That's what we get. We asked for it. It took thousands of years, but they're ready to create a marvelous jail cell. One where human beings are treated like animals, by people who consider themselves nothing more than robotic scientists. I do not want to be involved in any of this.
But I do recommend something. I say that the school should make available only to certain students a Biology Lab Zoo. It creates a greater transparency in the advances of our academic industry. I would like to see what they're doing with insects these days.
I was first exposed to the Bio Labs at the age of 12. I took a genetics course, taught by a Yale Undergraduate named Todd, who was from down south and I considered to be someone cool except when he acted like a drippy snot. One thing he did for us kids was take us to the Bio Lab, which is that tall building behind the Peabody. We got to go to a floor where they were conducting the experiments he explained to us in the classroom. Involving mixing genes, like the ones we solved with Punnet Squares. I asked to learn something more about the technique. And he said, sorry. Only if you go to school here.
I remember those words. But I have since determined that I will not be involving myself in any genetic experiments. There is too much liability involved. Even if you might say sorry after a supersized species of locust destroys every farm crop in the midwest, just keep this in focus: not everyone will forgive and forget when they know it was your pet who sent theirs to the vet. Or worse.
Tragically I could not relate to their interest in genetic experiments. I was, however, very curious about when Todd, one day in the wintertime, said, "Kids, do you want to walk back to the classroom inside or outside?
And I was wondering what he meant by that. "I mean, do you want to take the tunnels?"
"Todd, there is no tunnel here that can take us back to Phelps Gate."
"How do you know that? You've probably never even seen the tunnels," he said.
So he took us all to the basement of the lab, where there was a door which looked like it was for maintenance workers. It went down a long corridor which ran alongside large, hissing pipes.
"Those are steam pipes!" He yelled, above the din. "They're for heat!"
"I can tell!" I said. There was one other kid with us. His name was Antoine. I don't think he was even listening to our conversation or wondering about why were in the basement. All he used to think about was basketball.
What I learned from the experience (and this was in 1992) is that apparently the university runs on steam. There's a place called "Power Plant" and it's not for electricity, which I thought would be crazy, as well. It's a steam generation plant, it gets its petrol directly from the New Haven Harbor, and it is responsible for the heating of the entire university.
Subsequent to that, it contains a series of tunnels which interconnect its pipelines. They are all large enough for maintenance access, but not the most pleasant thing to walk through. They have access doors into each of the buildings, in the event that there needs to be some kind of labor on the inside of a room, if ever the case may be. So essentially, it's access to the entire university, and as of 2003, there was no obvious surveillance, but I'm sure this has changed since then, and I haven't been willing to try going down there, ever since they built that huge video control panel inside the main security office on Bristol Street.
Why am I telling you all of this? Because I know! Isn't that important, to the security of the university, that I am making this gesture to befriend it? As if to say, hey. I know a lot about you. Not because I've been spying on you, or anything. Just because we've been acquaintances for so long. Let's be friends.
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