Читать книгу Tower Hill - John W Trexler - Страница 7

The first few weeks were taken up by the hazing period. Freshmen wore silly beanies called “dinks” and had to do whatever any sophomore told us to do. In the center of the Delaware Valley campus, there was an allée of Ginkgo trees (Gingko biloba). Gingkos are dioecious meaning some trees are male and others female. The females are known for bearing foul-smelling fruit and the trees in the allée were all female. Two sophomores instructed me to hop on one foot the length of the allée. I politely said, “No.” They said I had to. I refused, less politely this time.

“Do it!” they demanded.

My response, which was something like “Go fuck yourselves,” was not well-received.

The following Saturday before a football game, my punishment was to kneel on one knee and sing the school song. I have a pretty good voice, so my rendition was applauded. The glee club later solicited me. As classes began in earnest, reality slowly sank in. You went to college to learn a skill that would lead to a career, one that would give you the ability to live independently and pay taxes. In my freshman year I was exposed to careers in ornamental horticulture that were then available: golf course superintendent, landscape contractor, nursery manager, arborist, florist. I realized after that first year that none of those careers appealed to me.

The school required that you work nine months at a job relating to your major and I decided to take a position as a grounds keeper on campus. It appealed to me more than going home and gave me the opportunity to spend time in Philadelphia, thirty minutes away by train. The job mostly entailed mowing and weeding, but one day I was ordered to dig a semi-circular bed flanking a path leading to the administration building and plant it with red geraniums. The bed turned out a bit misshapen but so was the path that gave it its outline. When I finished, I stood back to examine it. I thought it looked odd. Just then the assistant dean drove by, stopped, rolled down the window, stared long and hard at the bed of geraniums, then at me, and stuttered, “That looks like hell.” He rolled up the window and drove off. My first effort at landscape design was pronounced a definitive failure.