Category — community

I recently read an article on Forbes by Brett Nelson entitled, Why You Should Postpone College.

I know that it takes no effort to agree with people who share your opinions, but I think Mr. Nelson is exactly right: we need to give high school graduates more time and opportunity to figure out what they want for the rest of their lives.

I only wish this article had been around when I finished high school.

Let’s travel back in time, shall we?

It’s the summer of 1996. I’m 19 years old, and I’ve just graduated from high school with honours (though, I had to redo my Ontario Academic Credit (OAC) year to get those honours). As I clear out my locker, I feel the same way I did when I was a small child: giddy with excitement at the prospect of endless summer days. Days that I could I spend reading, and swimming in my boyfriend’s parent’s backyard pool; all the carefree parties, BBQ’s, keggers, and general teenage mayhem that I could find and enjoy would be mine.

Then, a little part of my brain, the one struggling up through my childish (and, frankly, rather awesome) ideas, imposed with some sobering and unwelcome adult news: “You’re going to have to get a job. University isn’t free – and you don’t even know if you got into one yet.”

I walk home from school with a heavy backpack, and even heavier heart.

I’ve applied to several universities. My parents are pushing for McMaster University or, failing that, Mohawk College (where, so far as I can tell, they hope I will take a nursing degree). I try to think about where I might find work for the summer, I’m already working at the A&P, but I’ll need more hours if I’m going to pay tuition. The images of reading in the shade, are replaced by images of ringing in produce and flipping burgers. I’m not a child anymore, but I want to cry. I hate that even at 19 years old, the tears of a frustrated and unhappy child are still very close to the surface, so I push them down as I walk home.

I unpack my bag while having questions and statements fired at me: “Have you got a job lined up?”, “If you go to McMaster or Mohawk, you could live here – but you’ll have to pay rent.”, “What are you going to take in school?”, “I think you should try nursing, we need more nurses in Canada.” And on and on. Now I really want to cry and throw a temper tantrum too. I do neither.

But later that night, while walking down by the river, and throwing stones at the few panes of glass not yet broken in the old abandoned factories down there, I admit it to myself: I have no idea what I want to be when I grow up. No idea at all.

Sitting here, in 2012, I wish I could go back in time and give 19 year old me a hug. I wish I could tell her that things did work out – eventually. But at the time…well, I signed on at the University of Ottawa for an English Literature degree because the only thing I knew I had any talent for, was reading. I knew enough to know that a degree would be an important bit of paper to have later. That future employers might not care what my degree was in so long as I had one. To employers, a degree meant a certain amount of intelligence and seriousness: I could be considered capable of learning new things – like a Rhesus monkey in a lab – if I had one.

Four years later, I graduated. By then I’d read Milton, Shakespeare, Chaucer, Wordsworth, Tolkien, Whitman and pretty much every other author considered “important”. And while I’d found new literary things to fall in love with, I still had no idea how to apply that love to anything practical that might help me pay off my considerable student loans.

I worked in a series of jobs completely unrelated to my degree: deli counter clerk, SGML coder, low man on the totem pole at the British High Commission, cashier at HMV, shipper and receiver at SportMart, purveyor of deep fried foods at Fast Eddie’s and, for a time, I was an unemployed and unemployable 20-something.

So I could recite Romeo’s speech to Juliet, that fair sun, as she appeared on her balcony…big deal. I still had no idea what I wanted to be.

Knowing what I do now, I wish that we had had the “grownup” training that Mr. Nelson talks about. I think it would have benefit me greatly as a clueless 19 year old. I was unfocused, unfinished, young, scared, stupid, and woefully unprepared to be an adult. An internship, or a minimum wage position, at various places to get a feel for the nine-to-five world would have been just the thing for me. If nothing else, I would have learned what I didn’t want for myself. I believe that it is just as important to figure out what you don’t want as it is what you do want.

I’m 36 now, and only in the past few years have I discovered that the nine-to-five world is a place I can only visit for short periods of time. I also discovered that I despise working in retail. Imagine if I had figured that out sooner! What if I’d known that at age 21, or even at 25? How much more diligently might I have pursued the things I really love? How much harder would I have worked to make them into things I could do to support myself? How much happier would I have been? How much more confident, and secure in myself might I have been?

I think that sending a teenager, especially one with no focus, into debt for an education that may never do them any good once they sort themselves out as a person, is stupid and foolhardy. What are they gaining from an academic setting when they don’t even know what they want to learn? The only really useful things I learned in my four years were, how to be more tolerant of people I despised living with, how to split a phone bill, and how to shotgun a beer without barfing. OK, maybe I’m exaggerating a teeny bit (though not that much, really), but for the young people who have no idea what they want for themselves for the rest of their lives, university is a frightening moment.

Think of it like this: most people in my family live to be about 90. So, doesn’t it seem stupid to ask me, at 19 years old, to decide on a course of action that will shape the next 71 years of my life?

Thought of in that way, what’s another two years delay? It couldn’t hurt to explore all the options a little before taking on the debt and work of a degree – could it? Wouldn’t it create the opportunity to explore different career paths while managing to get some of that partying stuff out of the way on weekends? And wouldn’t getting that partying and uncertainty out of the way allow for greater focus on studying and learning? And wouldn’t greater focus mean money well spent – rather than wasted? I think it would.

I know that some work places have “bring your kid to work” days, so they can see what you do to earn the family’s bread and butter, but how useful are those? Imagine this: being dragged to work by a parent, at a stage in your life when you find them most intolerable and embarrassing (and that’s often a two-way street), so you can watch them (sort of) do something that’s not the tiniest bit interesting to you, while you count down the seconds before you can leave.

Not terribly useful. But, working with adults who haven’t seen you flip out on a sibling, or get grounded for lying, or seen the state of your bedroom at home? That’s a fresh slate within a structured environment. It’s easier to learn from, and really pay attention to, someone who hasn’t got any dirt on you. Someone you don’t both love and loathe. It’s a chance to learn what a professional relationship is.

In addition to “grownup training”, I’d also suggest mandatory, weekly psychiatric sessions for at least the second year. A time to work through the crap-storm of being a teenager, to sort out the stuff that’s screwing you up so it doesn’t screw you over. A chance to start really becoming who you are without having to wait until your late 30′s to get there. A place where you can speak your mind without some adult grounding you for “being mouthy” because your opinion differed from theirs. A place to learn how to function in the “real” world.

We need to reevaluate how and when we send teenagers out into the world, and to university or college. Are they really prepared? Do they really know what they want for themselves? Do they know anything about who they are? Are we doing them any favours by forcing them to choose a life so early?

The education system needs to take a good hard look at what they’re really offering high school graduates these days because, from my own experience, it’s seems to be mostly shackles of debt, doubt and unhappiness.

I’ve just spent the last hour or so looking at things on Craigslist: books, antique furniture, apartments, and bags, and one thing I’ve noticed about a lot of the ads on there is this: they’re awful.

Here are a few things the awful ads have in common:

• Misspelled words
• Excessive punctuation and/or use of the Caps Lock key
• Photos of messy, dirty, and/or damaged apartments
• Blurry, dark, and/or useless photos
• No photos at all (which I prefer over blurry, dark and/or useless)
• Lack of information (maps, prices, general neighbourhood/area, etc.)
• Misleading information
• Confrontational tone of voice

For example, this is very similar to one of the ads I looked at today:

$980. COOZY GRND. LVL. 1 BR APPT. FOR MAR. 1. SHARED LOUNDRY, NS, NP. IF U DONT LIEK KIDS OR DOGS…DONT BOTHER CALLING!!!! CALL AFTER 6 P.M. & ASK FOR LINDA OR STEVE. THX.

Ooh! It has a corner! We'll take it!

That ad, along with the useless photo, doesn’t make me giddy at the prospect of even seeing it, never mind living in it. Still there are lessons to be learned from this:

1. ‘Ground level’ (or, GRND. LVL.) is just fancy talk for,  ’basement suite’ – the windows will be small, high up, and may or may not open.
2. ‘Cozy’ is code for ‘very small/cramped/poorly laid out’.
3. Shared laundry – well, that’s obvious, but be prepared for them to have a schedule where you get the washer and dryer one day a week.
4. Any mention of kids and dogs means, “We didn’t insulate for noise, and we don’t want you bitching about it like the last tenant did.”

So, what should a good ad look like since I’m such a know it all? Well, like this:

1 bedroom in ground level suite of private home available for March 1st. $980/month.

Features:

• 650 sq. ft.
• 1 full bath
• Radiant floor heating (mix of hardwood and tile flooring)
• Full-sized kitchen appliances (no DW, sorry!)
• Private entrance
• Full access to backyard and the BBQ!
• W & D (shared)
• tenant responsible for 30% of Hydro (bill is averaged out, you pay same total ea. month)
• NS and NP

You are responsible for hookup of your own phone, Internet, cable TV, etc.

We’re located on the west side of Family Friendly Park in Awesomeville, only two blocks from the main bus route into downtown, and a 15 minute bus ride to grocery stores, shops and restaurants.

Please note that we are looking for a single tenant (or mature student) who doesn’t mind a little noise overhead – we have two dogs and two young and active children. Our dogs are friendly, but are not good with other people’s pets, and they can be a little territorial.

Call [phone number] anytime between 6 and 9:30 p.m. and ask for Linda or Steve – we look forward to showing you your new home!

Then, the ad would show pictures of the bedroom (the whole bedroom, not just a corner), the kitchen, the living room, and bathroom. These photos would all be well lit, include as much of the room as possible, and the rooms would be tidy. Bonus points for posting the dimensions of the living room and bedroom, so prospective tenants can figure out if their stuff would fit into the space.

Nearly everyone has a digital camera – even if it’s just their phone – and access to a computer. And, if you’re selling or renting something, you’re in a position to know all the details about the thing to be sold or rented – so why not share the details? Save yourself the hassle of answering inquiries from people who would never have called in the first place if you’d provided the details up front.

Joe and I have sold a few things on Craigslist (laptop bag, a living room set, a winter coat, and a stationary bike), complete with clear, detailed photos, dimensions, and even links to the original product where that was an option. I got quite a bit of the original price back in those sales, mostly because people could see exactly what they were getting – no surprises. If you want your asking price, make the effort to show why they should pay it.

Why do I care since I’m not actually looking to rent a place, or buy anything I’ve seen on Craigslist? Well, poorly written and badly explained sales pitches and ads annoy me. It irks me to see people who want to make money and/or get rid of something, do everything in their power to ensure they won’t make a dime or sell anything.

So, Craigslist posters, “coozy” up to a dictionary, learn to take a decent and reasonably meaningful photograph, and maybe – just maybe – someone will “liek” your posting enough to buy or rent whatever you’re offering!

Title: Fahrenheit 451
Author: Ray Bradbury
Publisher: Ballantine Books
Pages: 190 (incl. afterword and interview)
ISBN: 0-345-34296-8
Price: $7.99 (CDN)

When I first read Fahrenheit 451, I was in grade nine, and though I liked it, I was too young and inexperienced a reader (and person) to get much more than the basics of the plot from it. When I tried again in university, I abandoned the protagonist, Guy Montag, and his wife, Mildred, in their parlour, hashing it out over the books Guy had been secreting away in the duct work. Finally, in October of last year, while visiting with my grandparents in Stratford, Ontario, I saw a copy of the 50th anniversary paperback of Fahrenheit 451 sitting on the shelf in Fanfare Books and I bought it (my previous copy was lost in one of my many moves all over Ontario) and tried reading it again.

The third time was the charm; this time, I really read it. I didn’t just skim it, I didn’t turn the pages and let osmosis do the rest, I really read it. I really thought about what I was reading, and the more attention I paid to the words and ideas, the more I felt like I was seeing pieces of our present and glimpses of our future.

This books gave me the chills.

The plot is still more or less as I remembered it from grade nine: Guy Montag is a Fireman, and his job is to start fires. He burns books that have been banned, because their contents make people think, and that makes them unhappy. It isn’t until he meets Clarisse McClellan, a young girl considered crazy because she enjoys thinking and imagining, that Montag begins to question the world he lives in, but when he does, his world falls apart pretty quickly.

As the story moves forward, as I met all  the characters and really listened to what they were saying and thinking, I kept being surprised by the parts that were so much like our own world. Consider this passage from the book:

Montag’s wife has overdosed on sleeping pills, and Montag has called in help to rescue and revive her. Two machines are brought in by two operators: one to pump her stomach clean, the other to replace her pill-saturated blood with clean blood.

The operator stood smoking a cigarette…”Got to clean ‘em out both ways,” said the operator, standing over the silent woman. “No use getting the stomach if you don’t clean the blood. Leave that stuff in the blood and the blood hits the brain like a mallet, bang, a couple thousand times and the brain just gives up, just quits.”

“Stop it!” said Montag.

“I was just sayin’,” said the operator.

“Are you done?” said Montag.

…”We’re done.” His anger did not even touch them. They stood with the cigarette smoke curling around their noses and into their eyes without making them blink or squint.

“That’s fifty bucks.”

…”Neither of you is an M.D. Why didn’t they send an M.D. from Emergency?”

“Hell,…you don’t need an M.D., case like this, all you need is two handymen, clean up the problem in half an hour.”

It’s as if an overdose is no more problematic than a leaf-clogged gutter. Just clean it up, and bob’s yer uncle. No need for a doctor, or personalized attention at all. Just send in a couple of guys with a machine.

While I sincerely hope that our health care system will never get to this point, I can relate to the impersonal treatment that Montag’s wife receives. I know not all doctors are like that: bored, indifferent, and kind of rude – but too many of them are. I’ve had appointments with doctors who spent the entire appointment staring at a laptop and barely even glanced at me. I would have bet money that if you’d put me in a line-up five minutes later, they wouldn’t have been able to pick me out.

This passage about schooling in Montag’s world (as spoken by his boss, Beatty) caught my attention too:

“School is shortened, discipline relaxed, philosophies, histories, languages dropped, English and spelling gradually gradually neglected…Surely you remember the boy in your own school class who was exceptionally ‘bright’, and did most of the reciting and answering while the others sat like so many leaden idols, hating him. And wasn’t it this bright boy you selected for beatings and tortures after hours? Of course it was. We must all be alike. Not everyone born free and equal, as the Constitution says, but everyone made equal. Each man the image of every other; then all are happy, for there are no mountains to make them cower, to judge themselves against.”

Sounds like our modern ideas about social promotion to me. And given that classes are getting larger and that teachers have very little authority over their students, I could see there being a proposal to shorten the school day, lighten the homework requirements, and forego discipline altogether – and I could see that proposal getting some serious consideration, too. I know, and have known, teachers – even English teachers – who have overlooked poor spelling and grammar because “the ideas were good”. They didn’t want to fail a student and deal with angry parents, hurt feelings, or the possibility of having what little authority they do have undermined by an unsupportive administration who passes the kid anyway. I could talk for pages and pages about the bullying epidemic going on in our schools today – and it’s not just the “bright boy” who is being bullied either, there’s a lot of kids who get tormented everyday by their so-called peers for a lot of different reasons, or no reason at all.

And Beatty says this to Montag in regard to books:

“You must understand that our civilization is so vast that we can’t have our minorities upset and stirred. Ask yourself, What do we want in this country, above all? People want to be happy, isn’t that right?…Coloured people don’t like Little Black Sambo. Burn it. White people don’t feel good about Uncle Tom’s Cabin. Burn it. Someone’s written a book on tobacco and cancer of the lungs? The cigarette people are weeping? Burn the book…Cram them full of noncombustible data, chock them so damned full of ‘facts’ they feel stuffed, but absolutely brilliant with information…And they’ll be happy, because facts of that sort don’t change. Don’t give them any slippery stuff like philosophy or sociology to tie things up with. That way lies melancholy.”

We still – still! – ban books because the subject matter is upsetting in some way; because the book might bring to light or trigger our less than savoury characteristics and beliefs:  racism, homophobia, cruelty, murder, greed, corruption, religious intolerance, cowardice, rudeness, selfishness, and any number of other flaws. We seem to prefer that the uncomfortable bits of books be taken out, or cleaned up and sanitized. We would rather speak incomprehensible, ‘politically correct’ gibberish to each other than speak plainly, because we don’t want to risk upsetting anyone. We’d rather ban a book (or burn it) than explain it or learn from it.

Montag and Beatty, their observations and explanations, the similarities of their world to mine…this book raises so many questions for me! It makes me wonder, is Ray Bradbury right – are there too many machines now? Are we in the process of building Montag’s world for ourselves? Is our technology helping us, or holding us back?  Are we getting further away from each other despite all the technology that is supposed to make it simpler to come together? Have we developed too many ways for us to escape real life and forget how to be truly human? Are there too many false things to lose ourselves in? Are we going through life with our eyes shut? Do we ever really see anything, or are we just taking a quick glance at things because that’s what everyone else is doing? Are we becoming more stupid, more insipid, more greedy and entitled and remorseless?

Some days, the pessimistic and melancholy days, I think we are up the creek as a species and I simply assume that this vision of ourselves will one day be a reality. Other days I feel hopeful that we’ll be OK, that’ll we’ll stop before it’s too late to take it back, and that we’ll avoid forcing ourselves to live in Montag’s world. But, most days, I wait to see what happens, and I try to keep from becoming part of the problems we have, I try to avoid the things, and behaviour, and stupidities that could lead us to Montag’s world.

I don’t always succeed in this, but I always try.