Flashes of Panic

I am sitting on a bench in front of the EECS department of a university to which I (tentatively) plan to apply for graduate study. I am something like 45 minutes early for an appointment to talk to a professor who has much to recommend him. I have gone in, walked around, and felt like I was somehow interrupting something. In a few minutes I will need to go back in and talk to someone in the department office in the name of extracting useful information. I could wish that leeching bandwidth from an open wireless network would be all the introduction I would need, but alas, I will need to actually walk in, introduce myself with face and name, and demand time from an actual person. Who knew that this would be the hard part.

I took a campus tour with a bunch of prospective undergrads. That was a waste of time; I’ll know better now. I found a father who was there without his daughter (she toured with her mother, earlier, and he was bringing himself up to date) and we stood in the back and discussed the relevance or irrelevance of the information being fed to us. (On-campus housing, for example, is of no interest whatever to me, though it was to him.) I was reminded, painfully, of the inane babble I myself had produced as a tour guide, lo these many years ago; I spent some time considering the things which appear important on tours which then prove to have so little relevance in the actual college experience. The woman who walked us around apparently belonged to the Fraternity of Long-Haired Blondes, since she waved “hi” to nearly every one she saw.

Near the library I picked up thirty-one cents in change which had apparently fallen out of someone’s pocket as they sat on the grass. One of the campus traditions has to do with exams and the placement of pennies at a particular spot on a particular statue. When I’m done here, I will pass the statue on my way to the graduate admissions office. I plan to leave at least a nickel.