| Matter of respect Following the men's basketball game that was held Saturday night, seven vehicles were found vandalized on South Drive between the Leo Potishman Tennis Center and the Tom Brown/Pete Wright Residential Community. Witnesses heard glass shattering and car alarms being set off around 2 a.m. Unfortunately, when police officers arrived, they were unable to recover fingerprints left by the vandals and to get a good description of what the vandals looked like from any of the witnesses. Police officers said they do not know if the vandalism had something to do with TCU's one-point victory over the University of Texas-El Paso. But regardless of the reasons behind the crime, it is something that should not be taken lightly. It all comes down to a matter of respect. Respect for others. We live in a society where there are certain rules that people should follow. When these rules are broken, the result is chaos. No one should have to worry about their cars being vandalized for no apparent reason. A college campus should prevail upon those who enter it to maintain a certain level of maturity. "I wish people didn't choose to do these things," said Amy Durham, director of Pete Wright. "It is not very respectful. But aside from parking cars in covered garages, I don't know what else we can do to protect the students." Indeed. There's not much that can protect us from stupidity.
Value the 'cheesy' life The disillusionment started as soon as I came back to campus. I don't know why, but it did. For some reason, fond memories of my Christmas break dissipated the moment I parked behind the Moudy Building. I'm sure everyone can relate. Finals eventually end, even though your mind took a vacation during dead days and never quite showed up again. Problems are locked inside the apartment as you hit the road for a month. You silently affirm to yourself grand aspirations of finding a job and exercising more, which realistically amount to nothing more than getting up at 2 in the afternoon and watching "Mannequin" on TNT three days after you're home. And then, all of a sudden, school arrives again. Not that I don't like school. It just has some strange way of making your month-long break seem about as big as your TCU Bookstore bill is small. And then it makes you feel just as tired as when you left. You return to your apartment to find that those problems you locked behind your door a month earlier have subsequently mated and produced a brood of ravenous, howling problem children who are angry that you didn't bring them home with you. And then you soon get tired of the same old routine. You get tired of having more classes in the same building and in the same room. You get tired of people asking how your break was during the first week of classes. You get tired of chicken strips in The Main. Most of all, you just get plain tired. So, how does one get rid of those post-break, second-semester, tired-already apathy blues? The surface answer would be sleep. But by now, I have realized I will never attain the standard of sleep I have been eternally chasing. My life is a continual cycle of an endless pursuit of sleep. It's been eluding me forever, and I realized, with great sadness, it's a goal I will never attain and a pinnacle I shall never reach. I will always be living under the phrase, "I'll catch up on Saturday!" A friend once told me we all like to think we look at the glass as half full, but that's usually only if it's something we like to drink. Maybe a change in attitude and a new focus on the overlooked daily blessings can take the preoccupation off the temporal worries. Perhaps the secret lies within a Velveeta commercial. It's the one where the family spices up that old, boring bowl of chili with hot, melted Velveeta cheese. They all sing and dance around the kitchen while the precious cheese magically transforms the drudgery of chili into an ethereal experience of curdled bliss. I watch that commercial in awe because those people have discovered something so magnificent about cheese that I apparently missed in all the cheeseburgers I've eaten over the years. I suppose it's all about the simple things. If you can get happy about cheese, you can pretty much get happy about anything. Enjoying the small things is what breaks up the monotony of the homogeneity. So here's to the next semester. If you find it becoming about as exciting as Al Gore in a presidential debate, do something to switch up the routine. Sometimes the individual turnaround lies more within the internal attitude than the exterior surroundings. It's about just enjoying the nuances and challenges of your day and meeting each turn with a different paradigm of thinking. And, at the very least, cook yourself a Kraft dinner. The beauty of life is, after all, in the brie of the beholder.
Kevin Dunleavy is a junior advertising/public relations major from Spring, Texas. He can be reached at (kduns80@airmail.net). Skin color not black, white issue I often wonder if white people are cognizant of being white. I wonder if they ever come to a sudden realization as they are walking down the street that their skin is pale, their hair straight, their lips thin. I wonder if they ever walk into a room and are so completely aware of their whiteness that the thought never leaves them, coloring every word they say and every look they give. Or do the privileges of being white extend beyond the physical realm, and white people aren't even troubled to think about being white at all? In a country that is more than 80 percent white, it is not likely that white people are often faced with the task of examining their color. Unless attending an National Association for the Advancement of Colored People meeting, black church event or some other gathering where the majority of the people are not white, most whites rarely move in a world that is not their own. This privilege of insensibility of self may seem trivial. But, in fact, I've come to realize just how important it is as I entered my classes for the first time once again this semester. Because TCU is a microcosm of American society with more than 80 percent of its students being white, it is a good example of how this privilege works in everyday life. For instance, it is a privilege to walk into a room and be Joe, Jenny or John instead of the black girl. It is a privilege not to feel as though you are an ambassador for an entire race of people simply because you are the only member of your race in a classroom. Moreover, it is a privilege not to walk into a class and feel completely alone. In looking back, it has become quite obvious to me that the privilege of insensibility of self is prevalent among whites at TCU. For example, I remember a writing workshop my freshman year in which my classmates and I were given the chance to help each other with our papers. In reading one of my group members' papers, I was surprised to find her use the phrase "us white people." Apparently, she was so insensible of her color that she took for granted that the reader of her paper would be as white as her. Such blatant acts of insensibility lead me to believe that many white people have no idea and have never thought about what it means to be black, Hispanic or some other ethnicity in a white society. For myself, it has always meant "us" against "them." All my life, I've been told the white man does not want the black man to succeed, that whites are two-faced, and, while they may smile in your face, they're calling you "nigger" behind your back. And that no matter how intelligent or talented you are, all the white man sees is black. These thoughts pervade my mind as I enter the classroom. Surrounded by what I've always known to be "the enemy, " I search for others like me. In those rare instances when I find them, I feel a certain kind of kinship with them. When I do not locate any black faces I am deeply disturbed. On one level, I am enraged. What does the lack of black students going on to institutions of higher learning say about the quality of education in the black community? On another level, however, I am saddened. What do my feelings say about me? What does it say when I walk into a room and my first concern is how many black people are in it? What does it say when I feel like I am an outsider in a room full of human beings simply because they are not my color? What does it say when I assume everything I say in class is perceived from the black perspective instead of Shavahn's perspective? Maybe it says I'm paranoid. Maybe it says I have been conditioned by my environment to value "my people" above all other people. Maybe it says I'm a bigot. What it says about me, however, is less important than what it says about us - society as a whole. It says we haven't come that far as we think in looking past each other's color. For a while, I am allowed to move around in the "white world." I see it as just that - the white world. It says that we still don't simply see each other as human beings as I walk into a room and connect to a color instead of a person. Mostly, however, it says that we don't, and quite possibly will never, have a good understanding of each other, as I'm sure I've raised some issues some white people have never pondered, and some black people have never admitted. Shavahn Dorris is a junior English major from Joliet, Ill. She can be reached at (MissVon21@aol.com). Future Pulitzer Prize winner moonlights as Skiff writer You can call me Mr. Day. According to my journalism professor, the power lies with whoever holds the information. The real powerhouses in this country are the ones who filter what the rest of the public reads, sees and hears. Control lies not with the newsmakers, but with the news writers. So now that I am the newest news-editorial journalism major, I plan to move directly into the role of luminary. My words will change people's lives. I am a writer. I am a hero. In my imagination, the headline is already penned: "Skiff writer wins Pulitzer Prize!" The story (written, of course, by me) will be an inspiring account of how I overcame adversity to become the world's greatest journalist, ending with a section of quotes about me from journalists and other celebrities. From Peter Jennings: "That's it. I quit. I will never be able to match his standards." From Sarah Michelle Gellar: "Hey, he's pretty cute" This is my destiny. I can feel it with every word that flows from my fingers onto my trusty reporter's notebook. My writing is going to save the world, and I will be forever upheld as the highest standard to which a journalist must aspire. Even as I write this, my mind flashes forward to an episode sure to occur many times over in my future:
OK, so maybe I am being a little unrealistic. I realize that I probably won't win the Pulitzer Prize, make Saddam and Fidel into new men or ever save the President's life. At least not as an underclassman.
John-Mark Day is a freshman religion and news-editorial journalism major from St. Joseph, Mo. He can be reached at (jmday2@delta.is.tcu.edu). Students speak out
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