Monday, June 13, 2005

 
Without fail, the second most popular response from people who learn I'm a writer is, "I was an English major." (the most popular response is something like, "Really? You? A writer? Do you, like, write books?" to which I want to say, no, I write those warnings you find on cigarette packages.)

Anyway, people act like there's a universal sisterhood/brotherhood of English majors that unites everyone who was ever forced to sit in a college classroom reading books by boring old men. But I wasn't an English major. So I tell them, "I was a government major." And then they have no idea how to respond.

The truth is, I hated every college English literature class I ever took. Not that I took many. My Freshman year I took a course that included reading non-fiction and then fictional accounts of the non-fiction. Thrilling. What I remember most is reading about the Donner party. For those of you unfamiliar with the Donner party, Tamsen Donner was a woman who traveled across the country to California back in the early 1800's. She and her family endured all sorts of trials and tribulations, including a lack of food. So how'd they deal with that? They ate each other. Lovely. Cannibalism. Hated that class.

Then, after taking every writing class offered in the five college area, I attempted another literature course my senior year. 'Romantic Poetry and Prose,' who wouldn't like that? Me, for one. It was Byron, Shelley, Keats, Coleridge, and Wordsworth all the time. I couldn't stand it. I even hated it so much I dropped the course after four weeks and took a W on my transcript. I just couldn't put myself through that my last year of college.

Then, at the start of second semester, I got a little note from the registrar saying I was two credits short to graduate, thanks to withdrawing from said poetry and prose course. I'd taken two additional courses at another college two summers before, so I should have had more than enough to graduate. But, they told me that the other college made their courses worth three credits and Smith's were four. Bottom line: The registrar was going to screw me!

But I showed them. I signed up for a two credit class titled 'Middle Eastern Dance' - otherwise known as belly dancing. Just for the record, I got an A, too. Unfortunately, unless you continue to hone your belly dancing skills they tend to languish. So today I'm no longer skilled in Middle Eastern dance.

It figures. The Donner party eating each other, that I remember. But the finer art of belly dancing, that I've lost forever.

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