I just desperately want to be a part of our perceived intelligencia now, after snidely commenting against our sociological debate that we’d be lucky if Drexel could graduate 8% of a class that would qualify for such an honor. Suddenly it’s not enough to give attention-getting presentations or to write witty papers that easily meet and exceed length limits. I want to know classic things… movies and books for me to debate assuredly the way i easily peel “A Day In The Life” apart like so much ripe citrus in front of my sleepy songwriting class who barely collectively own a pair of Beatle’s albums.
Here’s an aside i’m not willing to concede into a pop-up window: How can you ignore the Beatles? I’m the biggest anti-snob i know a lot of the time — choosing to deliberately ignore or discount something that god-awfully popular just because i feel that it’s over-weighted. You simply cannot ignore the Beatles, though, because even if you successfully argue around their innovativeness you’ll still have to bring in ten or twelve other pre-1970 albums to cover the width and breadth that they easily stride in any pair of their albums. Yet, hyper-popular R&B artists routinely confess in my treasured bi-weekly sessions with the Stone that their friends would be surprised that theylsiten to the Beatles. It’s the freaking Beatles, people. Even worse, the fans of these artists are often even ignorant of their own musical antecedents, as my mother discovered when a co-worker who endlessly rants about Mary J. Blige and Lauryn Hill returned to her a blank stare when she started talking about the likes of Martha and the Vandella’s and Roberta Flack (and, i mean, “Killing Me Softly” is just a gimme anyhow). But i digress. I digress because i want to be able to do that for other arts, other things.
Vanity Fair is suddenly written two leagues above my head, talking about influences and movements that befuddle me so much that i don’t know if i should look them up in Elise’s art history book or Webster’s Dictionary. This weekend, awake long past my bedtime, i caught myself browsing the net for Doctoral Programs in Communications … despite having just told someone in the last few months that i was never meant to be called “Doctor.” But i still feel like i’ve just left high-school, or seventh grade, or the womb. I don’t seem to know anything.
I don’t seem to know anything, and today i discovered that i only have eleven classes left with four whopping quarters to complete them in. Not one of them will inform me about the greats in literature, sociological theory, modern international politics, or the rise of technology in society. Not to mention science or math. All of those classes are over, and looking at my all-too-blank schedule for next quarter i find myself debating what to do with my free time: take classes in soc, lit, h/pol, anth, or begin to obsessedly prepare for the GRE’s.
I think this is the opposite of Senioritis.