I’ll stand eight hours tomorrow at the stadium for a college football game. Maybe it will be a fast game…..a rush here or there and we lose. The SDSU team has been losing a lot lately, and I don’t care.
I got one of those “calls” yesterday. “This is Marina from The SDSU Alumni Office….”
I always interrupt them early in the conversation. Saves them effort, time, and trouble, it does.
“If this is about money, I don’t have any,” I say. There, that’s simple.
“Oh no, it isn’t,” she carefully stated. I knew it was. “This is about connecting to the Alumnus who have helped us in the past.”
Sounds like a fundraiser to me. I let her go on for a prepared sentence or two. You can tell when they switch to a script. “We are,” she begins, “Attempting to connect to the Alumnus who have helped us in the past.” She already read that part.
I interrupt again. “Yes, I gave a scholarship to the Art Department, and it was one of the more important things I’ve ever done.” I didn’t mention all the struggles I had when they took my money and applied it to the kid’s debts instead of to the kids current needs.
She endeavored to start reading the script again.
“I lost it all in the 2001` market crash,” I exaggerated. “Now I work as a security officer.” She didn’t want to hear that. Why ever did I let this conversation get this far? She obviously had a printout of who I was, what I did as a student, and what I had done as an alumnus right in front of her.
She asked carefully wary of this much demoted alumnus, “Do you remain connected to the arts?” Did this imply security officers weren’t interested in the arts? “We are opening a new gallery downtown,” she continued.
“Send me some information on this,” for I still am interested.
“So you still support any of the other school programs?”
“Oh yes,” I said brightly my tongue stuck in my cheek….football. “I work at the stadium.”
“How nice,” she said very faintly.
Oh, shame on me.
Me: Library early and got loads of stuff cleaned out and shelved and….Only three poets for lunch. Two great pieces. My piece was a wash and I wonder if I can turn it into a tone poem instead of an essay. Knee better at last, but perhaps it should be wrapped for tomorrows standing.
G: He’s actually working. Hard. He created a schedule for the November train vacation too with trains plus roomettes, car rentals, and Hampton Inns….with their wonderful beds. Thank you.
Duck: Thursday he had clean pants on but the same shirt he’s worn three days. We are going to be there at his dinnertime today to see how he is eating. He wasn't eating his dinner. So we have stopped bringing in munchies and we hope this has changed his eating patterns back. He'd just sit in front of his TV all day and eat. Not good.
Hope y'all are okay!
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