Author's Note: I realized as I was uploading this chapter that it's pretty short and boring. I promise, the next chapter is both longer and much more interesting. Things are finally going to start happening...
A Better Fate Than Wisdom
Chapter 3: Bound or Unbound?
Dear Rachel,
It's been three weeks now, and I guess everything's going alright. My classes are pretty interesting, and I managed to find them all okay. Well, I did get lost once. Intro Paleontology, my science option, is halfway across campus. It's a really big class; there's like two hundred students. I had to sit right at the front, cause I was late, but it wasn't too bad cause the seats go up steeply, like in a movie theater, so the people that got stuck behind me could still see. I hope. I sort of thought the whole class was going to be about dinosaurs, which is why I took it, but we won't be doing dinosaurs till just about the end. Still, it's really interesting.
English is my favorite class, though; it's Tuesday and Thursday afternoons. We're doing Frankenstein right now; it's a great book. Have you read it? There's a copy in my bookcase if you want to borrow it. I always wonder what the symbolism of the word "bound" is in that book. She sure uses it a lot. Seems like all the characters are either bound or unbound. Weird. I can't wait till we do poetry, but that's not till November, I think.
Hey, remember that girl with orange hair? She's in my English class. And I think she must live on my floor too; I've seen her around a few times.
There are some interesting people here. It's like there's a bunch of different social levels, and they don't really intersect outside of class. Like there's a group of guys and girls who always seem to travel around the dorm in this big noisy pack, or else they break up into couples and sit around in the common room making out and talking about their sex lives. (So I don't hang out in the common room much.) And pretty much every Friday and/or Saturday they load up on beer and get drunk and rowdy in one of their rooms. I can sleep through it okay though – even the one time the party was right across the hall from me, it still wasn't as loud as Grim snoring. J
So I figure they were probably the popular kids in high school. They're the only ones who've made fun of me so far, but it's not a big deal. They just laugh or make stupid comments about Godzilla and King Kong and steroids and stuff when I walk by. Whatever.
Then there're the jocks – guys and girls who are doing phys ed degrees, and exercise all the time. They all seem to wear University of Chicago sweats and t-shirts and they always have these big bottles of water, and they wear expensive sandals or running shoes. And they only eat salad and bran muffins and stuff.
There's a bunch of just normal kids, I guess, who treat everybody okay and just hang out with their friends. And then there's a few weirdos who don't seem to have any friends, and you never see them talk to anybody. I'm one of them, of course, and that girl with orange hair is too, I think. I've never seen her talk to anyone outside of class. She talks a lot in English though; she sounds really smart. She puts her hand up for just about every question. It kind of reminds me of Kevin, except he used to get really impatient with Mrs. Donelli if she didn't let him talk as much as he wanted to, and this girl doesn't. If Dr. Kuntz doesn't pick her she just puts her hand down and waits for the next question. And when she does get to say something it's always really smart, and then everybody else kind of looks at each other like "Oh, why didn't we think of that?" Only I don't think she gets that that's what we're all thinking; she looks around too and you can see she's embarrassed. She almost looks how I feel after I've just said something really dumb, only she never says anything dumb.
Anyhow, I spend most of my time doing homework. There sure is an awful lot of it. Not so much the kind you have to hand in, like in high school, but a lot of reading. Like three chapters of a textbook or a whole novel a week. Crazy. But I think I'm keeping up okay so far.
Sometimes I walk to Promontory Point, which is right on Lake Michigan. There's a kind of lookout platform or whatever where you can stand or sit and look at the lake, and trees and stuff. I hang out there a lot, reading or listening to music or just looking at the water and thinking. And not too far from there, there's a mall with a bookstore and a movie theater. I've gone to a few movies. And that's about all I do, I guess.
I did write a couple more poems, though. One of them is from this dream I had, about a king and reincarnation and stuff. I like it a lot, but I don't know, it might just be cause reading it over reminds me of my dream, which was really cool, and not cause the poem itself is actually any good. Maybe I'll send it to you in a while, after I fix it up, and you can tell me what you think.
So how are your classes and stuff going? Do you like high school any better than junior high? What are you reading lately? And how's your mom liking her new job? I hope they do buy her a computer. It would be so great if you could email me from home instead of school. Oh, and try to stay away from Chris Fowler. He's trouble, believe me. His older brother was an asshole too – and now he's in jail, last I heard. If Chris calls you names again, let me know, and I'll kick his ass when I come home. Man, I can't wait till Thanksgiving. Two and a half months to go. Write back soon, okay? I miss you.
Love, Max
