Ernie and I starred at him as he put his hand over the phone, "Guy's, I'll give you anything in the world to get out of hear right now." Ernie, "Anything? How about some liquor?" Joel, "Yeah sure man, whatever."Me, "I want cash!" Joel, "Yeah whatever, go."

We entered the hallway laughing, partly because we were so new to this life, partly because it was the easiest money we had ever made. We wandered the empty city, large enough for 20,000 people, but we were the only ones around. We saw a TV, and needing to kill some time, we wanted to turn it on. Problem: no buttons, they didn't want students playing with it. Solution: Ernie's knife turned it on and to the Connan O'Brein show. We watched TV for a while but I was more taken aback by how cool it was. We wouldn't be going back tommorow, or the next day, or even the day after. This city was our home, but I never knew it existed. These were just buildings from the road, I had seen them a million times driving on Park, Ave. I had lived in State College since 1983 and I never appreciated what this was like. I had even gone to school at PSU for a semester, been to friend's dorms, and I still didn't get it.

These were some of the best times of my entire life, and then classes began. They were just as bad as we hoped they wouldn't be. At the time they all seemed insermountable but we managed. I even got decent grades. I'd like to say I partied and had a great time, and that's why it was so fun. Actually, it was just the constant feeling of kids in a candy store. We just loved the fact that we were there, so much that we began to take it for granted. Ernie drank pretty regularly, but not to the point were it was destructive, except for one night. Joel drank more often, and more destructively, but we got along fine.

I'd like to say I met a lot of girls, and I got some action. No, regretfully, I did not. But it didn't seem to matter that much. The three of us were a small inseperable group of friends. It was expected that 95% of your meals would be eaten together, even in winter. The walk was not so short, as I found out the following year, when I had to make the trip myself. The one thing that made it worth it, was the Spring, when you walk past the natatorium. There are a lot of flowers there, and I was always overcome by the scent, and the warm air, even at 2 AM. I never once felt unsafe walking on campus alone. The emergency phones to me, were just public phones to be used only for local calls. Just dial 8 and call anyone in town, or 2 and the last 4 digits for on campus.

We had some classes together, Ernie and I, not Joel. It was great, we studied, I wasted time, I got better grades, he needed the time I wasted. I think overall, I got the better end of that deal. We would sit in the study lounge and do a lot of our physics and calculus. People would just run through screaming, and you couldn't help but laugh to yourself, "college."

After the physics final I knew it was over for Ernie. Sitting in my dorm room, we were exhausted from the many hours spent studying. He was on the verge of tears, with a look of "now what?" on his face. I really believe that for that physics test, we gave our all. I somehow managed to pass with a B-, he did not. I see this as no reflection of intelligence. He is smarter than I am, maybe not on paper, but in many other ways. We saw the horrizon of summer, but it was blocked by a giant sign that read, "your best is not good enough." Why do I say we? I was soon to follow. Not because of him, but not in spite of him I began a decent.

I watched things change as I told myself they wouldn't. Joel had always hated the Greek lifestyle, so I was shocked when he pledged a fraternity. Ernie stayed in the same building, but Joel and I took a dorm contract risk, and ended up at the one dorm we didn't want. I would make the journey downhill to Ernie's place many times. Joel was increasingly never there, and everyone's grades sank a bit. I was for once totally alone. No high school track team. No friends to study with. No friends that lived near my dorm. Sure I knew people, but this was not the total imersion in each others lives that I had know as college. I was a lone warrior when I did well, and more often I was alone with my pain when I failed. In parellel, Ernie had one more semester of, "if you pull your grades up we might still let you in to the major." This was an evil taunt, in place by people who were at the top of the food chain but forgot the roads to their positions were earned as a students. Ernie was crushed under the weight of classes that I wouldn't take for another semester, and even then, with help, I dropped some and got C's in others. These were the final barrier of "weed-out" classes. When all the weeds look the same above the ground you can't see what you've pulled until it's lying dead.

For him it wasn't an, "I can't do it" it was an "I no longer want this life." It made me sad to face failure alone, but it made me sadder to see how his family convinced him to switch to another major. Through string pulling and begging they got him into a new major in the computer field. It held promise for some, but to him every day was hell. Like an artistist, forced to draw only stick figures, day after day he returned for more insult. Miles on a bike just for this. We began to eat lunch together, like old days, but not. Not as fun, not as naïve, not the same two young men as before. I was swimming in the flood as fast as I could, and I still felt myself loosing ground. To suceed you couldn't just be the kid in the candy store, you had to be the hard man running on empty. The classes shrank and were made up of these hard men, all business, no soul. Some females, might as well have been the same hard men. There were of course exceptions, I refered to them as the "super humans." I imagine my father as one of them, always, "the test was easy" as I starred at my F in self-disgust. The super humans had free time too, I'd hear them talking and listen to every word in jealous rage. I didn't sleep so much, and the highlight of my day was shower with lunch as a close second. Lunch on Friday was horrible, me eating as fast as I could while doing math homework.

I owe that last semester at University Park to Ed. Sadly, Ed took Joel's place and Ernie was less available due to physical distance, we were the two compadres. I had many other supportive friends, Phil, and Justin should not go without mention. There were other friends that I was all-out neglecting, and I never talked to my family. To admit to these few people who still saw you as you used to be, that you were a failure, was harder than to let them think you didn't care by never calling. Until semester three, I never hated my life. If a girl had come up to me and torn my clothes off, I would have pushed her aside and grabbed my EE book. I finnished that semester with a loud smack as my GPA hit rock bottom.

Let me suffice to say that I got proffesional help, and I had a great summer. These were two separate things, but both helped the other. I neglected to say, possibly for effect, that in my despiration I transferred to another campus. I tell people this is by choice, but if you want the real answer it's because I'm scarred of EMECH classes and I don't want to be an EE. I want to get the degree I started school for, I've known for years what I wanted to do, and this was the only way. I like it in Erie, I want to press pause on life and live here forever, but I can't.

Thanks to everyone who visited me. There is nothing that could mean more to me than to travel that far just to see me. These days I win and I loose. Right as I'm on a loosing streak I win. I think I'm failing a class, I get a B on the midterm. I think I'm anti-social, and a party breaks out. There are the sad times, a phonecall I'll never forget when Ernie left for the Army. I have to stop and cry as I write, these wounds are too fresh. Ed and I went to a Who concert, and in a small variation from a Steely Dan song, "That trip we made to Clevland is etched upon my mind." This quote could refer to the concert and the summer trip. I won't forget either one, and I'm almost not worthy of such great memories. I am now a hard man, but my tank is half full, and I can run like hell.
 
 
 
 

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