Written by Gil Gildner
Isit here, contemplating life and everything that goes along with it, sipping a drink at Midnight Oil. And the striking thing about it all is, nothing is simple. The story of a story is a story. My grasp of this is feeble, yet I see enough to suspect.
Delving into the details of my existence denies every lie that is thrown at me. The insecure existentialist is knocked aside, and the nihilist is laid waste. The tiniest descriptor and the most insignificant adjective provides me with enough ammunition to destroy the U.S.S.R. and sweep up the remnants with my toothbrush.
I take a sip of my short drip, which is code for small black coffee. There is something wonderful engrained in coffee, and the only way to fully experience it is with a thick, black, unadulterated brew. It’s pretty much spiritual. If I were an animist I’d probably appreciate these things even better.
After chapel, in this surging crowd of personalities, I look out over the students (the benefit of a couple more inches of height than the average man) and observe a sea of stratified faces. Through the tinted lenses of gunmetal Ray-Bans I can see the unsure emotions of confusion, happiness, gentleness, sadness, anger, strength, yet perhaps most of all immaturity. This is a university, after all. The rising sun shines on the young.
Perhaps it is because the youth of today are concentrated here like sardines in a tin, but in this sea of people and emotions I can feel the mistakes. I feel them committed all around me, in the acquaintance and in the friend. These are mistakes in the paperback romances and the broken realities and the vermilion faces of drama and spite. These are weaknesses. These are our immaturities.
Existence at a university is a lesson in basic social patterns. Forget textbook sociology (did it ever teach us anything?) and grasp what truly happens when immaturity meets immaturity in the student center. They meet, fall into an already autumnal love, break apart in dissent, and then begin the action loop over again. It was never meant to be, not even considered. There were two books on the shelf, and they chose the paperback over the hardcover.
It is the current societal fad to emphasize youth’s charm and consider aging a curse to be avoided at all cost. I would propose that we reverse this. I would propose that we endeavor to lose the baby fat of immaturity and attempt to enter into adulthood. At the risk of sounding like an uptight grandmother griping at her progeny, I look around and see immaturity robbing students of grades, of daylight, of experiences. I look around and see a single reason why students exist in a state of growth limbo: the fear of what lies ahead.
After class I return to Midnight Oil and offer up more of my cash for another thick black coffee. I also get a bagel, with butter (it makes everything better). Darkness falls outside, and the last dregs of coffee grounds have been drained from the bottom of my cup. I remember five or half a dozen things I must do, so I drive off.
Filling up at the gas station, I stand at the pump braving the chill wind. The little gold Kia next to me has two occupants. The man makes the woman fill up the car, and snaps at her. He’s in his early twenties and is an unsavory type. I feel sorry for the girl. She doesn’t deserve such a man.
Sometimes I wonder about how things turn out in the long run. The earth turns and spins and rotates, and it’s tempting to consider Nietzche’s eternal recurrence as a viable philosophical view. But it’s not. It’s purile filth. There is a reason to grow up.
That couple at the gas station haunts me. Even adults possess that immaturity. The sooner it is ridden from your veins, the better. Otherwise, it starts to eat away at people.
There is only so much coffee that a man can drink. Caffeine gets to him, eventually. With me, caffeine has the curious effect of inducing a sort of stupor. It’s a sort of energy, but with it comes a deranged unawareness of reality. I feel dreamy. It’s as if coffee puts me to sleep. This, paired with driving around, paired with the slow melancholy strains of Pink Floyd playing through my stereo, induces complete brain fog.
Through my caffeinated stupor I still wonder about maturity.
College is the only time in which most of us are able to let loose. Thus the horn-rimmed glasses, the Converses, the proliferation of facial hair and the earth bracelets. This is weird, but weird does not equal immature. Immaturity is defined by the poor results. Immaturity is defined by a return of no gain.
Don’t do something with no end gain. Grow up. Pay bills. Drink black coffee. Pick the hardcover over the paperback, even if the words are harder to understand.
