,..^y^ •' ;
On an angst-filled campus,
the DN is your faithful friend
_ , ' Jl
JOSHUA GILLIN is a
senior news-editorial
major and the Daily
Nebraskan opinion editor.
I hate these “welcome back” columns.
For the last VA years, all I have ever seen
on the opinion pages ofthe Daily Nebraskan
at the start of a new semester is a “welcome
back” column.
So far be it from me to break from tradi
tion.
Welcome back to college.
Welcome back to classes.
Welcome back to Lincoln and to your
friends.
Welcome back to the fabricated, shel
tered, unrealistic and impossibly Wonder
Bread community that is the campus culture.
Welcome back to another apathetic stu
dent body, with another near-farcical student
government election.
Welcome back to new parking garages
built so alumni and boosters will continue to
pump money into the university.
Welcome back to union construction and
parking tickets.
Welcome back to legislation that will
deny the university funds to help pay for ren
ovation programs on buildings slowly sink
ing into the ground.
Welcome back to sculptures dubiously • v
appearing across campus while some acade
mic programs are threatened with extinctions
Welcome back to TAs, since professors'
aren’t teaching many of the classes, it seems.
Welcome back to overpriced textbooks
and study materials.
Welcome back to countless sales on
Husker memorabilia. *
Welcome back to thousands and
thousands of whining, fanatical
football fans intent on destroy
ing Frank Solich’s head coach
ing career before it really begins.
Welcome back to student
fees, senior checks, late adds
and frantic drops.
Welcome back to this bone
chilling cold that has seen fit to
delay its entrance until January
(of all the nerve!).
Welcome back to your car _
•' being towed on a week^basis. jmnr^O afi
' And for that matter, welcome
back to the unreasonably high-priced
parking tickets you couldn’t pay in
the fust place.
Welcome back to professors who
can’t remember your name, sleeping in
• • j . : . ' .■
* v '
class, skimming by on a pass/no pass ^B
option, late term papers, late-night coffee ~JI
binges, doodling, running on three hours’ J
sleep, eating garbage for the one meal a jM
day you can afford, missing television, ^k
killing brain cells in hordes, walking V
around in a daze, foigetting friends’
names, jump-starting your ’ 82 ^R
Celebrity, misunderstanding NRoll n
instructions, yelling at your room- wKm
mates (unless you’re lucky enough to Smf
not have one), slipping on the side- ^
walks, freezing in lecture halls, miss- Jlp§|E
ing your family, losing friends to ; ™ Jg|
drugs and alcohol as well as gradua- Jfi
tion (though I’m not quite sure which /jmm
is worse;, railing on uie wagon, oeing
baffled by computers that lose files,
not being able to afford new clothes
(or the laundry soap to wash them),
electric and phone bills, cafeteria
food, BMG music reply cards,
army recruiters, cover letters,
resumes, a complete lack of phone
calls, bad basketball, worse base
hall, tornadoes, Ramen noodles, '
basic cable, Puff Daddy, Hilfiger
jeans, Ray-Bans, Doc Martens,
greeks, jocks, brains, geeks,
losers, scholars, graduates,
dropouts, motorheads, gung-ho
joes, unemployment, bad cred
it, daddy’s girls, mama’s boys,
veterans, athletes, four-day
Thursday
bars.
xm