Education

Beautiful Architecture

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circa Spring 1983

The architecture is beautiful.  The grass is thick and bursting with life.  The squirrels are running around and gathering nuts that have fallen from the tall, shady oak trees.  And the birds are flying and singing.

We walked in the door, up the stone steps, and into a room that an Oriental rug dominated.  A man and woman whom he introduced as his wife greeted us; they were dressed very properly.  Two students greeted us who were also dressed very properly.  We walked aound and saw the rest.  More beautiful architecture, pretty green fields, and pretty girls.  How nice it was.

That was three years ago.  Since then the beautiful architecture has been overcome by long, dark, grimy corridors.  The thick grass has been covered over by the sneaking out to the barren woods and the pretty girls have been uncovered to their skeletons.  Oh, how the school has changed!

The purpose coming here has changed to gossip and worrying.  Life has been changed from the simpleness of catching the bus to the complexities of making breakfast to avoid missing out on an hour of your weekend or yet missing your entire weekend away from here.

The room I once had that was dirty only from clothes is now unhealthy from spit and the thought of studying for a do-or-die test that could alter your entire thought of life.  My room is also unhealthy because of the differences of opinion of its inhabitants and the opinion of the people who surround that room with the Oriental rug.  It’s confusing because the opinions of this room’s inhabitants were strongly shaped by what these people who surround the the room with the Oriental rug have provided us.

This school’s classrooms provide invaluable information that we survive on but the school’s authorities try (and successfully do) to change what we learn into something to keep us from enjoying life here.

The people who live around the room with the Oriental rug still show people around.  The people still see the beautiful architecture, the thick green grass, and the pretty girls.  And some of those people come the following year.  These people then see the long, dark, grimy hallways.  And the cycle continues.  When have those people who surround the Oriental rug seen my room?

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