The Abrevolution

(Read: a-BREEV-a-loo-shun.)

If you think just a niche of too-lazy-to-actually-say-the-whole-word people exist in the Jesuit school world, you are totes wrong. The Abrevolution has swept the Jesunation, and it’s here to stay (at least for a few months, which is all the longest our generation can hold on to any trend, idea or job). Just a little sampling of abreves that SU students are using in their daily, higher education lingo: C-Street,  ASSU, CampMin, Admin, OAs, St. Iggy’s, the X-Box, RAs, Bell, Piggy, the Beast, OMA and the StuCentPav.

Okay, so maybe StuCentPav hasn’t caught on yet, but it totes will evenchies. Espech after you read the entire next graph in abreves and acs (acronyms).

I came to SU for my edu and to find besties. Along the way, I had some bites and sips while going to skoo and studs for tests and quizzes. Most stus here love the camp, but some peeps pref going DT and getting out of the Jesy world. I def will miss it since I just gradued last weekend, but fosh willl come back for a visie in the near futch.

Now, for those of you who are not well-versed in the speak of abreves and acs, do not fear, the expert is here. It’s all about phonetics, so if you can read and sound words out, you’re totes in the CoolKidsClub. There are exceptions to this rule in Abreveville, like with the word “sors.” Sors is short for sorry (if you didn’t catch that before I wrote it I suggest you just move on to reading something more worthwhile) but isn’t pronounced phonetically “sores” but rather how you would say that shortened version of sorry, “sars.” Now obvi I can’t write on my friend’s wall on facebook “Sars I didn’t see you last night!” because then everyone and their Reflection Pond Ducky would think that I had that scary Asian disease, and that would totes be a face 22. Sors is an exception, so careful as you proceed.

Instead of dialogue, let’s use a video clip to show how abreves and acs have had a cross-generational effect on our society:

Notice how the mama isn’t phased one bit by the acs being used by her kids and “grandma.” Loves it. Let’s try another (in supes slowmo style):

The MOTS (moral of the story) is that AT&T is totes genius and Beth Ann is my hero. This girl is def Queen of Abreveville I mean, those people are freaking brilliant. First they take normal, everyday shapes like buildings, coffee cups, people, playground equipment and trees and turn them into cell phone bars. Next thing you know society is going to be crediting those marketing freaks with the medal podium at the Olympics and aesthetically-pleasing skylines. 

But, I digress, if The Abrevolution comes from anywhere, it comes from the world not just of AT&T, but of cellular telephones, themselves. Our obsessive selves are texting all the damn time, so to make sure that we don’t get MTC (massive thumb cramps) it’s important to cut corners in every way possi, which means abbreving, acking and using numbers for words.

Jesuit people love to use numbers for words just as much as the rest of the world, but in the Too-Lazy-To-Actually-Say-The-Whole-Word Olympics abreves totes take the crown. They’re flexible, agile, fierce and supes trendy. Ackies garner silver, but only because you can use an abreve in an ack (BTdub). While NFWs (numbers for words) takes lowly bronze because, well, 3LW was just so 1999.

Being “Spiritual,” Not Religious

Here’s a peculiar trend if I’ve ever heard one: college students at a Jesuit Catholic university running from religion and all of its formalities like it’s a Target-purchased, mini-van transported, white-picket-fence grown weed  that suburbanites cultivate and is taking over campus with greater speed than those plants-on-crack from the cinematic work of genius, Jumangi.

If you haven’t noticed the Agnostics, Atheists, Deists, Spiritual Searchers, Wandering Souls, Frolicking Faithfuls, Inquiring Minds, Hopeful Philosophers, Believers of the Unknown, Champions of Love and my personal favorite, the “Jesus was just a really cool guy” -ers then I’m pretty sure you’ve been stuck in the Campion Basement playing ping-pong and living off “food” from The Cave for the last, oh, three years or so.

If you ask the average SU Person about his or her religion, you might be faced with a face that resembles the fright and surprise that goes along with finding out someone eats their daily helping of carbs from a dumpster that’s outside their local bakery. Because in today’s higher education setting, being “religious” is as dangerous and limiting as calling yourself a Midwesterner, including all those “eh” accent jokes and overweight “Middle America” jabs.

But, there’s a lifeboat that have helped the religious paddlers find their way to shore in the as much comfort as a five-star Hilton suite (Paris not included). It’s called being SPIRITUAL, and it’s the cookie-cutter, PG-13, I-don’t-have-my-shit-one-bit-figured-out safety net that 1,000 little SU swimmers love almost as much as their “free food” at C-Street and the I-am-too-lazy-to-walk-home-from-QFC-with-my-groceries mobile (aka the NightHawk).

Being “spiritual” is like a magic firecracker that bursts in the stormy, black sky that is religion and produces rainbows decorated with beautiful butterflies. Okay, let’s try this in conversation:

Blithe, Campus Ministry guru: “So Kendra, tell me where you are in your religious life right now?”

Kendra: “Hegh? My religi-whaty?”

Blithe: “Religious life.”

Kendra: “Girl, I ain’t no nunsie.”

Blithe: “Nunsie?”

Kendra: “You know, like Whoopi in that movie.”

Blithe: “I feel like we’re getting off topic.”

Kendra: “What? You want to get a hot pocket?”

Blithe: “Let’s try this: where are you on your, uh, how do I put this … “spiritual journey” … right now Kendra?”

Kendra: “My spiritual journey? Ohhhhhhhhhhhhhhh. My spear-itch-ew-Al- journey. Blithey, hun, let me tell you!”

You can imagine that Kendra will dive into a narrative full of “I strayeds” and “found inner peaces,” making sure Blithe is fully understanding that the spirit in her has sprouted in the same soil religion couldn’t even buy a plot on. 

So, SU grads, as you enter into the ‘real world’ in the near future, remember that presenting yourself as “religious” might be a bit too unpoco for those non-Jesuiters to handle, and if you don’t communicate it well online, either, you’ll get yourself into some face 22s. 

Remember, SUPL is all in good humor and HAPPY EFFING GRADUATION! (Tune in soon for the graduation version of “SU People Love Publicly Acknowledging Good Deeds.”)

Being Dramatic on facebook

I remember the day like it was yesterday. I was sitting in my 8th-floor Campion dorm room (OMG! I just said “dorm!” I’m going to be nervously peeking over my shoulder for the next 16 hours for an RA to come swooping by and tackle me to the ground and brand the words “RESIDENCE HALL” on my forehead and make me recite every Jesuit value while adhering to quiet hours standards… but, I digress…) on a cold, rainy Saturday when my roommate turned to me and asked, “Are you on facebook yet?!”

“Facebook?” What is this facebook he talks about? This book of faces. This unknown, undiscovered place of faces in a book. This arena that includes people’s faces in an electronic book. A “booky wooky” if you may. A booky wooky that had a schnooky while eating a cookie. Cookieface. I love cookies. Cookies and milk. What is a “schnooky,” anyway?

Ok, I know I’m getting completely off track, but if you are a fan of train-of-thought writing or speaking, I suggest you check this clip out.  Now, back to that drama on facebook. DOF.

Facebook was originally created for bored college kids to creepily stalk people that went to kindergarten for two weeks with. Or, wait, that’s not it. Facebook was originally created for in-the-closet gays to get a date. Damn, wrong again. Let’s try this: facebook was created for people to be so overly passivedramatic that the SUPL gods had to come up with a new word for individuals that ooze passive-aggressive-drama-kings-and-queens-ness: passivedramatic. AKA PD.

PD can totes be found all over the fb. It’s on people’s walls, in their “About me” section, posted in notes (oh! don’t get me STARTED on notes) and, famously, their statuses.

Yes, the facebook status was created just for PDPs (passivedramaticpeople if you didn’t catch on, HELLO!). The status is the place where PDPs can post their frustrations, their fears, their anger, their drama (of course), their broken hearts and their inquisitive minds. 

Inquisitive minds are a standby classic for one simple reason: ambiguity. Facebook is as much about ambiguity as it is about PDPs. Let’s try an example:

“Clara is wondering … why?”

Notice that Clara isn’t just wondering, but she is wondering why. And, she’s wondering why with a dot dot dot, which is rather suspenseful for the reader when reading Clara’s status. When I started reading that, I thought to myself, ‘what is Clara wondering about? Perhaps she’s wondering where her toothbrush is, or why her phone is broken.’ But Clara isn’t wondering about one of those silly sally sort of things, she’s wondering (…) why. Totes ambigy, totes passivedramatic. Totes love it.

Let’s try another: “Craig just wants people to leave him alone.”

Oh Craigsies, king of the PDP. Craig uses another standby classic: the status that is PD, angry, but rather ambiguous. Why does Craig want people to leave him alone? Is he pissed at a certain indiv? And his status also presents the ultimate facebook conundrum: does Craig actually want people to leave him alone? Or does Craig want people to comment on his wall with words of encouraging encouragement?

It’s a face 22.

Yes folks, you read that correct, a face 22. One of those fb sitches that is a lose-lose. The girl who you had third period math with sophomore year of high school and always wore annoyingly loud flip flops just “ended her relationship” with her fiance on fb. Do you write on her wall? Send her a message?!? Give her a box of tissues as a gift?!???!? Totes a face 22.

Lately I’ve been having nightmares about face 22s. I dream that this guy I used to be dating wrote on my wall with some sort of flirty remark about my current status but didn’t necessarily ask a question. Do I write back?!? Do I comment on HIS status? Or would that be totes stalkerish? A face 22 if I’ve ever heard of one. And then I wake up in a cold sweat.

Yes, I admit, I am a PD statuser at times, too. But, aren’t we all?

The point is, facebook is a hot mess of PD statuses. Why else would we be on it everyday?

The Sun!

SU People love the sun just as much as Republicans love the American flag. And American flag pins, for that matter. Didn’t you hear the whole controversy with Obama not wearing an American flag pin? What a terrorist. He deserves to live in a cave where there is no sunshine and NO AMERICAN FLAG PINS! Which, according to those aforementioned Republicans from Florida, is what hell is like.

But today I had a sungasm. What is a sungasm, you might ask. It’s a gasm that comes from the sun, you idiot. Didn’t you take Latin in high school? The root word is sun, meaning that ginormous yellow thing that my pasty-white Irish skin loathes. And the not-root word is gasm, which is a really good thing. Really really good. A sungasm comes from the sun and it lasts all freaking day long … or at least as long as the sun is out.

But while all SU People have simultaneous sungasms on one of the 17 days of the year the sun actually decides to grant us our wishes and appear in our ever-gray sky, we need a way to express our gasming of the sun, something that let’s others know: Yes, I feel the same way you do. This feels So. Damn. Good.

That’s where facebook comes in. Yes, yes, my friends, the Book of Faces. Because it’s in this book where all your friends can tell you about their sungasms. How it feels to them. Why theirs is better than yours. It’s like an all out sunorgy on there. Ok, you get the picture…

Sungasm testimonials:
Lucy can’t believe it’s sunny. IT’S SUNNY?!?!??!?!?
Tyler was supposed to study all day, but the sun is calling his name.
Sara hates life. But loves the sun.
Winona has the worst sun burn of her freakin’ life. But damn, was it worth it.
Carlos would totally make love to the sun if he could.

Oh Carlos, always such a dirty boy. But he speaks the truth that SU People are sometimes afraid to admit: We love the sun almost as much as our significant other. Or, for some of us, more.

But then comes the days when the sun disappears after teasing us for a bit, and SU People hate those days. Almost as much as they hate people who check MySpace or that Facebook thing in the computer labs five minutes before class when everyone else is trying to print their papers. Bitches.

So even if you’re pissed about spring quarter ending a week later this year, remember that you get an extra week of in-school sungasms to make it better. Which is just so, so worth it.

Free Food

SU People love free food as much as anything – especially when it’s, well, free.

Here’s a phrase I’m so over hearing: “I’m a poor college student.” No, no, my friend, you are probs not poor at all but rather very, very wealthy (emphasis on the ‘probs’) and could go out and buy a table of six din din at Wild Ginger downtown on Daddy’s credit card.

But, I’m totes okay with this phrase: “I’m a hungry college student.” Yes, you are very hungry. You are hungry because you suck at planning, hungry because you’re too lazy to go grocery shopping and hungry because the saltine cracker packet you stole from the C-Street soup line broke open in your pocket and is wreaking havoc with crumbs of crunchiness in your pantelones.

So I guess it would be more PoCo (author’s note: ‘PoCo’ is totes the new term for Politically Correct. I’m so over PC. PC is a computer, people. It’s a thing that is personal and is a computer and plugs into a wall and sucks up lots of energy, not some idea about saying the right words at the right times about the right things. PoCo will be as big as ‘totes,’ you just wait.) … So I guess it would be more PoCo for us to say “I’m a poor and hungry college student,” but then we would just end up sounding so UnPoCo that might have to clarify our gaffes in an email signature, which we already clarified is long enough.

OMG! All this writing is making me SO HUNGRY!

Luckily for the poor and hungry college students of SU, many clubs and professors (or whoever those people are who are planning the 7,000 events we have on this campus everyday) are supes intuitive.

Program planner 1: “I just really think people are going to show up to voice their concern over the issues in Darfur.”
Program planner 2: “And if we have pizza.”
PP 1: “No. This is an event about solidarity and peace, not Piecora’s.”
PP 2: “Okay. Whatevs.”

Needless to say we all know how the Darfur movie night (author’s note: the Darfur movie night is a fictional event that didn’t actually happen, so don’t get all huffy puffy over what I’m saying here … I’m trying to be sarcastic here, people. Sound it out: sar-cas-tic.) … of 2005 went: Little Betsy Blewit really lived up to her name, she fosh blew it. She had the movie, and she had pamphlets, and t-shirts and stickers and little glow sticks to represent each refugee of the crisis. But Bsquared totes forget the pizza – well, she didn’t even think of the pizza after she first shot it down. Which ended up shooting her in the foot: no one came to her event.

So here’s a sure-fire way to get people to come to the most boring of the borings: have food! Here’s what my schedule looks like for the next week:

Monday: Society of SU Students Who Hate the Cluster of Annoying Buzzy Bugs that Emerge in the Spring and Want to Spray them With Shitty Chemicals panel at 7 PM – Serving BonApp wraps!
Tuesday: Gathering of Creepsters Who form Giant Circles in the Pigott Atrium at 11:05 PM – Veggie Tofu scramble!
Wednesday: Some SEAC Event – PIIIIIIIIIZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZA!
Thursday: Another SEAC Event (IDK what it’s called – there’s SO MANY! Those SEAC betches.) – Smoothies.
Friday: Association to Replace Kerry Lynn Campbell as the One and Only Resident of 101 CAC Lane information meeting – Marshmellows.

Not only is my tummy full just thinking about all that food, I can’t help but know that I’m eating a healthy, well-rounded diet. BonApp is so environmentally conscious that they serve hormone-free marshmallows and free-range smoothies!

SUPL love them some social justice with their bites, so any club meeting best come with some bread and butter on the side. I mean, it would almost be UnPoCo not to have food, right?

So remember that SU People love food just as much as you and me, so eat up y’all!

The Lingerers

You know who they are: they’re in Pigott, rummaging through a stack of newspapers; or in Connolly, going to ’stretch’ … again and again and again; or in the Bellarmine Lobby, pretending to talk on their phone while surveying the foot traffic. They’re Lingerers, and they’re all over Seattle U’s campus.

To say SU People love Lingerers may be an inaccurate statement, so instead we’ll call it a hate love. SU People hate love Lingerers. Totes.

Just the other day I was in Connolly working out. My routine is simple: 20 minutes on the treadmill, a few minutes of abs and a couple weight machines and then I’m off to frolic in the shitty spring weather Seattle has been providing us as of late. But during my 45-minute workout I couldn’t help but notice a girl – we’ll call her Lolita the Lingerer – successfully avoiding working out for the entire time I was there. A full-fledge Connolly Lingerer.

Now you might not be too impressed by Lolita at first mention, so let me paint the picture for you: first she comes in (wearing short shorts and a tank, of course), Nalgene bottle in hand and heads for the stretching mats. Good call, Lolita; get those muscles nice and warm. After a mere 60 seconds of light stretches, Lolita spots some “friends” over at the free weights and lets out a squeal. She sprints over to greet them, jumping up to hug one of the guys with her legs wrapped around him. All Connolly eyes are fixated on Lolita.

This is where lesson one of Lingering comes in: get noticed. Most Lingerers appear to be soft-spoken, relaxed and rather introverted individuals, but the minute they see an opening to turn their Lingering into a public spectacle, they pounce. Because that’s what is at the heart of Lingering: socializing in the most awkward of ways because the Lingerer is incapable to socialize in any way.

Back to Lolita. After her minor freak out with Willy the Weight Lifter, she proudly announces that she’s off to do a little cardio on the treadmills. Much to my delight, Lolita picks the treadmill next to mine, so I get to see the Lingering star up close (should I ask for an autograph?!?). Deep breaths.

Lesson two of Lingering: know how to procrastinate. As soon as Lolita gets on that treadmill you know that she never intended to actually USE it, right? She stretches a bit, spends a couple minutes browsing through her iPod, takes a swig from the Nalg and then plays with the buttons on the treadmill for a bit. Soon she’s walking at brisk pace, but then her shoelace comes untied and she gets a text message and her hair needs fixing and her song selection needs to be tended to again. Lolita’s been on the TM a stunning 7 minutes and has walked .013 miles. Lingerer brilliance.

Lesson three of Lingering: never do the same thing for too long. Lolita hops off the TM and heads back to Willy, just to update him on what she’s been up to (it’s been so long). She happens to run into Mary (and by happens I mean she runs her down on the eliptical and talks her ear off for 10 minutes before checking in with Willy again) and then heads for the weight machines.

Lolita is a Lingerer Legend, if you haven’t noticed by now. She owns these weight machines, and all of Connolly by now. She adjusts the settings, the weight, and then does a few reps. It’s repeat rinse and lather for a couple more machines, but soon Lolita grows bored so she calls up her good friend Betty the Bellarmine Lobby Lingerer and they have an overly personal chat (ten decibels too loud) for a few minutes while Lolita eyes herself in the mirror.

If you’ve been keeping track, Lolita wore me out for 45 minutes now. I’m ready to head home, but Lolita is just re-connecting with Willy, making social plans for the evening and being damn loud about it (Lingerer Lesson #4).

Lolita is joined in the Legends of Lingering by dozens of SU People – in the Bistro (always getting up to get something else from the condiments counter); in C-Street (talking way too loud on the cell phone while eating alone); in the library (“studying” and reading “books” for hours); on the Green (“waiting” for friends while joining several other convos) and in the hall in Admin (talking to anyone who listen about how shitty classes are in Admin – “the classrooms are just so … OLD!”).

Lingerers have made their mark on Seattle U. And SU People hate love them all the same.

Programming

Oh yes, you know it. SU People love programming. If you have a club, a class, an RA, a team, an itch, a thought or just a hiccup – chances are there will be a program attached along with it.

I love getting information out about issues as much as the next person, but isn’t there a more creative way to do things than just having a program? That’s where SU People come in. Programs aren’t just a one-size-fits-all sort of deal. No, no, my friends, programs can take on many shapes: Now that there are 3,000 clubs on campus, there are about 9,000 programs ranging from speakers to panels to forums to rallies to gatherings to concerts to sing-alongs to circle discussions to prayers to photoshoots to movies to plays to craft-making to just-come-and-attend-my-effing-event-and-we’ll-call-this-a-program programs.

But the programs don’t stop there. It’s as if Seattle U is a sleepy young child waking up for a day of kindergarten, and then when she gets out of bed her mother informs her that there’s no school on Saturday.

“No school?” She asks, a little bit puzzled, nibbling on her thumb

“Nope. Not on Saturdays,” her mom replies cheerfully. “So what are you going to do now?”

“I’m going to… to… to… PROGRAM!” The little girl wails. And then she leaps out of bed and bounds down the stairs – taking them four at a time – and dives into the ‘craft’ room where she rifles through mountains of crayons, markers, colored pencils, glue, scissors, paper and glitter to create the perfect program poster.

In her high-pitched, I’m-such-a-cute-kindergartener-that-just-found-out-it’s-Saturday-and-I-don’t-have-to-go-to-school voice, she starts listing off all the programs she’s going to plan: “I want to plan a program on AIDS and GLBTQ awareness and mid-term study habits and study abroad programs to Uzbekistan and spiritual direction and philosophical ideas in the 21st century and carbon-free diets and… MOMMY!”

The poor little SU-programming kindergartener has just ran out of glue. CRIMINAL!

Basically, SU programming would kick the Energizer Bunny’s ass in a cage fight, even if that damn pink bunny was given some ‘roids before the battle. Headlines would read: “SU Programming Makes Energizer Bunny Re-think its ‘Keep Going’ Motto” and “Energizer Bunny More Red than Pink after SU Programming Rips off Both Ears.”

This isn’t to say that SU programs are violent. Quite the contrary, however, SU programs are mostly peaceful and informative, though few would know because since there are 1 billion programs per day only .054 SU students actually attend them.

Gotta run now – off to a…. well, you know where I’m off to. A PROGRAM, bitches! I just can’t get enough.

Freaking Out About the Weather

Second in the “Freaking Out” category to Finals Week, SU People love to freak out about the weather.

Lately, it’s been rather excusable. First it’s cold and rainy, then the sun peeks out for a couple days and then it SNOWS?!? IN APRIL?!? OMG! Someone call Public Safety and document this shit – this can’t be happening in SEATTLE!

But the weather we’ve been having lately is like Britney Spears on drugs – a sloppy mess that you just never know what you’re going to get one minute to the next. I’m not sure whether to pack my string bikini or my fur-hooded parka that I bought at a HellyHansen sale (HH, another SUPL fav!) when I leave the house everyday.

At this point I’m guessing you’re laughing… or at least nodding your head in agreement. But even when the weather is rather “normal” for Seattle standards, SU People just love to freak out about it.

Student one: “Can you BELIEVE it’s still raining!?! I’m so over this!”

Student two: “Totes. I mean everyone told me that the rain in Seattle wasn’t that bad… but I’m pretty sure 45 days of straight rain classifies as “bad.” HELLO!”

Student two is a wise, wise individual. SU People are chronic liars about the weather – especially when they are outside of Seattle. Whether they are from out of state or going to visit friends at another college, SU People love to tell you that the rain just “isn’t that bad” in Seattle, no matter what Grey’s Anatomy might tell you. It’s our we-are-so-tough-we-live-in-the-city-where-it-rains-all-the-time mentality. “I mean it drizzles sometimes and it’s grey a lot,” I tell friends at home. “But really, it’s not that bad.

More than rain, however, SU People love to freak out about snow! Yes, I said SNOW! Every time it snows, or might snow, or snowed three days ago, or is snowing in Tacoma, SU People have snowgasms all day long. Facebook statuses vary from “Shawna is playing in the SNOW!” to “Katie can’t believe it’s SNOWING!??!” to “Ryan hates this effing white shit.”

Katie is the classic Hawaiian SU person… she’s never SEEN snow! For a girl that has never missed a class in her life, Katie skips her Philosophy 220 class just to run through the dusting of flakes on the library lawn. But, of course, Katie doesn’t realize that snow is cold and is still wearing her flip flops. OH KATIE! So silly.

SU People aren’t to blame, however, because Seattle people like to freak out about the weather, too. It snows like half an inch and the entire city is paralyzed. I can just see Mayor Nickels peeking out his window at 4 AM giddy that there are a few flakes in the air. “Call all the city offices!” He barks into his phone. “We’re shuttin’ ‘er down today!”

SU People can’t believe that when they wear flip flops or other poorly-chosen footwear that their feet get cold or wet. WHAT?!? It’s like SU People think we’re immune to the weather coming off the Pacific Ocean. Yes, Public Safety has built a giant weather-resistant bubble between Madison and Cherry so you’re totes safe.

If it’s still snowing in May, then we all are validated in freaking out.

Social Awkwardness

Imagine this scene:

You’re walking on the lower mall and up ahead, about 40 feet or so, is a girl that you think you had a philosophy class with a couple of quarters ago. You’re not sure, but you think she lives in Campion with you, too… and that she might’ve been in line with you at C-Street the other day when you watched a poor freshman totally wipe-out, tray and all.

But, as I said, you’re just not sure. And, she’s getting closer. To make matters worse, you’ve already made eye contact, so there’s no denying that you’ve already seen each other. As you grow closer step by step, your palms start to sweat and you can’t decide between doing the nonchalant chin nod, the peppy “Hey! How are you?” or the I’m-too-cool “Sup?”

Before you can decide, the moment has passed, and she’s on her way to Pigott as you grow closer to the Student Center. Awkward Moment #18 of the day, check.

The thing is, SU People love Social Awkwardness, almost as much as they love the Idea of Social Justice and Being Overinvolved.

It starts on day one, when preppy, over-excited and hyper-caffeinated upperclassmen greet freshmen with enthusiasm usually found only at a monkey exhibit in a zoo. Freshmen aren’t sure whether to duck and run or pop their collar and join in. But they soon realize that it’s all part of the initiation to the next four years of their lives at AwkwardU.

From there, they learn to stand silently in elevators, talking rigidly about classes, majors and the elevator’s “habits” along with realizing that just because you “meet” someone on campus at one point or another – whether it be in a class or through a club – doesn’t mean you actually have to say hello.

Now that would just be too silly, wouldn’t it?

But the awkwardness doesn’t stop there. It penetrates across campus and finds its form in long, drawn-out conversations that should’ve been short ones; eye-contact in the Connolly mirrors that boarders between recognition, flirting and just plain creepiness; I-think-I-should-say-hi-to-you waves that go foul when the other person doesn’t recognize you (or just doesn’t want to say hello); greetings to professors who say hello back but obviously have no idea who you are by the looks on their faces; a quiet dinner at C-Street reading that is interrupted by a “Hey! Is this seat taken?!?”

Awkwardness is all around SU. But the thing is, SU People love it too much to get rid of it. It’s ingrained in them from day one like a birth mark that mysteriously spells AwkwardU on the lower back. And SU People totes love tattoos, too.

Being Over-Involved

If you’ve ever been in a class that requires a small-group project or extended small-group work throughout the quarter (which you most definitely have because SU People love to hate group projects) then this dialogue will sound familiar to you:

Student one: “Okay, so when can you guys meet? I’m free Tuesdays and Thursdays after 4 and weekends.”

Student two: “Well… I have work every day from 7 a.m. to noon, and then class until six, so I can only meet in the evenings.”

Student three: “Oh. I have dance practice every morning at 5, and then class until noon, and then three club meetings during the afternoon, volunteering in the evenings and going out most Tuesdays, Wednesdays and Thursdays. So I could get together in four Saturdays from now at 4:15.”

SU People love being over-involved, and LOVE talking about how over-involved we are, too. It’s not about taking 15 credits, working a part-time job and hanging out anymore. No, no, my friends… this is college of the 21st century: 20 credit-quarters (so you can graduate in three years, of course!), a full time job, a membership in at least three clubs (one of which your originated, obviously), volunteer work and the always-dependable pre-weekend bar-hopping.

Over-involvement is a must.

Because SU People like being over-involved so much, finding originality in our over involvement is crucial. Having a hip, obscure, off-campus job is always a plus (“I work at this environmental engineering firm in Fremont that just sent fifteen engineers to Cambodia to do pro-bono research”); originating a club is another plus (“I decided to start the ‘United Student of Campion for an Easier Commute to Connolly’ because a bunch of us were just sick of walking to the gym – ew!”); calling administrators and higher-ups by their first/nickname is another biggee (“OMG did you see RKelly today? We bumped into each other at the Sidebar were talking university politics for like 20 minutes… he was totally late for a meeting!”); majoring, minoring and emphasizing practically every academic field at SU (“I just became completely obsessed with my biology class so I decided to add it to my double major of Business and Nursing… it shouldn’t be too bad”) and including each and every thing you do with your every minute in your email signature is critical:

Mary O. Verinvolved
Sophomore Liberal Studies and Psychology Double Major
Marketing and Biology Minor 
President of United Students of Campion for an Easier Commute to Connolly
Office Assistant – Fremont Engineering
Orientation Advisor ‘07-’08
Chardin 323 | 718.333.5324 (cell) | 206.296.0030 (room)
overinvolved@seattleu.edu | myspace.com/overinvolved

Staying on top of the over-involvement lingo with phrases like these are sure to launch any novice into over-involvement stardom: coalitions are the new things (clubs and groups were so last year); being a liaison is mysterious and important-sounding; ‘sitting in‘ on an advisory council earns you extra over-involvement points. These are just a few tips to be ultimate over-involved SU Person.