A TIME LONG AGO AT A HIGH SCHOOL FAR FAR AWAY

North Bend Oregon High School, class of 1973. What’s so special?

 

Like later generations staking their claims to, ‘the first digital generation’ or ‘the first paperless generation’ or ‘the first generation raised on video games,’ the generational niche of 1973 is ‘the first modern generation.’

 

Born of the roaring ’50’s with TV dinners in aluminum foil and new fast food burger sensations on the horizon, the class of 1973 was far enough removed from the peak hippie days of 1967 to see the effects of an alternative lifestyle choice.

 

By 1973 high school kids knew the difference between parsley and Iowa ditch weed, good beer was a decade away, and fashion was leaning away from Twiggy. The times had changed.

 

Married? No one does that man. We need to be free? Not so much by 1973.

Modern classmates got married. Some stayed married, some not, but it wasn’t communal. By then the dream of surviving on nothing in warm weather only happened in movies. Instead, our dream was finding a way to make a difference, and someplace to try.

 

The line between high school students and athletes blurred more than ever with a shared competition to go to college, any college. The driver for me? It felt important to make a mark somewhere, something to point to, raise the bar. By 1973 we knew it wouldn’t be a one shot effort, that we couldn’t coast on the fumes of a glory days past.

 

At least that’s what I told myself when I dropped out after freshman year for the Army and learned a new way of doing things.

 

After 1973 the scorn on the military died down a little more, heading toward the universal acclaim the guys get today. Winding down the Vietnam War helped.

 

Education stayed a focus, with early couples populating Generation X, later families filling the Millennial ranks, then complaining about teachers instead of unmotivated kids who didn’t seem interested in school. Like they were.

 

To show the right stuff, 1973 learned how to graduate. It was either that or hear radio ads like, “Isn’t it time you finished college,” or “A college degree is the edge you need for a promotion.” The ads still air, they just don’t pick at an open sore, and no one pipes up with, “You should finish your degree.”

 

It’s only a piece of paper if you have a few of them. Hanging one up as a returning student when it was easier to let it all slide made it a trophy.

 

Funny college story? You tell me:

I like talking about going to college for three decades to get a four year degree. I like to explain what it was like between freshman year in 1973 and graduating in 1991; from college kid in a dorm to married suburban father of two in night school.

 

One time a middle aged man talked about his fourteen year academic career.

 

“It took you fourteen years?” I said. “What kind of loser takes fourteen years for college?”

 

Normally this is where I’d confess it took me fourteen years. Not this time.

 

The guy didn’t think my academic advice was funny.

 

“What’s wrong with fourteen years?” he said.

 

“Ha, ha, it took me fourteen years, too,” I said.

 

“Getting my bachelors, two masters, and a Phd went by fast,” he said. “Did it seem fast for you, too?”

 

“Not that fast.”

“I matriculated in my home country before coming here,” he said.

 

I’d heard enough. A bunch of degrees from foreign colleges don’t stand up to Portland State paper, but I didn’t tell him.

 

“I dropped out of Southern Oregon and UofO before hitting the sweet spot at Portland State,” I said. “It was part of the long game before kids. When they got old enough they both graduated from Oregon.”

 

“Long game? I’m sure,” he said.

 

“At least I don’t make up degrees from colleges that don’t exist,” I said.

 

“They exist where I come from,” he said.

 

“You probably had a pretend scholarship to a pretend college. Was your diploma issued on xerox paper?” I said.

 

“My colleges are pristine examples of higher education. What is Portland State but a catch diploma factory for dropouts like you to cobble together enough credits for a General Studies degree so you don’t feel like such a loser,” he said.

 

“History degree,” I said.

 

“Pardon me?”

 

“I hold a history degree.”

 

“American history? Even worse. At least general studies would give you some exposure to the world,” he said. “That’s the problem with Americans. Too lazy, too complacent, too entitled to the ways of the rest of the world. A lounge chair and a beer in front of football on television isn’t a human right.”

 

“Neither is watching soccer in a hookah bar sitting on pillows and sipping tea.”

 

“That is cultural. You could learn something,” he said.

 

“You don’t know much about your new home yet, but you’re a fast learner,” I said.

 

“I am from an ancient civilization of respect.”

 

“In that case we can call it a failed civilization overrun by Romans or Huns, the Mongol hoards, Alexander the Great. America isn’t overrun like where you came from,” I said.

 

“Really? You don’t think so?”