The students are back

dod

After an uncharacteristically long and sultry-hot summer, the new academic year, and all that it brings with it, is upon us. Warm autumn breezes have supplanted summers dead-heat; formerly sun-scorched yellow lawns are now carpeted with fallen browning leaves; children and retailers turn their thoughts to the Christmas, and our next generation of businessmen and industrialists, still fresh-faced and enthusiastic from their final school exams, set out on their chosen university programmes.

Circulation of the Evening Herald has soared in the last few weeks. New generations of students are seeking rooms and small hovels in flatland. The quarters are small and dingy, the walls damp, the wiring dodgy. The occasional sparks from the electric cooker and the burning smell from the extractor fan in the shower room give only the smallest hint of how great a fire hazard this fourth floor flat is. But it is space away from home, space to make your mark, space to establish your identity independent of homes umbilical cord. The shrewd students have been flat hunting since early September; those who arrived on the scene more recently are picking what miserly (but extravagantly priced) flats remain.

As you walk through those parts of the city where students are wont to reside, there is a refreshing buzz. A new cohort of fresh-faced scholars is taking over the local bars. In the first weeks when money is not so tight as it soon will be, the trendier bars teem with young people exploring their bold new horizons. In time, some will make the choice to drink at home first, then venture out later; some will move to the cheaper bars; others will figure how to dress and pout in such a way that an inability to afford drink themselves will not compromise their ability to consume their fill free of charge on a nightly basis.

Their plumage is another aspect that draws attention. Some will use their newfound freedom to dress in ways that would have a cosseting mother, her influence now a hundred miles removed, offering up novenas and wondering aloud what the neighbours might think. Some will continue to wrap up in such a way that would gratify a Carmelite Mother Superiors requirement for modesty - for ingrained attitudes, parochial mindsets, and the active discouragement of independent thinking take time firstly to acknowledge and secondly to overcome in this brave new world.

There are no quiet times in the local supermarket as students work to their timetables on a discretionary basis. Nubile young ladies in groups of three cluster around the meat counter trying to figure out what meal they can cook that they all will eat and which works out cheapest. Supermarket sales of unbranded Vodka, Blue Nun and Dutch Gold soar in order to facilitate those looking to get a low cost start to student nights out. The single-basket checkouts are overrun with beautiful young girls, all buying dried soup, yellow-pack pasta and tinned tomatoes. Also in the queue is an unkempt male Computer Science student wearing the same clothes for the third day running, an economy pizza under one arm, a pint of milk in his hand. As he queues he reads the sports pages at the back of a tabloid whilst listening to some tinny music through his walkman headphones.

They are refreshing, their autumn arrival annually revitalising a tired and suspicious old city. The verve and energy that they bring, their vitality unchecked by world-weariness, is a lesson to us all, disenchanted and cynical, embittered by our own failings. Long abandoned are our convictions that we would change the world by virtue of our beliefs and by force of our actions, long lost our idealistic aspirations. Their exuberance and their vigour, their refusal to be inhibited by the social constraints that we willingly embrace, might serve to remind us how we too once laughed in the face of the establishment before we came to embrace the very things that even then we knew might one day destroy us.

Doodee

Also in the queue is an unkempt male Computer Science student wearing the same clothes for the third day running, an economy pizza under one arm, a pint of milk in his hand. As he queues he reads the sports pages at the back of a tabloid whilst listening to some tinny music through his walkman headphones.

:eep:

Mac daddy

nice story, you should be a writer

elexes

u done the one about the guys on the dart didnt u ? thats pritty classic . reminds me of my college years . wp nice to read

Mossy Monk

someone give dod his own board. as always this was a pleasure to read

mike65

Dod that bring a tear to my glass eye....I lie!

Mike.

(Member of Grumpy Old Men Assoc.)

LegacyUser

Originally posted by dod
They are refreshing,

They are a 2000% increase in the length of the que at spar dude, i just wanna go buy lunch without having to bring a sleeping bag ,

good writing though

Big Chief

Also in the queue is an unkempt male Computer Science student wearing the same clothes for the third day running, an economy pizza under one arm, a pint of milk in his hand. As he queues he reads the sports pages at the back of a tabloid whilst listening to some tinny music through his walkman headphones.

next time you see me say hi

(and im not even a student, bloody cheek!)

nah, good read as usual dod.

joseph brand

Your writing is as fresh to the forums as the young lively students to a village of old people, grumpy truck drivers and whining kids.

Enjoy it while ye can!

Brilliant, dod must be a writer. :rolleyes:

A far cry from reading tabloids and 'Soap weekly'.


Keep it up, please.

catspring

dod, that's was really enjoyable.
you've got a great style of writing.
i hope you're putting it to more use than just entertaining us boarders!!

Kone

a great tale

StickyMcGinty

always a good read?? don't tell me all your 331 posts have bben that long?

you should write a book man

Some will continue to wrap up in such a way that would gratify a Carmelite Mother Superiors requirement for modesty - for ingrained attitudes, parochial mindsets, and the active discouragement of independent thinking take time firstly to acknowledge and secondly to overcome in this brave new world.

LoL Dod

There was a lass like that in my class when I was in college, she wore an adult version of a school uniform...

/ she was emmmm very popular actually

Great writing as usual Dod, why aren't you contributing to the Creative Writing forum ??

mm

Sarky

Damn students.

I had my pick of the Galway computer suites over the summer. Now there are queues. Queues! Students really get in the way of enjoying college, I find.

/me has just left college, and so feels perfectly justified in saying this.