 | Samuel Goodstein Grand Illusion |
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GRAYLING, Mich. - A great social anthropologist once wrote that all of society can be explained in bifurcated form. For example: "There are two types of people in the world, those who love The Smiths and those who do not." Or: "All society can be broken down into those who will willingly eat fat-free cream cheese and those who will not."
This same theory also can be applied to locales: Some places are firmly entrenched in reality, others are not. Those places that exist in reality will henceforth be signified "RW," for Real World, while those that do not will be signified by "UM," for the University.
After putting up with four weeks of graduate school, the LSAT and neighbors that perpetually play Snow, I knew I needed to get away - I needed a dose of the RW. Since I have a standing invitation to visit an old friend here in northern lower Michigan (RW), this weekend seemed the perfect time for a getaway, and for a brief inquiry into the difference between those at UM and those in the RW.
(I knew northern lower Michigan, not to mention northern northern Michigan, would be a good place to get away from the UM crowd when a friend at school, upon hearing of my trip, asked me if the Indians still controlled northern Michigan.)
My journey was only 45 minutes old when my car-mates (two Graylingers getting a lift home for the weekend), and I easily pegged the first of many distinctions we would make over the course of the trip. I will share with you, reader, some of the more poignant ones.
RW: People like to drive pickup trucks. Actually, the Ford Ranger has been the best-selling automobile in America for over a decade. People like these pickups because they allow them to both transport themselves and their friends, yet at the same time they can carry things in the back. Big things. I know, because I have a pick-up.
UM: People like to drive Jeeps. The Jeep, or variant of same, is easily the most popular car on campus. People like the Jeep because it not only moves them around, but it makes them look and feel cool. This issue, however, is quite open to debate.
RW: People who wear gas-station employee shirts with the name "Ken" sewn on both work at a gas station and are named Ken. If they were not both of these things, they would not wear such a shirt.
UM: People who were raised in very large homes and drive the aforementioned Jeeps like to wear gas station employee shirts with the name "Ken" sewn on. However, most of these people are not named Ken, and even fewer work in gas stations.
RW: My friend and I, after exhausting the cultural availabilities of Grayling, went to Spike's Keg o' Nails for a drink. At the table next to ours were seven large bearded men, all drinking domestic beer, smoking domestic cigarettes, having a good time.
One of them leaned over and asked, "Where you fellers from?" We answered and asked the same. "Jackson (very, very RW). Well, really Chicago. We all just spent a couple years in Jackson. At the jail. We're on our way to the casino, then to Canada!"
UM: After an exciting night reading about Native American agricultural practices, I went to the bar for a drink. At the table next to mine, two goateed men were drinking Belgian Ale, smoking Euro-cigarettes and debating whether James Joyce's "Dubliners" is "entirely, or only moderately allegorical."
One of the most popular shows on television today is MTV's "The Real World." This unbelievably stupid show is usually staged in New York, San Francisco or some other snazzy town. I suggest that the next episode feature seven college students living in a shack in the Upper Peninsula.
They could hunt, fish and do what many up there like to do: Get unbelievably wasted and go snowmobiling. Well, I doubt this would really boost MTV's "alternative" image, but the ratings would skyrocket in rural America.
Anyway. Don't get me wrong. I love Ann Arbor, I love the University, and I often enjoy staying far away from reality - and even farther away from Grayling. After a weekend up north, I was only too happy to come back to town. A dose of reality, however, would do a number of students in town a great deal of good. Grayling is only three hours and half a world up the expressway.
- Samuel Goodstein can be reached over e-mail at faygo@umich.edu - even when he's in his red pickup, tooling around the northern northern parts.