WAS (Carson Hall)

 


WAS (Carson)
 
40 years ago today a swift brown fox
crossed the road between the campus
as we drove up the hill in our  green 65
Ford Fairlane  just before 4^th of July--
moving from Raleigh  and the engineers
of NC State.
 
Life is exquisite and amazing and floods
back like an ongoing surrounding movie:
the whole 70 + years –even the awful stuff
feels golden and I hardly know how to
appreciate it then or now.
 
The pond had a robust diving board as well as
a raft in the middle and life guard. Thunder
showers every afternoon.  We learned we
were living in a rain forest.
 
My first class at 8:am in Carson basement, I
asked a question and no body answered,. We
sat silent as Quakers the whole hour.
 
Weekends began 12:30 Saturday, after last class.
 
Olin Carmichael. a rigorous history teacher
delivered his whole lecture to empty seats in
Carson 102 once when no one came.  .
 
President Holden dressed as  Santa every year,
sat in a wagon & got pulled into Glad by faculty
reindeer with red pingpong balls on their noses to
give gifts to faculty children.  The good ones.
 
During Once Upon a Time (spring festival)  he
MC'd as Winnie the Pooh.
 
Later he declared there be a bar in the basement
of  Gladfelter.  We celebrated Octoberfests and
Casino nights. People  would slip & slide on spilt beer.
 
An Arab student named Kartalab violated visiting
hours in the girls dorm  and electrocuted himself
tossing a line across the road to make contact with
his girlfriend..
 
My beagle Zeke got elected homecoming queen.
Mary Sue Rix (dean of students) canceled the result.
 
One spring we played whole-campus Capture the Flag.
Students dressed as clowns burst into classrooms and
sprayed us with large squirt guns.
 
Gladfelter had PONG.
 
I coached tennis for a season and we beat Mars Hill
and Montreat like anything.
 
The fall I was appointed Dean, President Holden took
the administration down to Nantahala for a rafting trip.
Wives and all. 
 
Work Program: I painted women’s dorms with Norm
Probst, Gladfelter outside and inside; put storm windows
up with Dusty Benedict, unsuccessfully attempted to
separate two copulating faculty dogs with Hugh Himan,
hosed down the piggery over xmas break, disced fields
in the summer for Ernst Laursen, & drove the Blue Bird
bus to town for Sam Devries.  Also: was a very poor
fireman assistant to Tom Showalter but got to drive the
2 fire engines—you had to double clutch.  . 
 
David Holt & Joan Beebe & me got the Appalachian
Music program installed. Joan found the funds. David
did all the work, bringing in local old-time musicians  to
serve as instructors. .
 
Sharon Lytle and Christa Bridgman  took my courses
Rodney and  twin Ronald dressed alike sometimes
jogged all over campus together & down to the pond
for a swim.

That's when we had  a diving board and raft in the middle. . .
 
(Christa gave herself a B in Am lit  although she deserved  an
A, no doubt!)
 
Life is exquisite and amazing and floods back like
an ongoing surrounding movie: the whole 70 + years
–even the awful stuff feels golden and I hardly know
how to appreciate it then or now.

xxxooo, Sam