1974 and the Phones it Wrought
I'm not sure I'll ever get over the "sculptura" phone. It's just the most beautiful phone ever!
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I'm not sure I'll ever get over the "sculptura" phone. It's just the most beautiful phone ever!
Now that I think about it, I think that my first few months at Kenyon were a lot like being in Paris a couple of weeks ago.
I've studied French for years, can even claim a certain fluency with it but, when I went to Paris, I realized, quickly, that there's still so much I don't know. I don't know how to make the sounds in between the words. I don't know which expressions and intonations really go with the words. It's as though I can speak autistic French.
So, I have this memory of a dinner hosted by the English department at Kenyon. There were about a dozen or so professors, a handful of students, and August Kleinzahler. We had some clear onion soup and there I was, the only first-year invited (how this happened, I'll never know) and sitting next to Mr. Kleinzahler himself. There were all sorts of interesting bits of conversation being thrown around the table hinging mainly on poetry and Kenyon, etc. and I knew, the way you know that you shouldn't talk during church, that I needed to shut up and listen. The problem was that the more I listened, the more I realized I had nothing to say and, even if I did, it would take me a week to learn how to say it. I can tell you that the table linens were dark red and that I was wearing a knee-length green skirt. As a lull in the conversation opened up, Mr. Kleinzahler very politely asked me to tell him a little bit about myself. I told him that I worked at a deli that summer. I probably whispered it. He nodded and said "hmm, a deli." After that, there was more silence, a strange look from everyone at the table and more time passed as I listened until I could go home.
