Animal mating call breeds discontent

The past three years of my college career, life has been different. My years still have seasons, that is the same, but now there are only two of them.

The year starts in September when I unpack all of my worldly possessions and cram them into a closet-sized space where I will spend the next nine months of the "school season."

Around May begins my second season. I pack up my worldly possessions once more and cram them into a car and head home to Wisconsin. Once I get there, starts the "work season."

At first, adjusting to only having two seasons was difficult. After 18 years of four seasons spread across 12 months in one place,the adjustment was not an easy one to make.

Now after three awkward years of splitting my life into years of two seasons, and dragging my possessions across two states, one season disappeared.

This year there would be no "working season." There would be no return home where I could spend nine to 12 hours a day doing hard labor to make money for the upcoming "school season."

Oh sure, I still had to pack up my possessions, but they just got dragged across campus and thrust into another slightly bigger closet-sized space where they will stay for three months while I take summer classes.

As if losing a season wasn't enough of an adjustment to be made, I am experiencing a strange kind of culture shock. It is happening in a place I have lived the past nine months. A place that I have come to feel comfortable and confident of my knowledge of the cheap gas stations, and the best sandwiches.

The shock began shortly after my roommate and I moved into our "summer home," Mitchell Hall. What appeared to be a normal residence hall during the previous "school seasons" had somehow developed a "singles club" atmosphere.

One friend of mine was frequently hooted and hollered at whenever she walked out the front door of the building. Would-be male suitors seemed waiting to pursue her around every corner. She loves the outdoors and the sun, but she was terrified to go outside after an aggressive male refused to take her objections to his attention seriously.

What these BOYS (as this kind of behavior no real man would be associated with) fail to understand is that the residence hall is just like your house, or an apartment. A living place, a sanctuary. Would you hang around the outside of a stranger's front door, plant yourself on their porch next to their mail box or doormat then yell "Hey baby," as they tried to proceed into their home? I think not.

The construction I can get used to, the classes, the sometimes seemingly empty campus yet somehow miraculously ALWAYS filled parking lots. I can even accept the heat, and the musty spell of damp wood or the dust that has never been cleaned out of the shower stalls. But what I absolutely cannot stand for is the blatant disrespect to my friends, my summer family, outside of our summer "home."

There is no excuse for the kind of behavior I have been forced to witness and even have at some points been subjected to. Whistling, hooting, shouting comments, hollering out windows, and refusing to acknowledge an individual right to live life without harassment is not a compliment, nor is it a way to get attention from nice girls.

To the boys that like a girl, or are intrigued enough to want to make some kind of noise, which an instigator might argue is a complimentary gesture, I say this: Girls appreciate sincerity, kindness and ingenuity. Anything that indicates an iota of respect will be much better received by a serious college girl than sporadic yowls. If you want to make noises to attract a mate, I hear there is a zoo in the Twin Cities. Try your luck there.

Email Story to a Friend        Printer Friendly Version