The man, the myth, the legend.

   Here I am sitting in an office chair in the confines of an Edison State Community College classroom. Black NEC computer monitors linked to a row of black IBM computers are lined and mounted on the multitudes of particle board desks against the flat, white drywall of a typical Edison classroom. In the background is a large man. He is about 6 foot 4, he weighs approximately 230 – 240 pounds. He is sporting a horribly groomed beard of auburn tint and his hair is in a frizz with matching color. We wears stylish, coffee shop style, black rimmed glasses, and he parades around in his latest GQ magazine clothing preaching the Gospels of fine writing. His name is Stephen Quincy Marlowe. He is 32 years old, with degrees from the University of Iowa, Toledo, and Arizona. He is a practicing writer, lawyer, and community college professor. And he has made a dramatic impact on my life since the course of my junior year of high school. I present to you in the next couple of blogs a group of teachers who have had a significant contribution to my character and development as a human being. I start with Mr. Stephen Quincy Marlowe Esquire, jack of all trades, greatest teacher of one, life.

   He may teach Composition 121, 122, 123, and a slew of law classes between the Edison campuses of Darke and Miami County, but my interaction with him benefited in the lessons of life, not of Robespierre, Jefferson, and Hawthorne. Marlowe should me in our converations that I could be whatever I wanted to be. I had always known this before in my life, but just took it as a common cliche of American society. He told me that there is no reason why I could not make the grades of my peers, and why I could not be the best, academically, or at least in work effort within my class. His words were elequent, and fiery, and inspiring, and I took them to heart. From that moment on my GPA has been much better, and my lackluster effort has now transcribed into a much more dedicated effort.

  Marlowe also fired me up to defend social issues I believe in, and how to support them. More times than not I did not agree with Marlowe on many social issues, but it was the quality of the conversation that strengthened me as an individual. I was able to attack things analytically, critically and with surgeon like percision. This ability has stuck with me throughout the past two years at a highly successful rate, and I suspect that it will in years to come. Through these debates and these discussions on people, college, and society we became friends. Something absolutely essential to being a great teacher, is having a great relationship with each of your students. My friendship with Mr. Marlowe probably has a great deal to do with why I respect his brilliance so much and his impact on my life.

    The care he puts into each student is the key to what makes him such a great teacher. He teaches more than the subject, he teaches to the human being. A man more concerned about the student in his class, than the contents of his syllabus. His jokes may be bad, his stories hilarious, and his dress dry as toast, but his personality and his effort are vibrant and tremendous. He brings all of his guns to a shootout, and leaves nothing behind. He works hard, and loves hard too. It’s all of this that makes him man, myth, and legend, and one of a handful of teachers that have had the most significant, positive impact on my life.

Thank you SQM. 🙂

Half conscious

Over the years I have found that lying in my bed right before going to bed is one of the most creative, intense, occasionally loopy, and amazing times of my life. It is here in this paradox of thoughts that I make up moves for a lip sync, think of ways to suprise a loved one, think of conspiracy theories involving red, Russians, and tennis. It is here where I converse with God at perhaps my most intimate point. It is here where I retrace every room and design of the high school in my mind one hallway at a time. It is here that I think of friends, and my admiration for them, and I search myself, seeing what I need to do for me. Isn’t it amazing that this psychadelic train of thoughts can last an hour long, maybe even two hours. I always think, wow, there is no way I would be able to lie in my room at 3 pm and do the same thing, only at night, only when I am tired can this happen.

The mind is a powerful and curious thing. It drifts from place to place, seeks ambitions, finds answers. They may not always be right, but they may be suffice enough to solve the mysteries within yourself. The thoughts can make you hungry too. Hungry to find the answer. They can give you desire. Desire to go wrestle, or play tennis, or do whatever it is that you like to do. The thoughts aren’t always the best, but they’re always full of ambition and inspiration, and curiosity.

I love it when it’s dark out, and I love it when I’m tired alongside it. I love to think, I love to ponder, I love to jest with myself about so many things. Jokes are given birth here, great ideas, and desire on top of all that. When I’m half conscious I truely do leave the confines of my bedroom and drift into a land of fantasy and knowledge. Thank you mind, and get out of town Freud.

Lip Sync again

A lot of excitement has been generated around Sidney about this Lip Sync on Thursday. It’s pretty much a showdown between Gutman and me.

I got a group together and I give tons of credit to all of them. We’re all working hard, wanting to win. I am most exicted about this upcoming Lip Sync, moreso than any other Lip Sync in the past. I gurantee that I will not be able to sleep Wednesday night.

Anyway, here is the picture that we have launched to get people excited about Lip Sync this year. Enjoy:

http://viewmorepics.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=viewImage&friendID=11326967&imageID=1476375746

Sorry, had to use a link. The file is like 7 500 kb.

Happy Turkey Day

How does Thanksgiving work at your home?

At mine we all gather to grandma’s house in the metropolitan area known as Maplewood, OH. population 50. As of late the attendance has varied from 15 – 25, but nonetheless we all still get together and see one another. The common staples of our thanksgiving meal include turkey, mashed potatoes, dressing, rolls, noodles, some sort of cornbread thing, some cheese dishes, grandma’s custard pie, pumpkin pie, angel food cake, and some jello for good measure. We always eat at 1 pm at my grandmother’s farmhouse, and we’re always done by 2.

Now, most of the people in my family are of 50 years or older. They all pronounce things funny. For instance, creek is pronounced crick, Bush is pronounced Boosh, and refrigerator is pronounced refurgerator. Common conversation amongst the men include Ohio State football, the Cleveland Browns, the great Republican party, the craptastic quality of the President (although they rallied around him today,) retirement, and of course the aches and pains. They all try to outdue each other, and they all have no idea as to what they are talking about.

I haven’t been a fan of the Michigan Wolverines since I was 10 years old, but for some reason my uncles all think that I still am one, so for the past 4 years they have made fun of me, and “laid on the heat” because I am a Michigan “fan.” I of course play along, because it gives us something to talk about and some Joy amongst family members, even if it makes me mad each time they do it.

The food. Well, being Ohioan middle aged men and predominately farmers, they all eat quite a bit. So the typical eating competition comes by every Turkey day. Of course being the old people that they are, they reminisce to the days of old when they could eat more, and their hay bailen’ boys were around to hogmunch down on the food with them. They all talk big game, but hardly back it up. The Casey stick boys always outperform, and each time we start the rest of the family is always in denile of such eating ability, but concedes the loss at the end of every Thanksgiving; this is without fail.

At your Thanksgiving do relatives always guess how old you are, but never get it right? Aunt Sally, “wow Billy, what are you, 16 now?” “Ummm, no Aunt Sally I’m actually 17, even though you’ve thought I was 16 for about 3 years now.” But you never say the second part of that sentence.

In addition, the family members usually make some sort of comment about your height or your weight, in either case discussing how much you seem to have grown. I’ve been 6’3 for the past 3 Thanksgivings now, but somehow each year I seem to magically grow another few inches each year in my aunt’s eyes. But family is family.

We’re glad to see them, and Thanksgiving just would not be the same without them, no matter how grueling it can be at times. It’s one of the best 3 hours of my day during the holiday. Even if jokes aren’t funny, air is confused for ciggarette smoke, babies are bawling and rolling around, and no one really remembers any detail about one another aside from their sex and relation to themselves, we’re still family, and we’re still meeting together to share a bit of each other’s lives.

Happy Turkey Day to all, and to all, a goodnight!

College sports

I love sports. I mean, I just love them. I’m a statistical freak, I really want to go “Stump the Schwab” and I want to show Schwabie that I can destroy him at stats when it is what he reads for a living. I don’t know where I’m going with that.

Anyway, I love college sports more than professional sports. I was inspired to blog this after watching the end of the North Carolina/Gonzaga college basketball game. It was amazing. The chanting, the jumping, the craziness, it’s phenominal. It is the fans of college athletics that makes it far superior to professional sports. Much like a soccer chant at the World Cup, or the electricity of a match up experienced live at the stadium, the viewer is envigorated from the frantic frenzy that takes place on their television screen during a collegiant sporting event. Holy cow.

Cameron Crazies and Whoo Pig Sooey.

These kids are just insane. Bonkers for their team. And even if your alma mater isn’t Duke or Arkansas, you still experience feelings of hate or love for the team, or at least the team’s fans. If you do not fall into one of those catagories, you have no soul, or you’re a woman.

But alas, there are problems feuding between college sports and their athletes. And instead of plagiarizing or giving you a synopsis of my viewpoints on this issue, I’ll present to you my writing hero, Malcolm Gladwell. He offers quite an article on it, and of course, my viewpoint on this mirrors his. The following is completely the work of Malcolm Gladwell, all rights and credit go to him. I love you baby.

NCAA Redux

 

“There is an adage in the legal world that difficult cases make bad law—that is, that it is foolish to draw general principles from exceptional circumstances. A number of readers have argued that this is just what I’ve done with the Bomar and McElrathbey examples. After all, most college athletes don’t cheat, and most college athletes aren’t the legal guardians of their little brothers. So why toss out a system that works perfectly well in most cases because of its failures on the margin?

I think that’s a fair criticism. So let me try again. I don’t agree that Bomar and McElrathbey really are “difficult cases.” Although the particular circumstances in which they ran afoul of the NCAA are unusual, the reason for their predicament is not. In fact, I think, both cases point to a problem that runs through the NCAA’s treatment of just about everyone: the idea that a regulatory agency can have jurisdiction over the entire life of athlete.

I made this point before, briefly. But it’s worth restating in more detail. McElrathbey is an athlete. He is also a student, a brother and, now the legal guardian of his younger brother. The NCAA’s formal mandate is to govern students in their capacity as athletes. But here, in forbidding McElrathbey from accepting outside donations to help him take care of his little brother, the NCAA has extended its jurisdiction to govern McElrathbey in his capacity as a brother and legal guardian.

I think that’s outrageous. We all accept the fact that if we attend a high school or a college, that institution can impose a certain behavioral code on us when we are attending that school. But a high school that forbids its students to wear miniskirts or jeans or torn t-shirts cannot extend those restrictions to the way students dress when they aren’t at school. Authority is necessarily tempered by the question of jurisdiction.

Bomar’s case raises the same issue. His ability as a football player made him a celebrity in Norman Oklahoma. Because of that celebrity, the car dealership that employed him was willing to pay him an extra several thousand dollars (the $18,000 figure initially quoted in some news reports, by the way, is wrong). Was that sleazy? Of course it was. Was it an underhanded way for a booster to get money to a star player? Totally. But working at a car dealership is not playing football, and football the only thing over which the NCAA rightfully has jurisdiction. Sure Bomar got paid for doing little or nothing. But the hallways of Oklahoma—like the hallways of every college in this country—are filled with students who for one reason or another got paid a lot of money on their summer vacation to do little or nothing. (I would include myself in this. In the summer of my junior year the Government of Ontario paid me to do almost nothing at a theater group called Toronto Workshop Productions. Let just say a good time was had by all).

The NCAA would respond that they have to police Bomar and McElrathbey in all of their various roles and incarnations because they are defending an all inclusive ethic—amateurism. To be an amateur is like being a virgin. It’s not situational. It’s absolute. McElrathbey, the NCAA would say, has to understand that the requirements of amateurism, in his instance, are in unfortunate but unavoidable conflict with the freedom to accept outside financial assistance.

Fine. In theory, I can buy that argument.

But wait. Surely if you want to defend an absolute ethic, you have to defend it absolutely. That’s the way it was in the late 19th century, when the principles of amateur sport were first codified. Back then, the games were free. The coaches were volunteers, and certainly no one was pulling down millions of dollars from Bowl Game appearances. The amateur ideal applied to everyone.

Now? It only applies to athletes. If I’m Oklahoma, I’m allowed by the NCAA to trade on the celebrity created by my football prowess and sign a $500,000 endorsement deal with Nike. But if I’m Oklahoma’s quarterback, I’m not allowed to trade on the celebrity created by my football prowess and make a few extra dollars in my part-time job. If I’m Clemson University, I can pay my men’s football coach $1.1 million a year in salary to coach an “amateur” athletic team. But if my cornerback wants to accept gifts from the public to help raise his little brother, he can’t. Why? Because he happens to play on that “amateur” football team. I repeat what I wrote in that last post. I cannot, for the life of me, make sense of that position.

I’m not advocating the end of amateurism. I think the NCAA killed amateurism long ago, when it decided that this grand noble “ethic” applied only to athletes, and not the coaches and athletic departments and schools they play for.”

Lip Sync

Lip Sync, November 30th, 7 pm, Sidney High School, we’re leapfrogging.

Do You Want – Franz Ferdinand

Matt Casey, Eric Renner, Zac Watson, Steven Billups, Anthony Dinzeo

Be.

There.

Lost in translation

I was going to blog about something today. Something that happened to me. However, I continued to play with my presentation features first. Now, I do not know how many of you are reading my blog, or how closely you are paying attention, but today alone I have changed the presentation of my blog 4 or 5 times. I cannot find something that I like, but ultimately “Banana Smoothie” is my favorite so far. Furthermore, I cannot find out how to edit the stupid side tabs. Tabs like links to other web sites, and descriptions of my blog and so on. It is most frustrating.

I am lost in translation because on the old blog I could do all the things I wanted to do with the technology that was at hand. Problem is, on Word Press, I have more technology to use, and I cannot for the life of me figure any of it out. Most aggrivating.

I’m lost in translation.

Style, anyone?

Today I finally got my senior pictures taken. A certain Mr. Todd Acker was the man who performed the dastardly deed. He was fabulous, if you are looking for someone to take your senior pictures, or for some of you, wedding pictures, this guy is your man in the Sidney area. He made me laugh, he made me loosen up.

Now, I am usually a pretty easy going character, but with something like senior pictures I wanted to look suave, cool, debonair, and most of all… not stupid. Todd made me forget about trying to be Mr. GQ and got me focused on being Mr. Matt Casey. Thanks Todd.

This happens quite a lot in our lives actually. I’ve heard it said once that people have 3 identities. The 1st identity is how you present yourself to your friends. Maybe you laugh at things you think aren’t funny, or you hang around people you don’t like so you can fit in better. Maybe you dress black, maybe you dress in vogue, maybe you’re senical, maybe you’re comical, but one thing’s for certain, you’re not yourself. The 2nd identity is how you present yourself to your family, particularly to your parents. You may shell yourself off from your parents wishing not to express any feelings whatsoever because you would be giving in to the enemy. You listen to your loud music, or run away to a foreign land with your nose in a book, just so you don’t have to put up with your family. You are an independent, self-relient rogue. And lastly, your last identity is the way you present yourself to yourself. More times than not this is the guy (or gal) that you are most honest with in your life. But even sometimes we still manage to lie to ourselves. Why does such an epidemic of identity occur?

The world, society, or more pungently described, our mentors (whether they know it or not) are the ones who influence such a decision the most. Little girls long to be Lindsay Lohan and Tyra Banks, and guys long to be Brad Pitt or Matthew McCoughna-whatever. The perfect person that is portrayed on television by our mentors of many, or society are disgusting.

Find yourself through your Creator. The One who knows you more than you know yourself. He who created every fiber of your being. I gurantee you will be much more consistent with who you are and as a result much more confident. You will love yourself and embrace a relationship once thought to be distant, but one that is now incredibly close.

This is to say that once you have acheived such a security, you will not slip up every now and then as I did. Hopefully you’ll have somebody to keep you in check. Someone who will help keep you on road to your goals, ambitions, servitudes, praise, love, Joy, and respect of self. Love each other, love your God, and for goodness’ sake, love yourself. 🙂

I’ve gone bananas.

My current background is merely temporary. I really am a big fan of bananas and their delicious goodness. I remember a time in 3rd grade when Justin Griffis told me I couldn’t eat 10 bananas in one lunch setting. Well being the adventerous type that I am and was I took on the challenge with full throttle. Digging 5 ft holes in my backyard with mere miniature farm equipment had been accomplished because I wanted to go to China, how could eating 10 bananas be any more difficult?

I proceeded to ask everyone in the lunchroom for a banana, and granted little boys and little girls giggled at me as I continued on my quest, but after completing the daunting task of munching down on 10 bananas, I was well received with applause. Maybe this is the root of why I seek so much attention? No, ‘course not!

Just as 9 years ago was the rising of a dawn symbolizing my passion for bananas, today is the rising of a new dawn; the dawn of my new blog.

Enjoy, and don’t eat it all at once.

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