I'm Still Learning

In my freshman year at the University of Maryland, I had a disgruntled professor named Jon Franklin. I might have cared more about what he was saying if he sounded like he wanted to be there any more than I did. History of journalism? Not a difficult thing to make boring, but he was good at it. Printing press, yellow journalism, Edward R. Murrow, yadda yadda yadda.

What's more, Franklin spent what seemed like the first half of the semester on advertising and how "we, the readers, were the ones being sold to the advertisers." What?!? Dude, stop grumbling and explain yourself! The man seemed constantly frustrated - from the start - that we didn't "get it." It was as though he expected us to know what he was talking about before he said it. Clearly the material meant a lot to him, but that passion came out in the form of anger, rather than in creative teaching methods. This was a man who planned to say his opinions, have us memorize them, and then repeat them for his pointless little tests.

Nothing is worse, as a student who wants to learn, than just being forced to repeat what is being said by the teacher, especially when I don't even know what he's talking about. Can't learn anything if the teacher doesn't let you think for yourself, no? Either way, he was not getting through to me. For a kid interested in journalism, this man was the opposite of an inspiration.

At the end of the year, I learned this man, this rotund, balding man, this grizzly-bearded man, this grouchy, grumpy, malcontent man, was a two-time Pulitzer-prize winning journalist and a leading member of the innovative "new-wave" of non-fiction-novel reporting - a writing style of novelizing non-fiction.

With the Baltimore Sun, Jon Franklin won the first ever Pulitzer prize for feature writing in 1979, and the first ever Pulitzer prize for expository (or explanatory) journalism in 1985. Since then, he has published 5 books, and wrote for many science magazines, known best for humanizing his subjects

Photo of Jon Franklin....
and you thought I was exaggerating.

I've learned more from Jon Franklin since my time with him has passed. I learned he was right, of course, that the audience is sold to the advertisers. I've learned the elements of storytelling, which he was right about as well. I've learned that, just because he's aged, it doesn't mean he wasn't 'new-school' at some point in time.

I've also learned that - even though he did not inspire me as a teacher - his words have been an inspiration to many. He's quoted here by a teacher from VCU: "Back when I first started, I thought intelligence was the most important attribute a reporter could have. I have since changed my mind. You do have to be intelligent, but the big thing is courage. Courage to open your mind and let the whole damned confusing world in. Courage to always be the ignorant one, on somebody else's turf. Courage to stand corrected. Courage to take criticism. Courage to grow with your experiences. Courage to accept what you don't understand. Most of all, courage to see what is there and not what you want to think is there."

I think I can learn something from that.

Race War: The Squirrel Saga

University of Maryland: College Park. Upstanding state university. Questionable administrative policies. Rampant rodent war-zone.

Several days ago, I was granted the opportunity to return to campus after a year of being away. I started my first year of law school in Baltimore the fall following graduation and never really found a reason to come back to the university and visit. Fellow gent Jason Schlafstein was in accompaniment and, after a rigorous brainstorming session over some Indian food, we decided to spend some time just relaxing on the mall - an activity neither of us had done in some time. Passing through the construction of what was Tawes Theater, Jason shared his lament over the loss of a source of memories while I chattered on about one of the first things I had noticed about the campus when I transferred to UMD - the Squirrel Race War of '05 - '08.

Eastern Grey Squirrel

(Sciurus carolinensis)

Crazy, I know. Under the crust of this slice of American academia, the fires of xenophobic warfare raged on unwitnessed. The squirrel community was torn apart in a ferocious campaign for territory and resources. Splinter groups segregated and reformed, collecting and nesting according to the color of one's fur. The large plot of land we knew and used as "the Mall" served as a trench-less, open air battlefield where the five Squirrel Clans (the Greys, the Reds, the Browns, the Neither-nors, and the Dark Ones) vied for conquest and dominance. Sidewalks divided the Mall into separate territories to fight over. Each clan worked to eliminate the other from their respective plots of grass, braving the coverless concrete in desperate charge, hoping to bring their clan that much closer to supreme rule over the entire campus and its abundance of wild nuts and dropped food. Admittedly, I'm embellishing and being slightly theatrical, but it happened all the same. The squirrels teamed up according to color and fought over the Mall on a daily basis.

I noticed this for three reasons: 1) I'm a verifiable crazy person 2) I transferred into UMD my sophomore year, leaving me with crappy housing and scheduling options. I spent a lot of time on the mall during the day - reading, cross-wording, observing, and making up stories about the unfamiliar people and things around me. I tend to make up stories in this fashion fairly often and I did this sort of thing with the squirrels, as well. Care for a sample?

The Greys, lead of course by Squeaker the Mighty, launched a harrowing offensive against the Dark One's and their leader, Overlord Fuzzles. Fuzzles and his men were outnumbered, exhausted from taking a patch of land from the Browns that morning, and were absent their largest advantage in the daylight. Given the ferocity of Squeaker and the Greys, Fuzzles was pressed to his heels . The battle ended swiftly, leading to a fast retreat by the Dark Ones, and the Greys celebrated their victory with barking and acorns. Securing this plot meant the Greys occupied a majority of the plots on the Mall today. Squeaker gave a rousing speech to commemorate the occasion and declared a holiday from battle. Meanwhile, Grouse the Half-breed, chosen hero of the Neither-nors, sat high in the Neither-nor tree-base on the Mall's south edge, stroking his greyish-red tail, plotting, and waiting for a break in the Grey's now thin defenses. To Grouse, the Grey Clan was Rome. And, he wanted their Caesar's head on a twig.

"The Squirrel who fights for his clan in battle, fights for the future. And acorns. Which means more future."

Squeaker the Mighty, Elected Leader of the Grey Clan

(Reason 1 can now be read as: pure unadulterated insanity)

Reason 3? Well, at UMBC the squirrels were just far more friendly by comparison. Seriously, they never ran unless you, literally, reached out and touched them. As a result, "squirrel tag" was a common place phenomenon (a game where a person would run up, touch a squirrel on the tail, and then run away. The person who touches the most squirrels wins). The photography students also discovered to their delight that the squirrels were so socialized that when the students presented cameras the squirrels would strike a pose until the cameras were gone. What's more, they never tended to fight amongst their own kind. Unbelievable amicability.

Given, they were all brown squirrels. Maybe that had something to do with it.