Welcome to Braggsville (6 page)

Then THEY texted you. Couldn't back out then, even if you wanted to—Because! Because! Because! Nonetheless! Understandably!—your heart exploded like a watermelon being eaten by an elephant.

And so YOU are at Six Flags in Vallejo. Va-yay-ho! Screams overhead; fluorescent math problems ride the sky. Vallejo was once the home of the Miwok, Suisunes, and the Patwin, a Wintun people, according to her. In 1850, the government drafted plans to build a new city within the city, a well-appointed capital district complete with a university and botanical garden, according to her. This gilt municipal zone was to be called Eureka, according to her. The irony is lost on you. The irony is not lost on you, but neither is it found. And you, Ferric, you say. A wink your reward. A tickle in your gut, shame, because that's how it always is, Banks loan quickest to those who least need money. Celaka!! Fuucked up, you say. You don't know what a ferret has to do with anything, but you'll, Ferret it out, you promise, you'll have that
vayay-ho,
that
va-jello,
that earthy gash, your own Eureka.

But first you tried to eat, Charlie and his Macho Nachos, Candice and her Paddle Handle Corn Dog (could the universe be more unfair?), Daron and his Smokehouse burger, and Louis and his Totally Kickin' Chicken, which he pushed away after two bites, I'm throwing in the chopsticks. Was it nerves, or was it that centered on the picnic table marred with initials carved, etched, and drawn, and stained with mustard and food scraps, sat a fluttering stack of memorial brochures doctored by Candice—
Adbusters
-style complete with new photos—to extoll the virtues of the Six Flags Graveyard, and one box of ashes. The remains of Ishi, if asked.

W
as this what Mrs. Brooks meant by a like-minded group? How did he get into Berkeley anyway? Professors, students, Miss Lucille—that dining hall attendant who always complimented his manners—even Daron himself. They all wondered, he knew, especially hearing his Friday-night accent,
you
—fermented—becoming a long
y'all,
and
ain't
rearing its ugly head before, worse yet, being distilled into
'ant
. He could reckon the direction of the wheels turning in their heads: budget cuts plus more out-of-state fart-sniffer students equals lower standards. They were wrong, and if they dared ask, he'd say so. Unlike some of them, he'd done it on his own. No college counselor, no private consultant to groom and polish his applicant profile, no practice admissions interviews. Hard work, summer school, and all the AP he could eat were his salvation, the price of his admission. That, and he wrote a damned fine application letter.

He had revised for weeks, reading every Wikipedia entry on writing, watching every YouTube video on the application process, some links provided by the school, others he found on his own, checking out every book of cover letters from the library. He even ordered online, with his lunch money, a book entitled
100 of the Best Application Essays Ever!
He consulted, at their insistence, his father and his
AP English teacher. His father's advice: Tell the truth. A man's word is his only honor, and honor is the only currency that never needs exchanging. His English teacher's advice: Teachers spend most of their lives reading piss-rich attempts at mind reading. Distinguish yourself in writing by being completely yourself and speaking your piece, even if your opinion runs contrary to the popular position, in fact, more so in those instances. D'aron had done just that, at the end, working in secret.

Freshman applicant prompt:

                    
Describe the world you come from—for example, your family, community or school—and tell us how your world has shaped your dreams and aspirations.

Dear _________ Application Committee,

                    
I am submitting respectfully this essay written for your perusal.

                    
If we were a TV show, we'd be a soap opera. If we were a musical, we'd be a rock opera. But, in real life, we're a Shakespeare play, Romeo and Juliet.

                    
I was born into a working-class family in the heart of Georgia. My mother's family was Irish and my father's family was descended from coal miners. They never had much, but we worked hard and made our way up. Mostly everyone works for the Kenny Hot Air factory where they make motors for the hand dryers used all across our great United States of America. The Davenports and the McCormicks never got along until my folks were married. We believe in diversity and multi-cultural-ism.

                    
My father wanted to go to college, but after coming back from Honorably serving his country in the First Gulf War, the
GI Bills weren't any use because he had to work and couldn't commute seventy-five miles each way to the nearest community college. Now he is a floor manager and enrolled to earn an online degree in business because capitalism is the future of the world and even China realizes that now, after what Reagan did to Russia and Germany.

                    
My community is working class. When we get together each summer for the annual town picnic, we all share food and really we're like one big community. We have the most Special Forces soldiers in all of the state per capita. We don't have a school in town or a college nearby. The nearest community college is 75 miles away and the high school is in the next town.

                    
My town is small, only 700 people, so I had to be bused to school. I integrated well and managed to get along with everybody. I was captain of the debate team and I once saved my grandmother after she was lost in the woods for three days with cancer. It was a scary time.

                    
We're blue collar, but proud and my family supports the American spirit and the freedom we're bringing to the middle east, and our town has that same kind of spirit. We're all red, white, and blue underneath.

                    
I want to major in political science, bio-engineering, and bio-technology because people require peace, parsimonious food, and hygienic water. We also need to protect the earth. Ecology is the future. Not a day goes by when we don't see a volcano erupting or an earthquake. Global warming is debasing the atmosphere and only we can prohibit it.

                    
I am also interested in education because we need better schools and no child should be left behind. The children are the future. After I graduate, I will also teach. My town needs a summer camp that doesn't involve hunting and camping
and whittling. Trees have rights, too. It should involve things to prepare you for the real world, like math and science and computers.

                    
That is why I am applying to ______________. _____________ has the best programs in these majors. Every time I read the paper, I see someone from _____________ being quoted in the news and giving scientific evidence and explanations for how we can make the world a better place for everybody. That's how I know that ______________ is the school for me.

Prompt for all applicants:

                    
Tell us about a personal quality, talent, accomplishment, contribution or experience that is important to you. What about this quality or accomplishment makes you proud and how does it relate to the person you are?

One day I was down at Lou Davis's Cash-n-Carry Bait Shop and Copy Center, where the slogan is “You Want Credit, Come Back Tomorrow.”

                    
I was after gum, but killing time. It's dim in there, the only light comes off the iceboxes. Ever since I was little I liked to stand there in the blue glow and pretend I was on a spaceship. That day it was hot, so hot I had to walk to cool down. I walked along the big fridge and freezer, feeling the chill, and saw all the venison sausage and souse and Georgia hash, which was all pretty cheap, cheaper than Jimmy Dean, but more than it would really cost to hunt. I added up the cost of the shells, and the gun, and the time, and the deer lick, and the beer, and whatever else. They'd just built a Super Walmart two towns over, and I thought about how you could
track out all day after a deer, or you could shoot up to Super Walmart or Lou's and be back in a couple hours with all you needed for a week.

                    
So I decided I didn't need to hunt anymore. It didn't make sense.

                    
Now understand that my hometown has produced more Special Forces soldiers per capita than any other town in America.

                    
And when the season opens there's more hunters out than trees can shake a leaf at. When the season closes, there's still more hunters out than trees can shake sticks at. Everyone has trophies mounted over their mantels or the front porch and the first buck is a bigger occasion than the 13th birthday.

                    
You got to understand we're proud, and we respect prey drive. We put down dogs that don't hunt.

                    
So, I got more hell for this than for being a Battlestar Galactica fan or complaining that Lost was stupid. But I argued that we didn't sew our own clothes even though there were still patches of wild cotton at the edge of the old Southerby Plantation and that we didn't make our own shoes even though there was a dairy two exits up, and a hemp farm in the next county so we could make laces.

                    
I'd been a scout all my life, all the way up to Eagle Scout, but hunting just didn't make sense. I stuck with my guns and am proud of that decision to this day, even though everyone still teases me about it. I won't repeat here the names they call me.

                    
My father took it hard because that was the one thing we did together that my mom just wouldn't go for. But he hasn't given up on me, right now he's snoring soundly, thinking that I'm pecking away at a letter to UGA.

Freshman applicant prompt:

(Revision)

                    
Describe the world you come from—for example, your family, community, or school—and tell us how your world has shaped your dreams and aspirations.

Dear Sir of [sic] Madam,

                    
My mother helped me write several previous drafts of this personal statement. In them, we listed accomplishments such as the Eagle scouts, the volunteer work for the local Red Cross, and my membership (for one day) in the Braggsville Historical Preservation and Dissemination Society. We also listed my participation in several school organizations and the time I saved my cousin from drowning, saved a cat from a bird, and saved my grandmother from certain starvation when she wandered off into the Holler and got lost. I also claimed a long-term interest in about a dozen majors that aren't even related.

                    
I learned a good word in the process: logorrhea. Not only were those letters too long, and had too many fancy words, the biggest problem was I didn't remember many of these things. I will not dare to question their veracity. It was my mother who spoke those words, mind you. But the fact that I could neither remember these renowned events with which my extended family regaled each other around the Green Egg, nor supply my own memories, explains exactly how my world has shaped my dreams and aspirations. As my cousin Quint would say, I've been worked over by a one-armed potter.

                    
It is not a college admission board who I write at this late hour, long after the parental units have retired because I need to write this on my own, it is to a parole board that I write.

                    
I love my family and my town. My parents never went to college, but have done right by me all their lives. They didn't take my schooling for granted and they made me study and take summer classes, and made me read all those test-taking books because they wanted me to go to college, but neither could tell me what for, other than that I have to. And for years I never understood why I have to, especially when they want me to go right up the road. But I need to get out of shouting distance of this place where everyone secretly calls school, Juvie!, and openly calls prison, School!

                    
So in addressing the parole board in this hearing I feel I must demonstrate that I have changed, that I have atoned for whatever sin caused me to be born in this partially dry county, that I have learned my lesson. And I have.

                    
I have learned that no matter where you go to school, it's what you do after school that counts. But, we don't have an afterschool program. I have learned that kids from all different areas can get along if given a chance, but our schools rarely meet and have only limited contact with other schools. I have learned that sports can bring people of different races and colors together to work for a common goal, but I don't play sports and we only have one team, and it has only one race on it. I have learned that with access to public health care people avoid dying unnecessarily painful and lonely deaths, but the nearest hospital is over 100 miles away.

                    
I have learned all this from reading books and watching the History Channel and Discovery because my town is tiny. It isn't even on most maps, and we never had a representative. All our lives we wanted to matter, and we've applied for the Special Olympics, the Georgia Games, and the Capital Seat, all to no luck. We've tried, but our resources are limited until
someone invests something in us, like time and a little money and a little outside influence.