Final thoughts with Feltes

By Greg Feltes

“Hey Greg, do you have a job yet?”

We’re leaving together/ But still it’s farewell …

“Oh, you’re living with your parents, Greg? That’s cool. I really admire losers.”

And maybe we’ll come back/ To earth, who can tell?

“Greg, you do know that students loans must be repaid, right? Also, did you get the letter in the mail about you dying alone and therefore killing your family name?”

I guess there is no one to blame/ We’re leaving ground.

“Hey Greg, do you have a job yet?”

Will things ever be the same again?/ It’s the final countdown …

It’s strange, but true: This is the last column written by Greg Feltes of the Northern Star, and graduation, which I actually get to experience because Jehovah’s Witnesses, rodeo clowns and the WWE likely got outbid, is almost here.

And now I’m torn between bolting out of DeKalb at speeds that would cause a riff in the space-time continuum and refusing to leave the life I’ve built here. There is only one middle ground, and it’s not that attractive – grad school.

Graduate students remind me of that guy in “The Shawshank Redemption” who stabbed another prisoner just so he could stay in jail longer because it’s all he knew. Sure, they are buying themselves some time, but they’ll get paroled eventually.

Not that NIU is comparable to a prison; it’s much worse. Do prisoners pay “prisoner fees” to build useless athletic arenas? Heck, no. Residence hall rooms are also smaller than jail cells. In fact, there is convincing evidence that NIU students would riot if it didn’t involve leaving PS2s, couches or artificially tanned significant others for more than 10 minutes.

If you consider college the happiest time of your life, then you are a gigantic loser – the type of person who would wait around for the perfect opportunity to claim Michael Jackson kidnapped your son.

But every once in a while, the universe, and the university along with it, found its way to complete balance and all became right at NIU – good friends and good times intertwined perfectly.

It was those moments, some of which remarkably occurred without the aid of alcohol, that made the last four years bearable.

So, in conclusion, don’t sue fast food places for making you fat, keep chasing that green light, don’t sleep with anyone on your residence hall floor (unless he or she are significantly more attractive than you) and stick together because we are all flawed people going to the same flawed school that will kick the crap out of the Wolverines Sept. 3.

And by the way, college has been the happiest time of my life. Always will be.

Feltes out.

Views and opinions in this humor column do not necessarily reflect those of the Northern Star and its staff. Send questions and comments to GFeltes @northern star.info