Balancing Delicately: What’s so special about Specialty Floors?
BY RONNIE BLACK
GMC doesn’t have Fraternities or Sororities, but it has a similar form of housing as the organizations I just mentioned. There are several floors on campus known as the specialty floors because the residents have some special qualities about them.
The Rec kids have their own floor on campus, which is better known as North Pit. The Rec kids’ idea of a good time is filling a kayak with PBR and shotgunning it through the drain plug. If you don’t know what I’m talking about, then count yourself lucky. These are the only people besides NASA that can make a career out of falling off things and breaking expensive equipment. Speaking of equipment, have you seen the robotic kangaroo legs? The Rec kids can be seen waltzing around on these spring-loaded stilts and it is just another aspect of this college that will hold a special place in my heart. I urge you to take a field trip and visit our fellow outdoor enthusiasts. Their floor has a half pipe and a bouldering cave in the common room and plenty of other toys. So if you like rock climbing, paddling, biking or some other awesome variety of adrenaline pumping activity, the floor has them all.
The Creative Arts and Living Floor or the CALF is equally unique in that the students here want to live an “alternative” lifestyle. I take this to mean that they live off the meal plan even though several times a week you can see residents of this floor sneaking in to steal the Chartwell’s food they so strongly rebel against. As a sophomore, I went into the basement of Cree not knowing that this was CALF territory. What I was met with was the strong smell of “herbs” and some kind of techno rave mixed with a Christmas party. I guess by having pot lucks or finger painting their neighbor parties, they in some sense achieve an alternative lifestyle I would never want to mess with.
A similar floor to the CALF is a deep, dark place hidden within the bowels of Ames second. There is a special door that leads to there and once a person has gone through it and seen the wonders on the other side, they rarely return to our world the same. I’m talking about the Sustainable Living Floor. I think this means people who like to conserve water, electricity and have a plethora of recreational activities that somehow save heat. If you don’t mind your neighbors being opposed to showers and listening to some heady tunes at weird hours, maybe you should think about living on this floor. In fact, most people don’t even know it exists.
There is a certain floor that is higher than the rest, and I don’t mean high like Bob Marley. I mean like high and mighty. The Honors Floor is for people who don’t do anything except study. It is a common misconception that they even go to class. They are so busy studying that they don’t need to go. They are some of the smarter students at this school. Why do you think yours truly doesn’t live there? I’ve also heard the rumor that they don’t even sleep. They just plug themselves in at night like a race of super intelligent robot human hybrids. In fact, they are so efficient they don’t even need to go to the library to print out their papers, since the majority of them are morally superior vegetarians – they just chew up wood and make their own paper, which prints out of their ears. If you feel like your life needs an upgrade or you are more interested in flirting with your term paper than a real person, maybe this is the floor for you.
The last specialty floor is the Substance Free Floor. Interestingly enough, this is also the only specialty floor with two Residential Assistants. Now what this means is that they trade in regular substances like beer and marijuana for legal prescription drugs. These tend to be the shy people or students with ADD trying to get away from the noise pollution that is generally in front of Cree and Lyman. This also means that the building of Bogue is generally filled with freshmen who shouldn’t drink anyway. The problem here is that there is too much sobriety on the Sub-Free Floor. They don’t pass out from too much THC or BAC, so there is greater risk of insanity because they stay up late drinking energy drinks and are actually a totally nuisance to their neighbors and the RAs. I know, I lived there for two and a half years.
Don’t feel bad if I didn’t mention your floor. They are all special to me. I’m sure you all identify with one or more of these floors and are groupies of some form or another. For everyone not on a specialty floor I like to refer to you as the collective unconscious because I’m sure some one at some time has drawn a penis on your white board or passed out in your bathroom. There is fun to be had in every building and every floor on campus.
Short URL: http://www.themountaineer.org/?p=245
Posted by Ronnie Black
on Dec 18, 2008 Filed under First-Person.
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