Howdy! There, I said it. Another
time-honored Aggie tradition has
captured me —and I’ve only been
here since September. Why is this
such a major accomplishment?
Last fall I transferred from a school
to which I shall refer
euphemistically as “That Other
Major State University” (or
TOMSU), out of respect to our
more sensitive readers. If you do
not know which university I am.
talking about, you need read no
further. For the other 98 percent of
you, I would like to give you a
glimpse of what life is like as a
student at TOMSU. This will not,
however, be an exercise in
unrestrained Bevo-bashing; I will
attempt to be as tasteful as
possible.
Let me establish some
background first. TOMSU is
located in the capital city of a large
south central state (let us call the
city “Austin”). Way back in the
dark ages of the mid-1970s, 1 was
informed by my father that we
would be moving to Austin. At the
time, I was living in New York (a
fair-sized northeastern state), and
had just gotten out of junior high.
Enter significant trauma. I was in
no mood to make the move,
knowing for a fact (as all Yankees
know) that Austin, along with the
entire state (by now you will have
guessed that I am speaking of
Texas), was smack-dab in the
middle of the desert.
My oldest brother was already
living in Austin, having been
stationed there by the U.S. Air
Force. Several months before we
moved, my brother sent us all
some gifts which would be useful
in the future. I don’t remember
what my other sibs received, bu 1
do remember what he gave me. It
was a T-shirt, bright orange in
color. On the front was the picture
of a charging cow, and beneath the
cow was the word “TEXAS. ” On
the back was the same cow
charging away, and the word
“TEXAS” was reversed. In my
innocence I started wearing the
shirt, thinking that it merely
promoted the state. Such matters
as college football meant little to
me at the time.
That quickly changed once I got
settled down in Austin. Austin, it
seems, is extremely partisan
toward TOMSU. The year I moved
there, TOMSU’s football team (the
L s) had a very good season,
and I was caught up in the
excitement. Little by little, though,
I began to pick up on references to
a mysterious entity known as the
“Aggie. ” It seemed a silly name at
the time. In my freshman year, my
high school got a new principal.
The comment was made in one
class that the new fellow “used to
be an Aggie. ” My teacher, with a
snort of contempt, said “Once an
Aggie, always an Aggie,” and we
all laughed knowingly. Never mind
that the statement is said with pride
here; in Austin, it’s intended as an
insult.
Then there were the Aggie Joke
books, available in bookstores and
gift shops. These were mainly
rewritings of the ethnic jokes which
were so popular (and so tasteless)
back east. It wasn’t until about two
years ago that I realized that the
joke books were being published
right here in College Station. I
wonder what would happen if all
of the teasip supporters realized
they were being used by the
Aggies, that Aggies were profiting
from the teasip’s prejudices.
When I graduated from high
school, it seemed natural and
logical that I should attend
TOMSU for my higher education,
citing such career-oriented reasons
as “inexpensive” and “can live
with parents. ” I must also confess
to no small loyalty to TOMSU,
having been immersed in its
propaganda for so many years.
So much for the background
(i.e. How I Got There). Now I wish
to embark on a comparison of my
experiences at TOMSU and at
TAMU.
My biggest beef (sorry about
that) about TOMSU was the fact
that to the University, I was just a
ten-digit number in the computer.
In my first semester I took a
chemistry class which had well
over 500 students. This Official
Anonymity had its effects on the
entire student body. Out of the
48,000 students and 15,000
faculty/staff, there weren’t many
that I could consider to be on the
level of Acquaintance, much less
Friend. One certainly wouldn’t call
out a greeting to some stranger as
he passed on the sidewalk or in the
hall.
TAMU has a major difference in
this regard. While TAMU also has a
problem with Official Anonymity (a
consequence of size), there is an
attempt to counter this through the
use of Traditions, the “Howdy”
tradition being one of the most
visible. Being generally friendly by
nature, I was often bothered by the
fact that I was usually ignored
when I said “hi” as I passed
someone. At TAMU, the responses
range from a mumbled “hi” to a
confident “howdy” (from a cadet)
— but I DO get a response.
TOMSU is surrounded by
central Austin, so there is little
breathing room. Finding decent
living quarters near campus can be
quite an adventure. Nearly ail of
the apartments within walking
distance have gone condo, so one
usually has to go farther away to
find a place to rent. In my last
semester at TOMSU, I lived with a
roommate in an apartment about
two miles from campus. The
apartment was what I would call
substandard, but we had to pay
$480 per month for the two-
bedroom place (about par for
Austin). The reason they could
charge so much was that they were
near one of the shuttle bus routes.
The shuttle buses were available to
all students (no pass necessary);
the cost of maintenance was
spread out over the entire student
body by being included in the
sinister “General Fee” at tuition
time.
At TAMU I also live off campus,
pleasantly surprised at the
relatively low rental rates. I have
not yet, however, gotten used to
the shuttle bus fee of $46 per
semester.
Parking is an adventure, too.
Student parking permits at
TOMSU are a lot cheaper that they
are here, but there’s a catch;
Parking permits are issued in a 7 to
1 ratio over actual parking spaces.
One issue which bothers me
may be totally trivial to you: That
of textbooks buybacks. At TAMU
(here I include independent
bookstores) they have a totally
arbitrary method of buying texts at
the end of the semester. Basically
(this is my impression) they stack
all of your books into a pile; if the
stack is such-and-such height, they
offer you $20 for the stack. If you
can produce another four inches,
they’ll give you $25. They take
absolutely no account of what the
book is actually worth. The college
bookstores in Austin consider each
book separately, using the
wholesale value of the book as a
basis for the buyback price. The
local method of buybacks must be
bothering a lot of other people,
too, considering the number of
students who try to sell their books
via dorm bulletin boards.
Then there’s football. Good
grief, there’s football. Particularly,
there’s the annual war between
TAMU and TOMSU. The following
statement may be a disturbing
revelation, so get ready; TAMU
takes the game a lot more seriously
than TOMSU does. In the ten
years that I spent in Austin, I
observed that the town (and the
university) got more excited about
the game against Oklahoma than it
did about the TAMU game. I
always saw the TAMU game as an
important one, but I don’t think I
ever saw it as THE GAME.
It’s different here. I was
somewhat overwhelmed at the
amount of time and energy spent
in preparation for the game. Here
it really is THE GAME. From the
first day of the fall semester,
attention is focused upon such
issues as Bonfire. Bonfire Buddies,
Bonfire t-shirts, etc. It’s almost as if
preparation for THE GAME is the
very purpose of the Aggies’
existence. As another example, I
compare the “Texas Fight” song
and the “Aggie War Hymn. ” Line
two of “Texas Fight” says “...
goodbye to A&M...” and that’s
the only reference to TAMU. The
War Hymn, however — good
grief! The entire song is aimed at
the teasips.
I know what you’re wondering
(come on, admit it!) — how on
earth did a loyal teasip suddenly
decide to turn traitor and come to
TAMU? All politics aside, I did it for
academic reasons. It is rather
complicated, but in the interest of
saving space, I will put it all in one
sentence and let you sort it out. It’s
like this: Meteorology is my major
but TOMSU didn’t have a
meteorology department per se
but rather had what they called the
atmospheric science group which
was a subset of the Engineering
Science degree plan which is really
meaningless but the atmospheric
science group was under the
control of the Civil Engineering
Department which is totally
ridiculous since meteorology has
absolutely nothing to do with civil
engineering but you can find it in
the Engineering Course Catalog or
at least you used to be able to find
it there but you can’t any more
because the university did such a
good job of hiding the
meteorology program inside the
engineering school that nobody
knew it was there and therefore
nobody enrolled in that degree
plan so the number of students in
the program eventually dwindled
to one and that was me and since I
was the only one left I decided that
I didn’t have much future there so I
transferred to TAMU since I heard
that they have a top-notch
meteorology program and after I
dropped out of TOMSU they
closed down the undergraduate
meteorology program and that’s
the truth. Whew!
I guess I can be considered an
Aggie now. My friends in Austin
think I am, anyway. I even have a
maroon “Gig ’em Aggies” t-shirt. I
wore the shirt when I went home
for Thanksgiving, and I even went
so far as to root for the Aggies
when I watched THE GAME with
my family. My folks think that I am
just going through a phase, but I
don’t know... Even though I
spent four years at TOMSU, my
degree will be from TAMU; I can
live with that. I still have a lot of
teasip friends; my girlfriend is one
of Them, too. That brings up an
interesting issue: If we get married,
how should our kids be brought
up? Maybe we should just send
them to the University of Iowa, or
Florida State, or some other
neutral college.
The Traditions have made this
place special to me, as have all of
the fantastic friends 1 have made
here in the past six months
(especially through the Christian
group that I am involved with). It
has all come together to convince
me that Aggies really are “Rough!
Tough! Real Stuff!” And that’s
saying a lot, considering my past
life as a teasip. “Once an Aggie,
always an Aggie. ” Hmmmm...
Tim Thornton is a senior
meteorology major.
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