Sha-zam, College.
Late February, I was finishing up applications to the two schools I thought I had a chance to go to, Ryerson in Toronto, and Queens college in another part of Ontario. Canada seemed like the place to be, worrying about the evil greedy anti-love U.S. government brings me down. Well, I'm rarely actually unhappy, but still, it's a bummer. Anyway, I was finishing up these two applications, when an artist I know told my mom that Mass Art was a happening place. So I checked out the website, and they seemed pretty hip about stuff, and I was like 'word'.
I was applying to schools in Canada because I thought I would have a better chance of getting in there without SAT scores. (I didn't take the SATs, its part of my love/hate relationship with the robots.) The Mass Art website didn't say anything about requiring SATs, and once again, I said 'word'. The deadline for applications had already passed on February 15 th , but I'm pretty hip about time, so I decided to do it anyway.
I put together a 10 minute portfolio of random stuff I have on my site, Jacks addiction, Midnight snack, my first music video, and a TheDan TV sampler. I didn't decide to write a rap song, I just did it, I wrote about half of it to myself in an email, and then the other half a bit later, and then I recorded it. I probably did 50 takes of the whole song before I was satisfied, but it came out pretty good, so its cool.
I don't remember the date, but it was a snowday, and Mass Art was closed, so I had to slip in as somebody walked out. I found the admissions office, dark, empty, and locked. My application was in a fedex envelope, and I wrote 'film' on it and shoved it under the door. I stood around for a few minutes just for good measure, and then I left.
March was a good month, I went to Toronto for a week, I had a new girlfriend, things were on the up and up. April was coming to an end, and I decided to give Mass art a call to see if I could get an interview or something. I told the women on the phone that I hadn't taken the SAT's and that I was wondering if I could talk to somebody about that, they took my information, and told me they would give me a call back when the queen of admissions had reviewed my problem. They called me, the next day, and the woman I had talked to the day before told me that because Mass Art is a state funded school, they require SAT scores from all students. I got a bit put out, I started to hate the robots alot, so I listened to some Kraftwerk to comfort myself...
The sun rose many times, and on may 18 th I got this email:
Dear Daniel,
Greetings from the MassArt Admissions Office! Thank you for submitting your application for the fall 2005 semester. If you are still interested in attending MassArt, we will be happy to render a decision as soon as possible; however, according to our records, your application has not been completed. Please call the Admissions Office at 617.879.7234 or 617.879.7230 to inquire about which credentials are needed to complete our file. We ask that you please submit these items to the Admissions Office as soon as possible if you wish to be reviewed for fall 2005 admission. If you are no longer interested in completing your application, contact us so that we may correctly close your file. Thank you for your interest in MassArt!Sincerely,
Lydia Polanco Pena
MassArt AdmissionsPS The only item needed is your SAT report. If you would like us to
switch your application to the fall 2006, please let me know.
I showed this to my mother and we danced in circles for a few minutes and then went to work composing an incredibly well composed letter explaining that they had not received my SAT scores because they didn't exist, and they would never exist, and that I was still interested in Mass Art. It was a fine letter. I emailed them the spectacular letter, and went back to being retumbant. Later that week I drove up to Toronto with my friends, and on the way, at a rest stop near buffalo, my mom called me.
"You got a big package from Mass art that says 'congratulations and welcome' on it, should I open it?"
and I laughed a bunch, and shot a big laser out of my head into the sky, and generally was joyous.
I had to Pass to classes before they would actually accept me, but I was expected to pass those classes. I took Art History 2 during the summer, and it devoured a small part of my soul, and then I just finished Studio Pre-semester and that was pretty cool, although I went quite insane for a while. It was a good kind of insane though, a focused insanity. I only say insane because I completely stopped thinking about things, I just started doing everything, twas radical.
For example, on Monday I was walking along in the park with a few friends of mine, and we met up with some other kids, and the kids told us they had just seen a skunk with its head stuck inside a Mcflurry cup. I announced I would free it, and everybody got pretty excited. As a group, 7 of us, we went and found the skunk milling around blindly in somebodys back yard. At first it wouldn't come out from under the car, but eventually it did, and I got really close to it while it bumbled around blindly, trying to hear and smell things, because it couldn't see anything. Unfortuantly for the skunk, its ancesters had never encountered a Mcflurry cup before and they didn't have enough time to evolve so that in the event they get their head stuck inside one, they can hear and smell out of other parts of their body. But Alas, the skunk had its nose and ears and eyes inside the cup, blocking all of its perception devices from everything except the retched smells and sounds that come from the inside of a Mcflurry cup. It was a very discombobulated skunk. Everybody except me started moving backwords, away from the skunk, and I got a bit closer and I knelt down and tried to grab onto the cup, this startled the skunk a fair amount, and everybody took a few more steps back. I got a got hold of the mcflurry cup while the skunk was trying to figure out what had bumped into its head. With a little jerk, the skunk popped backwords out of the cup and became very confused. I, less confused, having been 'not stuck in a mcflurry cup' took control of the situation and put a good amount of rooom in between me and the skunk, by running.
No one was sprayed, I achieved oneness with nature and then I finished off the night with an incredible bagel.
I made this during Pre-semester in the print making workshop, Im an ahhhhtist.