Friday, April 16

   I'm sending an application off to Baltimore Junior College. I'll go anywhere to get more schooling.
   At Tech High there are loads of smart guys, but I'd never met one who questioned me with the intensity of Bart. When I tell him my ideas, Bart doesn't just agree or nod politely -- or laugh. He takes them seriously and asks tough questions. The questions often require interpretation because his schooling ended in the eighth grade.
   When he said, "Chet, how can peroxide that my cousin uses have oxygen in it? Oxygen is a gas and her hair stuff is a liquid." I didn't laugh at his attempt to understand. I pointed out to him a case that he well knew -- that sodas have gases bubbling out of them. Then I showed him that mixing cobalt chloride and sodium carbonate with hydrogen peroxide creates the gas that makes red-hot embers burst into flames.
   I've had trouble buckling down for Mr. Royal's next assignment. My mind's been so occupied with college I kind of forgot I've got to get out of high school too.
   I got accepted by Maryland, but they won't give me any

 

additional scholarship money or even a loan. So UM is out, but I'm not sitting around waiting for something outside to give me a chance.
   Bart lent me a fiver to go with the fifteen I had -- one of his schemes had paid off for him. My application to Baltimore Junior College is in the mail. I never thought I'd end up in a junior college, but if that's my only chance.
   The other night I had an experience that didn't make me too happy. Betsy, Josh, Shirley, and I rode out Riser Rd. to the large cemetery where Black Aggie is.
   Black Aggie is a marble sculpture of a woman whose body lies buried in the plot below it. The eight foot tall monument is the site of many frat hazings and local pranks.
   We were bored that Saturday evening, so when Josh suggested we get some beer and party at the statue we all agreed. I had an absurd hope that Betsy and I would pair off. That didn't happen.
   Shirley kept close to me and Betsy gravitated to Josh. After I had three or four beers, I noticed that Betsy and Josh were kissing on the other side of Black Aggie from where Shirley and I sat.