Chapter Five: Burnout At St. John's U.

It’s September of ’87 and “Here I go again on my own” is playing on every radio in the USA. It’s also a very fitting description of what I am doing, education-wise. As a good chunk of my fellow Stuy graduates are Ivy-league bound and many others are going the SUNY and CUNY routes, I decided to stay local and go to class with several of my neighborhood friends, at St. John’s University in Jamaica, Queens. There’s Mikey P, Jimmy F, Jeff A., Donna S, Anissa M. and good ‘ol Dave R., my former St. Stan’s classmate. It’s nice to run into them in the hallways, but somehow, like freshman year at Stuyvesant, I felt that I didn’t fit in there. I wasn’t energized to compete with my classmates, like I did at St. Stan’s or Stuy. I wasn’t even religious anymore, at all. I had my doubts about religion since the 7th grade. I was asking all the tough questions that Sr. Magdalen did not want to answer and it made her dislike me more than a bit in 8th grade, plus some of my Stuy friends were not ashamed to admit their doubts about religion. All of that was convincing enough for me. By the time I reached St. John’s, I was an atheist at a Catholic University. I totally felt lost and I knew in my gut that I had picked the wrong major, Accounting. But there I was, taking Accounting 1, Economics, English Literature (which I was never into) and Theology (which I was not interested in, at this point). I basically went through the motions that fall semester. I studied enough to earn at least a ‘C’ in each class, with a ‘B’ in Accounting I and Economics. I spent more time focused on working after school, as a foot messenger for a Wall St. firm and hanging out, under aged in a few bars in the East Village, than in studying and did even more of both, the spring semester. It’s a wonder that my grades slightly improved in the 2nd semester, taking Accounting II, Creative Writing, Economics II, and Theology II. I finished the year with a GPA of 2.95 but, I knew that either my major would change to something more interesting or I would transfer to a CUNY like Hunter or Baruch or I would drop out completely and spend some time soul-searching for what I wanted to do career-wise. Right at the end of class for the summer, I was hired by UPS as an overnight, truck loader. I worked on 43rd St. and 12th Ave. from 4am to 9am. Perfect hours for stumbling out of the bar and going to work, NOT! Even though it had very good benefits, including college tuition help, I was not disciplined enough to keep the job. I actually went there drunk several times. I quit after three months. Certainly not the smartest thing I’ve ever done. As for my school situation, by August ’88, I knew I wasn’t returning to St. John’s, but I was still undecided what to do. I contacted CUNY and the only school that would accept me at this late date was Hunter, but I would have to go without a major and maybe decide by the Spring of ’89. I registered and decided to take Economic courses, towards that major. I was happy to see some familiar faces there. There were several former Stuy classmates, including one female that I had a massive crush on, Sami and also my former St. Stan’s classmate, Lynn L. I thought maybe Hunter would be fun, but the issue of still not being sure of the major and just complete laziness compelled me to withdraw from all of my classes, after a week. The thought in my mind was, maybe I’ll focus on work and land a great job, that could become my career, or I would be inspired to choose what I would really want, as a major, and return to school. Unfortunately, neither would happen.