talkin' on the phone is not my speed; don't send me no letter, 'cause I can't read

     The college admissions cheating scandal burst upon us recently, featuring the parents who are "celebrities," actresses Felicity Huffman and Lori Loughlin.

     The main point in the news stories is that these wealthy, already-advantaged people "stole" freshman-class "spots" from kids who studied and did well on the SATs, who may have parents who are not dishonest enough and wealthy enough to bribe and cheat and money-launder to get them into the "college of their choice."  (Or -- the college of the parents' choice....)

     The thing I see is, probably the parents very strongly want their children to go to college and the kids are less enthusiastic about it.  So the parents "threw money at the problem," as the saying goes.

     Lori Loughlin's younger daughter didn't want to go to college -- she said it in a video.  
        And her videos are good!  She has a talent for that, and her You Tube channel, "Olivia Jade," had sponsors, so she apparently made money with it.

     Typically, parents don't have faith in their children's Project of Enthusiasm, right?  (The daughter's vlog... the son's rock band... even Mick Jagger's father wasn't supportive of his musical ambitions...)  Loughlin said in an interview that she wanted her daughters to go to college so they will "have something to fall back on."  

That's what parents said when I was in high school!  (Maybe it goes back to cave-man times:  "You must study these stone tablets and get a degree in hunting and gathering, so you will always have something to fall back on.")

     I don't understand all the drama attached to the idea of entering college:  the drama isn't necessary, and for some people, college is not necessary.  Bob Dylan didn't go to college -- or -- he did, sort of, but dropped out pretty early.  He had other things to do.

     Tina Turner 

didn't go to college.  In her autobiography she said out of four children, "Craig was college-minded -- the others were like Ike and me, they just wanted to be done with school."

     I have a faint, distant memory of taking the ACT test, and acceptance letters from Boston University and Northwestern University in Evanston, Illinois.  Northwestern said I could come to school there, the next year, because they were already full for the current year.  BU said I could start this September.

     I didn't have any interest in waiting a year to start college (although many people choose to do that -- travel first, or something... in England they call it taking a "gap year") and I wanted to go to the East Coast more than I wanted to go to Illinois.  Decision makes itself.

-30-