I have a confession to make, on this, the day of my final column. I've been bullshitting you all year. You, my fellow undergrads, have been deceived, and you deserve an explanation.
You see, here's the truth- I don't know anything. I'm about as knowledgeable on any given subject as your average piece of celery. And yet, I have been bestowing upon the masses showers of advice all year. It's wrong, it's lies, and I deserve to be punished. Finals week should do the trick.
I didn't mean to get so self-righteous; it all started out amusingly tongue in cheek. I wanted to mock the very thing I've become. And it has evolved into tongue and a very different cheek- as I bend over weekly to kiss every reader's ass. At first, I completed my columns with dignity and even refrained from speaking in the first person. This column wasn't about me; it was about providing a little slice of humor, and maybe some genuine insight, to our crazy college careers. But somewhere, I took a turn for the worse. I got lazy, or I got pretentious, and I started to sound far too much like Julia Stiles reading her poem at the end of "10 Things I Hate About You."
Even now, as I write this, I'm taking things too seriously. I'm over-estimating my own readership, and my own influence. Why should I expect that anyone cares about anything besides their O-Chem notes and their Shakespeare research paper at this point? Which is why, at random points throughout this column, I will include an elephant joke, designed to further no greater understanding or platform, but merely to provide poops and giggles in a week where both are in short supply.
Who is the most famous female elephant singer?
Elephants Gerald!
Well, I'm through with my old ways. Perhaps it's futile to change now, in my final hour, but I swear on my N*Sync figurines, this week you'll get nothing but the straight truth. No sugar coating, for either of our sakes, and no unwarranted pretension. This is it, the formula for what I've been doing all year- "How to...How to."
1. Choose a topic. The best thing about teaching others How To do anything is, YOU don't even have to know how to do it. You can literally just look around and pick something in your range of vision. Where do you think "How to...Kill Time Between South Parks," came from? I was killing time between South Parks. If you look at your desk and see a pile of beer bottle caps, why not write "How to...Use Your Old Beer Bottle Caps?" You can make it into a call for environmental activism, or you can just suggest everyone find their old pog collections and use them as slammers. Please tell me someone else remembers pogs.
How do you know if you pass an elephant?
You can't get the toilet seat down!
The point is, make it as serious, desirous or delirious as you so please. Make it social commentary or make it social parody. The irony of the How To column is that people rarely read them to actually acquire a new skill. People read them to acquire a new perspective. And so all you need is your eyes pointed at something.
2. Wait for an opportune time. This is an important step that many people don't think about, but it is absolutely vital not to write a How To column until you are in the midst of some pressing assignment. You can only fully appreciate the gravity of advising others at critical moments in your own life.
What's more difficult than getting a pregnant elephant in a VW bug?
Getting an elephant pregnant in a VW bug!
Your How To should be interrupting a moment of intensity in your life to be able to express the intensity of the topic to the world. Thank God I've had this column to whisk me away from Bio notes and Psych papers all year long. This column, as well as urbandictionary.com, shadow puppets, mad libs, things in my room that need to be cleaned, highlighter towers, computer solitaire, girl scout cookies, Harry and The Potters cds, TI-83+ Tetris, and pretty much everything else on the internet and in my room.
3. Write. What clever comments can I possibly make about this? Just write it. If you can't write, I guess you could submit cave drawings as your column. Mine would usually be a drawing of a girl with a pen, a drawing of the girl throwing the pen, and then a drawing of an ostrich humping a bulldozer who is clearly intoxicated, or something.
Why do elephants wear shoes with yellow soles?
So you don't see them when they float upside-down in a bowl of mustard!
And so, you see now, you need me about as much as Bono needs another magazine cover. And not just me, all self-help columns, books, television shows, acupuncturists. You don't need anyone or anything to tell you exactly how to live and think and thrive. In fact, the most therapeutic thing you can do is write your own self-help manual. Consequently, I confess to being incredibly selfish this entire year. I have been writing a column that is a guide to how I personally could be living better, or at least more interestingly. And I haven't even been taking my own advice.
Why is an elephant big, grey, and wrinkly?
Because, if it was small, white and smooth it would be an Aspirin!
So here's my dare to all of you- I electric chair dare you to submit a How To column to The Elm next year. Everyone has something they're an expert on, or at least something that they have noticed and would like to bring to everyone's attention. People love to write napkins for the "Napkin Suggestion Board" in the dining hall, so consider this an open invitation to write in to a bigger suggestion board. Hell, write your column on napkins, if that's what floats your strange, strange boat.
To everyone who has read what I've written over the course of this brutally long school year, even at its most self-indulgent or downright ridiculous, I thank you. But I also would like to ask you don't you have friends or homework or a game of World of Warcraft you could have been spending that time on? Seriously, this is college. Go get naked and run around a flag pole or something. And my final words, which I hope will be remembered for generations to come...
What do elephants use for tampons?
Sheep!
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