When I was nineteen, I used to send away perforated info request cards to all of the colleges I was interested in transferring to back then. I found these cards inside college guides stored away in a top secret location that definitely wasn't behind the safety curtain inside the campus theatre. Hundreds of these guides shrink-wrapped and stashed away because I guess admissions must have ordered way too many. The school was almost a direct pipeline to the bigger four-year state school system anyway, so for most these guides were pretty pointless. I managed to steal a pack of five guides and stashed them away in my car one morning between classes.
My parents were not at home when I returned with the guides, which was probably a blessing of sorts in disguise. I began my research in earnest, flipping through page upon page of stunning campus images and corresponding business reply cards. I didn't have a set plan as to where I might send these cards out to, or if I would actually find myself applying to these random schools at all. The first batch of cards I sent out that next morning were all over the country. Schools in Nebraska, Iowa, Connecticut, downstate New York, and North Carolina to name a few. A few days later, more cards went out to places in Pennsylvania, Maine, Florida, Illinois, Virginia, and New Mexico. The third batch of cards included a few more states as well as a few others in my home state of New York and other short distances nearby.
In the weeks that followed, our mailbox started overflowing with big white packages addressed to me, myself, and I. My parents weren't pleased this kind of mail was clogging up that precious little metal black box out front, but I didn't care. It's not like these were bills for them, these were packages of fun for me.
Opening these thick envelopes was like Christmas as a kid. Campuses I've never even seen in person came to life in vivid color and ravishing clarity. Letters addressed me by name, typed on linen paper stock with the respective school's seal indented at the bottom. The smell of freshly-printed brochures filled my bedroom as I pawed through papers and course catalogs. I felt like a five-star football recruit with all these packages piling in, longing for my attendance. My above-average test scores and not-so-extra curriculars were of no paramount concern to them - at least not for the time being. I was somebody to them.
In the end, I wound up choosing a place that I never expected to, nor was on my original list of schools I sent away for information. They didn't recruit me as heavily like these other places did. In fact, I wasn't really recruited by anyone employed by the school at all. I applied to the school thanks to the persuasion of someone who was hardly a friend in high school, now attending Buffalo. In high school, we spoke briefly in passing here and there - she was the younger sister of a classmate of mine, a brilliant kid who was going to go somewhere expensive and science-y and engineer his way to a ton of money. She was no slouch herself, but chose to stay in-state and probably had a free ride going for her. I applied, got in, and a few short months later found myself moving into the dorms on a blustery cold day in mid-January.
My parents were not at home when I returned with the guides, which was probably a blessing of sorts in disguise. I began my research in earnest, flipping through page upon page of stunning campus images and corresponding business reply cards. I didn't have a set plan as to where I might send these cards out to, or if I would actually find myself applying to these random schools at all. The first batch of cards I sent out that next morning were all over the country. Schools in Nebraska, Iowa, Connecticut, downstate New York, and North Carolina to name a few. A few days later, more cards went out to places in Pennsylvania, Maine, Florida, Illinois, Virginia, and New Mexico. The third batch of cards included a few more states as well as a few others in my home state of New York and other short distances nearby.
In the weeks that followed, our mailbox started overflowing with big white packages addressed to me, myself, and I. My parents weren't pleased this kind of mail was clogging up that precious little metal black box out front, but I didn't care. It's not like these were bills for them, these were packages of fun for me.
Opening these thick envelopes was like Christmas as a kid. Campuses I've never even seen in person came to life in vivid color and ravishing clarity. Letters addressed me by name, typed on linen paper stock with the respective school's seal indented at the bottom. The smell of freshly-printed brochures filled my bedroom as I pawed through papers and course catalogs. I felt like a five-star football recruit with all these packages piling in, longing for my attendance. My above-average test scores and not-so-extra curriculars were of no paramount concern to them - at least not for the time being. I was somebody to them.
In the end, I wound up choosing a place that I never expected to, nor was on my original list of schools I sent away for information. They didn't recruit me as heavily like these other places did. In fact, I wasn't really recruited by anyone employed by the school at all. I applied to the school thanks to the persuasion of someone who was hardly a friend in high school, now attending Buffalo. In high school, we spoke briefly in passing here and there - she was the younger sister of a classmate of mine, a brilliant kid who was going to go somewhere expensive and science-y and engineer his way to a ton of money. She was no slouch herself, but chose to stay in-state and probably had a free ride going for her. I applied, got in, and a few short months later found myself moving into the dorms on a blustery cold day in mid-January.
I write all this drivel because recently, my father discovered his sister passed away in one of the most dreary methods imaginable. He found out by plugging her name into an obituary database, because she hadn't contacted him in years. None of her multiple children bothered to reach out to my father to deliver the news. She was my father's only living relative left - both his younger brother and parents having long since passed away. The most incredible thing about this is that she died over two months ago. My parents are listed in the obituary, but were never notified of her passing.
I never quite understood my father's relationship with his sister. She hardly reached out to him in later years. By my recollection the last time they spoke was almost a decade ago. I'm not sure if there may have been any bad blood between the two, and maybe I'll never know - but it doesn't take away from the fact nobody bothered to tell my father his only sister and last living sibling died a few months ago.
I don't refer to my father's sister as my aunt because she never was one, much like her kids were never really cousins to me. They never called, we never hung out, we never did anything together save for when I was too young to really remember - hell I couldn't even tell you any of her children's names. But that doesn't take away the estranged relationship my father's sister chose to keep with him. Much like all those colleges trying to recruit me, my father's sister and her children were nothing but strangers to me and my family growing up. I knew about them, but aside from some brief early contact, they never bothered to invest any more than they did. And just like my decision on which college to attend, my own immediate family blazed our own respective trails without adhering to the influence of collective outsiders.
And while my parents were never able to attend the funeral as they were never notified of it, maybe it's good that they didn't anyway. Why show reverence to those who didn't respect them? Sometimes, family doesn't mean obligation.