My mom, bless her heart, is a quilter. She’s taught me her mad skillz — to a certain extent — but she’s still much more advanced than I am in the sense of actually seeing projects through to completion. She makes quilts for new grandnieces and nephews, and even done a few pieces on commission. My favorite that she’s made is the one she put together for my graduation from high school. It’s big enough to be a bedspread, and since she put flannel on the back of it, I often use that way. The pattern is pinwheels on the front piece, and she used all vintage-looking fabrics reminiscent of the 1940s, which were really popular when I was a teenager.

It wasn’t a coincidence that she gave it to me right before I headed across the country for college. She was fine with it, since I was attending her alma mater, and I was at first — until I had a massive meltdown on the first day of freshman orientation. There were a number of things that comforted me — including reruns of “Friends,” since they were the same in both places, after all — but the quilt my mom made for me was one of the best ones.

And now, I’ll just let the poem speak for me. Happy Mother’s Day, you fabulous Angela Petrelli look-alike.

***

Eden

As usual, she began this creation
Behind schedule: a carefully planted
Plot of flannel and cotton,
Received just a little late,

A flowing checkerboard
Of rose and bluebell and lilac.
Golden pinwheels twirl sun spots
Skittering and dancing across its surface.

Cut and basted, stitched and batted –
She labored over this fabric,
Embossing it with daisies
Stemming from white thread.

At bedtime I slip under this garden
Of blooms. Even though I’m so far
From home, she still manages to
Keep me safe and warm.

Yes, it’s been a long time, but it was for a good cause. And now that I have a new gig and a new routine, it’s about time I freshen this place up.

The perfect article for this is something I wrote nearly seven years ago and appeared, at that time, on the now-defunct site called MediasharX. (I also reviewed Gilmore Girls and The West Wing for MSX for a bit too.) Looking at it now, it almost seems like an historic document from another era. You see, back when I was a senior in college and beyond ready to graduate, I got a little hooked on discussing my favorite TV show online. In those days, we did that through message boards and a little thing called email. When I see what shows like Glee have going on today, with their Twitter and Facebook feeds, text updates and all the information you can imagine right at your fingertips, I can’t help but be a little jealous. In my day, we had to work for our fandom!

(And we weren’t exactly the most popular kids on the interwebs, either. You Bieber fans have no idea!)

So this is a recollection of constructing a fandom on the Internet and monetizing it—along with some media history and theory I learned in all of those comm classes. It was a lot of fun to write (and research), and it’s honestly one of the stories I’ve written that I like the most. Even if it’s outrageously dated by now.

***

If anything was learned from the Clay vs. Ruben controversy on American Idol, it’s this: Do not underestimate the power of the television fanatic. Bottles of Tabasco sauce flooded into WB network offices in 2000, courtesy of Roswell fans bent on saving their show from cancellation. One of the first organized fan campaigns fought to keep the original Star Trek on the air—and morphed into the legendary fandom that exists today.

The advent of the Internet has broadened the experience of being a fan. In the past, only the most obsessed fans gathered together at conferences or published ‘zines on their fandoms, lapping up details on the next film or comic book and revering the creators as demigods. Instead of that pathetic and bespectacled image, fans now brought together by the Internet are banding together and turning proactive to take control of their programs. They’re acting as network executives and paying for the privilege.

I’m one of them. And I only wear glasses for driving. Honest.

After going through Friends and ER, my current favorite is the ABC spy drama Alias. In many ways, I’m typical of the Internet fan. I spend much of my free time at the Web site TelevisionWithoutPity.com, nitpicking episodes and searching out spoilers with those similarly obsessed. And like many of this new breed of fan, I’m willing to put my money where my mouse is.

Aaron Nadler, a college student from Harrisburg, Penn., is a poster in the Alias forums at TWoP who assisted on a banner ad campaign hosted by fellow fans. When asked why he visits TWoP, he incredulously responds, “Why not?”

Fans all across cyberspace were thrilled to hear on Aug. 1, 2003, that the trendy Web site had resolved its ongoing financial troubles to continue its unique approach to fandom another year. The site’s forums give diehard television watchers an arena where such devotion is commonplace, but with the caveat that fandom does not automatically mean mindless adulation. When judging shows on TWoP, impartiality is discouraged. Once known as Mighty Big TV, TWoP was the place where The West Wing creator Aaron Sorkin famously tussled with online fans as Benjamin, his nom de keyboard. He later dedicated a subplot on his show to illustrating his less-than-flattering impressions of TWoP users.

The site is well known across the Internet for its combination of cynicism and humor—more popularly known as “snark.” In one post, a typical TWoPer can go from proclaiming undying love for their show to ridiculing the main character’s speech pattern, makeup or very reason for existence. Mention the Pixel Challenge competition (a contest for the most creative use of Photoshop) and the words “Jennifer Garner Celebrity Hot Tub Party,” and you’ve got TWoPers across the world spitting diet soda on their keyboards. Another example of the site’s irreverent nature is the term “HoYay.” Short for “Homoeroticism, Yay!” it was jokingly invented by TWoP users to laud subtext of that very sort.

This mockery reflects the rough environment of the site. Instead of the typical juvenile gushing and flame-wars of most Internet message boards, respect is instituted in a trickle-down fashion. Moderators rule with iron fists, editing posts for failing to pass grammatical snuff and booting users who display embryonic signs of “trolling.” In turn, users are wound so tight with the thought of offending a moderator that they patrol fellow posters. Membership in the TWoP forums is a privilege for which one is not entitled by simple registration.

The restrictions only allow the most respectful cynics to post, thinning the pool to the most motivated—and articulate. “When I finally signed up, I found myself hanging about in a few of the forums—Buffy, 24, Angel, Alias—and I found an amazing group of insightful, polite and content-rich postings relating to those shows,” Nadler said. The intelligence and thoughtfulness on the site has lured many an executive producer to the thorny pages of posts, some of which certainly call for their heads. Sorkin is just one such muckety-muck. In an October 2002 article in The New York Times, Alias creator J.J. Abrams said, “I’ll accept a smart critique from anywhere, whether it’s from a 50-year-old studio executive or a 12-year-old kid in a rural town…They’re doing what I’d be doing if I weren’t working in TV.”

Alias premiered in the fall of 2001, and ever since, has become a program even fans find difficult to describe. The latter half of its most recent season had former double agent Sydney Bristow working with her father to bring down her nemesis, who had teamed with her treacherous, former KGB agent mother to locate the artifacts of a 15^th-century prophet.  She had also begun a romance with her CIA handler while her roommate was murdered and replaced by a genetically engineered double. And one throwaway scene this season confirmed that even jet-setting spies can receive their doctorates in literature. But if you want to know what happened in the one and a half seasons leading up to this, you’ll quickly learn that Abrams likes revamping his show’s premise.

With all the marketing challenges of such a Byzantine layout—It’s spiked with spy action! It’s a heartfelt family drama! It’s a rule-bending sci-fi!—ratings for Alias are tepid at best. The Nielsen ratings placed it around the 60th most popular show after its first season in the Sunday 9 p.m. timeslot, but scheduled against The Sopranos and an incarnation of the popular Law & Order franchise in its second, the ratings declined and placed it 72nd. Despite the lackluster showing, Alias has the buzz of a show exponentially more popular and a cult fanbase similar to those that sustained shows like The X-Files for years. For instance, the Alias forum is always buzzing and typifies all that is TWoP. The “Dear J.J.” topic opens a direct line from fans to creator. Humorous nicknames stemming from the popular recaps and from users themselves abound in casual conversation, such as the ever-popular “SpyDaddy.” But the rest of the forum isn’t always so complimentary.

The clichéd longing looks once exchanged between Sydney and handler Vaughn prompted one exasperated fan to plead for the other characters to play matchmaker by lining the hallways of the CIA and singing “Kiss the Girl” from The Little Mermaid. A beard and turban disguise worn by star Victor Garber in an episode last December elicited derisive snorts even from diehard fans of the actor. And many users grumbled about the blatant pandering the show made to the football audience by showcasing star Jennifer Garner’s lingerie-clad assets in the opening moments of the episode that aired after Super Bowl XXXVII in January.

The users at TWoP are media-savvy enough to understand how such a display figures into the economics of a television show—the Super Bowl gives a struggling show the lead-in of a lifetime, and by advertising a sequence straight out of Maxim, the network is just capitalizing on the demographics of a football game. Making sure Alias stays on the air is a prime concern of its fans as well, but they don’t like the effort muddying the integrity of the narrative. Sydney had never been a modest character, especially with her various disguises employing skin-tight rubber, but she is also an assertive, modern female. This was the first occasion where the objectification of her body for ratings purposes was blatantly obvious.

But instead of simply accepting commercially dictated changes like this as something they couldn’t control, the fans took matters into their own hands. In addition to making their feelings on the subject well-known in the “Dear J.J.” thread, fans turned to another method: advertising. And TWoP gave users the opportunity to spend their own money promoting their favorite show by handing over control of the forum banner ads—creating an odd, never-before-seen confluence of Internet and television advertising.

Internet users are very familiar with those pesky ads that ask you to pick a favorite color, or hit the bouncing ball, or tell you that you’re the site’s one-millionth visitor, all to get you to click. Visitors to the TWoP forums didn’t encounter any ads like this, instead seeing homemade banners crafted by amateur graphic artists. These banners advertised select shows, ones often not seen in the upper echelons of the Nielsen ratings, but worshipped by TWoP users nonetheless.

Glark, the online handle of David T. Cole, one of the three TWoP “elders,” said the decision to switch from corporate ads to those funded by users came early this year, mostly due to circumstances outside their control. “Ad brokers rarely want to place ads on pages with user-generated content due to its unpredictability,” he said. Because of this, few advertisers were buying ad space on the forums even though several hundred thousand users were taxing the limits of the servers (and the elders’ pockets) each day. The elders needed a way to generate cash to keep the popular site running in the short-term while investigating more permanent financial options. TWoP users knew that a decision on the site’s fate was coming after the end of the 2002-03 television season, and they were desperate to do something to show their support. Those two concerns met head-on in the forums’ ad space.

The setup allowed users to fire up Adobe Photoshop or other comparable graphics programs to create their own ads, or submit copy to Glark for design, which was included in the cost. Layering was also an option, which allowed any ad buyer to submit four separate ads. One ad would appear on each level of the TWoP forums, giving buyers more bang for their advertising buck. Ad creators could also designate text to appear in the banner’s alt tags. Ads initially cost $100 for 24 hours in the forums, and $50 for each consecutive day after that. These banner ads were for TWoP users alone—there was no tracking information provided for ad clients nor any of the bells and whistles associated with Internet advertising. “It was all grassroots stuff,” Glark said.

The opportunity for users to create their own ads caught on right away, and became one of the hallmarks of a site already famous for irreverent reverence. Creative promotion of individual shows began fast and furious—characters, popular couples, even wardrobe choices became fodder for banner ads. A whole thread devoted to banner ad praise—prime real estate on a Web site already strapped for bandwidth—allowed creators to interact with their instantaneous groupies. New ads would send observers scurrying to examine all the jokes in intimate detail, and an informal camaraderie blossomed amongst ad creators as they shared the warm, fuzzy feeling of supporting their favorite Web site.

But this didn’t mean there was no competition. The originality and sheer number of ads created by those known as TARflies (fans of The Amazing Race) and Wingnuts (The West Wing) upped the ante for all banner makers. Within weeks, all banner ad campaigns had to incorporate layers and snarky alt tags or face ridicule. There was even competition within the same fandom. Fans of the Tara/Willow lesbian relationship on Buffy the Vampire Slayer created ads condemning Tara’s death, using rainbow motifs and declaring, “They are the magic.” A group of opposing fans bluntly bit back by advertising that Tara was dead, signing the banner with “Fans of moving the hell on” and setting off a blistering flame war that likely ate more bandwidth than the ads covered. The monkey employed by the opposing users in their ad has since become the icon of the TWoP “Banner Ad Wars,” and is available on t-shirts and mugs for those who wish to preserve the memory.

For Alias, the gauntlet was thrown one afternoon last spring, when one poster spotted an amusing banner ad for the HBO prison drama Oz, which said, “Our HoYay can totally shank your HoYay.” Following a casual statement about the possibility of a banner ad campaign in the “Alias in the Media” thread, the next week passed with almost a thousand dollars raised from dozens of distinct users and more than 100 separate suggestions for ad copy.

Somehow, an impromptu organization took hold. Five different sets of ads were planned, and the copy concepts were divided accordingly: general ads about the show as a whole, then ads dedicated to the family of spies, the romance, and sidekicks/enemies as well as a thank you to the show’s creators. A group of four users amicably split the stresses of collecting votes for ad copy and publishing a Web site for Alias newbies intrigued by the ads. They tweaked copy and workshopped the graphics with two amateur designers who volunteered to create the ads based on the chosen favorites.

Nadler was one of the designers and used the opportunity to hone his burgeoning commercial design skills as well as augment his passion for the show. “A picture is worth a thousand words, and a funny banner is worth a thousand misleading commercials,” he said. “I think that promos for television shows should be catchy, memorable, and (have) a positive message about the show—without giving away the ending a week early.” The fan-voted spots favored more obscure characters and plotlines rarely referenced in network advertising, and definitely treated them with the TWoP flavor of snark.

On fan-favorite Mr. Sark: “Evil has never been so sexy.” On the broken relationship between Sydney’s parents: “Love means never having to say, ‘Why did you shoot me?’” On Sydney and Vaughn: “Screwing protocol. And each other. Keep your HoYay. We’ve got SpySex.”

Even though the show can be confusing to even the most dedicated viewer, these ads filled a void that Alias fans everywhere agreed that network advertising was not addressing. ABC is widely loathed for canceling low-rated fan favorites, including Sports Night, Once and Again and Cupid. The overwhelming belief in the forum is that the network cancels complex, intelligent programs it finds too difficult to promote, earning the nickname of “ABCimians” or, more simply, “monkeys.” Nadler points to one tagline as the epitome of the network’s lack of imagination in promoting such an intricate show.

“Also, ‘Double Oh-Yeah… with a kick!’—I mean, seriously,” he said. “That had absolutely nothing to do with the show, and plenty to do with making the show look stupid.” That’s only one of many fouls fans say the network has committed, including running a repeat on the weekend that the opening of Garner’s blockbuster movie Daredevil coincided with her appearance on Saturday Night Live, and a 40-minute post-Super Bowl show earlier this year that pushed Alias out of prime time on the East Coast.

To Sabrina Pavolini of Austin, Tex., the other graphic designer, this was ABC’s worst fumble. She said that as a subsidiary of Disney, ABC is failing to capitalize on numerous cross-promotional opportunities. But she also recognizes that fans may have more enthusiasm for the process. “Your average ad person is there to do a job. There’s a very good chance that they don’t have that ‘connection’ or special feeling for the show they’re working on,” she said. “To them, it’s just another day at the office. For people who love the show, I think it becomes more than that.”

Media scholar Henry Jenkins labeled this phenomenon as “textual poaching” more than 15 years ago, referring to fan activities such as fan fiction that have since proliferated on the Internet. Fans believe they have purer views of their favorite characters and plotlines than their creators do, so they wrestle control away. Fan fiction allows fans to rewrite narratives and plotlines in their own individual ways, but the banner ad campaign gave Alias fans the opportunity to take commercial control away from ABC under the belief that they could do better. “I want (the ads) to be something people notice—something to make them think ‘Wow, those Alias fans are amazing!’” Pavolini said. “In an ideal world, the banner ads would make everyone watch Alias.”

This enthusiasm resulted in 20 separate ads completely generated by fans, in content, design and funding. The campaign debuted to great praise from both Alias fans and TWoP users, and much to the delight of the hardworking fans, the incessant ads produced numerous converts. “Quick question—when is the season premiere of Alias? Because sadly enough…it was your brilliant banner ads that have sucked me into Alias,” said one user. “Go creative minds. Banner ads: they’re like heroin.”

After that initial ad campaign, the TWoP format changed slightly. Fifty dollars gave any submitted ad a week in the banner ad pool. Each click in the forums brought up a randomly selected ad out of the dozens in the pool at any given time. The topics broadened to praising the site’s recappers to conveying birthday wishes and campaigning for presidential hopeful Howard Dean—individual messages that up to 300,000 users see every day. Alias fans have continued to donate money to TWoP via banner ads in response to the show’s season finale, which was—at the very least—controversial. Sydney and Vaughn fans were upset that he was wearing a wedding ring in the last moments of the episode; Sark fans wondered what would come of the sexy assassin now that he was in CIA custody; and the show’s inexplicable jump two years ahead in time jarred everyone. The desire to express those opinions in pixelated form kept TWoP’s coffers overflowing this summer.

Even though fans were paying much less than corporate ad brokers, the temporary funding provided by the fan-sponsored ads allowed TWoP the freedom to negotiate new contracts. This led to the joyous announcement in August that the site would remain open for at least another year. Unfortunately, these contracts include forum ads, so those created by users will soon phase out. But the ads have become so popular that Glark has pledged they will live on elsewhere on the site, perhaps as part of the Pixel Challenge. “The response was great and certainly exceeded our expectations,” he said. “Our users are a great bunch.”

Thankfully, Alias fans received relief midway through the banner ad campaign with the news that ABC had decided to renew the show for a third season. The season premiere on Sept. 28 will provide the first clue as to whether the ads created by fans will actually boost ratings. With the possibility of a fourth season hanging on improved popularity, the producers may need all the help they can get.

The TWoP banner ads have proven that dedicated, intelligent fans are willing to work to save their favorite Web sites and television programs. Pay attention, J.J. Abrams: Even a simple, snarky campaign staged by the nerds and geeks of the world can’t hurt. They have the power. Just ask Clay Aiken.

We wouldn’t need to scramble in these kinds of situations if the pre-existing conditions were better for all involved, unfortunately, but that’s a different argument for a different time. Instead, I’d like to present something I started to write nearly 10 years ago as a memoir of sorts about the emotions I had around 9/11. Given the subject, the theme’s a little more “yay America!” when it comes to lauding recovery efforts, though the events of the past few weeks definitely show once again that humanity itself is pretty resilient. (This excellent piece on NPR’s “The Story” the other night proves that.)

This piece was also never finished. I apparently started getting into the nuances of patriotism vs. dissent, but didn’t complete the thought. So I’m just sticking to the relatively schmoopy parts here.

***

In the summer of 2001, I had a girl’s weekend with my best friend. We went on a road trip to Lake Tahoe, stayed in my cousin’s cabin for a night and went to see the Counting Crows perform at Caesar’s Palace on the South Shore. Looking back, I can remember a few moments that took away from the reverie of the trip, including the tricky navigation of the curves of Highway 89 along the lake’s western shore on a moonless night.

But what most made an impression was a comment by the opening act, Glen Phillips of Toad The Wet Sprocket. Of course, I can’t remember the context of what he said, only that it was part of the typical musician’s ad-lib before a song. He commented on the fall of the once-infallible Rome, and said something along the lines of “Who knows how long this American empire is going to last?” It sent shivers up my spine. At that point in time, the idea of our society falling seemed as fantastical as those apocalyptic visions illustrated in films such as The Terminator or Independence Day. My mind just wouldn’t go there.

Little did I know that several months later, that comment would come screaming back to me as I saw footage of the World Trade Center collapsing on my little dorm-room-sized TV. I was lucky enough not to see it live. I was in my Shakespeare class at the time, and as I headed back home with a dining hall lunch in my hand, I knew something was wrong. Everyone I passed was talking on cell phone with shock written all over their faces, and a parked transportation van was blaring a radio news report with the keywords of “terrorism” and “hijack” coming across the waves. That definitely perked up my ears.

After returning home, I turned to that touchstone of college communication—AOL Instant Messenger. (In those days, getting in touch with friends across the country or down the hall stemmed from that one piece of software.) My roommate’s away message conveyed the country’s gut reaction in a very succinct way: “Fuck the terrorists.” I fumbled for my Internet home page—not thinking to flip on the TV—and finally understood the enormity of what was happening when I couldn’t even get onto ABC News’ Web site.

Like everyone else, I cried and shook upon seeing these foreign images on my screen. I called my father on the West Coast and begged him not to go to work, thinking like Chicken Little that the sky was falling. It took me a few hours for my muddled brain to come back to Phillips’ statement and realize something. This was a terrorist attack of epic proportions. It took an organized and concentrated effort. It was intelligent enough to target the nation’s air system when and where it was at its weakest—a weekday morning, and at a small outpost airport. Yet with all of the energy this group expended to demonstrate its hatred of America, the country didn’t roll over and cry uncle.

The systems in place weren’t expecting something of this proportion to happen, but they stayed in place. The skies were cleared of all aircraft in a matter of hours. Emergency personnel did what they needed to do and saved numerous lives. Lines outside blood donation centers stretched for blocks. We may not have been expecting an aggravation of that magnitude, and while the intended purpose had been to shake us to our roots and plant the seed for our eventual destruction, we rose to the occasion. I’ve never been prouder of us than when I realized that our physical and emotional structure had remained intact.

So these two poems seem appropriate to share today. The first was inspired by Thanksgiving travel during my college era, and the second by the woman who took me in for Thanksgiving all four of those years…and then some. Her 89th birthday would have been on Tuesday, and this is my first Thanksgiving without her.

(Oh, and a note: The first poem is a form known as a pantoum, in which the repetition is part of the design.)

Stand-By

I know my turn is yet to come –
Waiting for the almighty loudspeaker
As I’m held here in limbo
Gagging on this stale coffee smell.

Waiting for the almighty loudspeaker,
We all squirm in these fake leather chairs;
Gagging on this stale coffee smell,
Sneaking sideways glances at each other.

We all squirm in these fake leather chairs
As a couple argue over their son’s head,
Sneaking sideways glances at each other,
Still bickering over what “family vacation” means.

As a couple argue over their son’s head,
An older woman thumbs a magazine –
Still bickering over what “family vacation” means!
Overachievers concentrate on their calculators

And an older woman thumbs a magazine.
In front of a Thanksgiving reunion,
Overachievers concentrate on their calculators
As weary travelers are welcomed home.

In front of a Thanksgiving reunion,
I yearn to hear my own name called
As weary travelers are welcomed home
With hugs and tears freely flowing.

I yearn to hear my own name called
As I’m held here in limbo –
With hugs and tears freely flowing,
I know my turn is yet to come.

***

Grandmother, 1941

Your crackling knees and papery skin belie
this youthful figure carelessly jitterbugging
the afternoon away as attack planes sit idling
across an ocean. Your hips, slim before they bore
five children, shimmy and shake as I flip
through these black pages. Your bright eyes
adore the photographer, your future husband,
who had to go perform his patriotic duty before
you could actually marry. Your curly brown hair
and toothy smile reflect me like a mirror,
our faces echoing across the decades as we sit
laughing together, reliving the life that led to me.

It’s November. Not only is it getting cold (even in Los Angeles), but it’s also the start of the college basketball season. If you hadn’t already figured it out before, I’m a graduate of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, which tends to field a fairly decent team every year. In fact, the Tar Heels played North Carolina Central tonight…and beat them 89 to 42. So my head is a little wrapped up in college nostalgia, which made me think of the below tidbits.

These are anecdotes I put together as part of the “24 Hours” project for The Daily Tar Heel during my sophomore year of college. Writers from all desks of the DTH observed activities on the UNC campus over the course of one winter day–from noon on a Thursday until noon on a Friday. My segment was from 10 a.m. on Friday until noon that day. I walked all over campus, wrote up these little vignettes and turned them in, coming back to the newsroom a day or so later to see that the editor-in-chief at the time marked all of mine as “solid.” However, when the special section came out, none of my contributions were included.

C’est la vie, of course, though at the time I was pretty devastated (a wee lass, I was). I really liked these moments-in-time, and I still do. And since they were never published, I think it’s entirely appropriate that I post them here. Especially now.

(And two of these were based on actual experiences, with real characters and events from my daily life at that time. I’m pretty sure you can tell which ones are which.)

***

10:11 a.m. The morning sun is just beginning to peek over the top of Cobb, and the life of the slab of thick ice layered on the front lawn is coming to an end. Loud cracks spell its doom, and the grass sticking through the ice finally begins to feel some relief. Cars obliviously coast by on Country Club Drive. Meanwhile, the pansies and daffodils meant to impress visitors over by Jackson Hall look humbled and defeated as melting ice splats all around them.

10:17 a.m.: Two of those ubiquitous tour groups have congregated outside of Mangum. One tour guide assuages nervous parents by talking about the safety measures in place on campus such as SAFE escort. The other tour guide tries to make a joke about fake I.D.s. The parents laugh nervously in response. The sounds of garbage trucks behind Davis nearly drown everyone out. They continue on, each group going in opposite directions.

10:41 a.m.: A group of orange-garbed workmen fiddle with the traffic light on Franklin Street at the Bank of America Center using what seems like a glorified vacuum cleaner.

Meanwhile, the pedestrians waiting at the light are too impatient. They wait for a break in traffic and hightail it across, backpacks and purses bouncing.

A dapper older man window-shops in front of Julian’s. After glancing to see if anyone’s looking at him, he ducks in.

A semi-truck labeled “El Sol Mexican Restaurant Supplies” pulls away from the curb.

And another group frustrated with the length of the traffic light attempts to dash across the street.

10:56 a.m.: The requisite throng of South Campus residents crowds the U-bus at its last stop of Raleigh Road. However jubilant they are over the end of class for the week, a titter goes through the crowd as their chances at a seat grow slimmer and slimmer.

“When is y’all’s spring break?” yells the bus driver. When someone gives her the correct dates, she remarks, “I gotta get myself some vacation.”

11:11 a.m.: Over Chick-Fil-A and Dr. Pepper in downstairs Lenoir, a group of friends catch up. This group of sophomores has been friends since they were in the same suite in Hinton James last year, but now, the group of five is spread among several North Campus dorms.

Jen Rehberg from Middletown, N.J., returns to the table with a wrap, but complains that all of the sour cream is in the folded part. An unfortunate incident results in sour cream being dabbed on several faces.

Michelle Abshire from Selma wants to hear her horoscope for the day, so Liz Templin from Charlotte reads it out loud. Despite the myriad Zodiac signs present, it’s a 6 for everyone today.

Michelle’s boyfriend, Chris O’Connor from Charlotte, has not yet returned to the table, so Liz asks, “Did he have to go kill his chicken nuggets?” What she doesn’t know is that he went to Top of Lenoir for take-out and finally returns with fortune cookies for all. This begins a conversation over the point of fortune cookies.

Susan Boone from Roxboro deftly observes, “It doesn’t make sense to put fortunes in egg drop soup, so they put them in cookies.”

Chris tickles Jen, leading Jen to complain, “Michelle, your boyfriend is groping me!”

Michelle shrugs. “I’m not really concerned,” she says.

Liz smiles and says, “Ah, the depth of lunchtime conversation.”

11:38 a.m.: The consumer goods and games of “The Price is Right” have attracted a tired group to the big-screen television in the basement of the Student Union. One munches on a snack of pretzels, one feverishly attempts to complete calculus homework and one naps with their face smashed up against the cushions of the couch. The only noise is the sound of Rod Roddy, inviting yet another lucky contestant to come on down.

11:53 a.m.: Outside Bingham 103, the members of John Kasson’s History 156 class congregate, waiting for the class before them to exit. The people remaining inside are finishing up an exam, so the newcomers read the newspaper and finish up their lunches. As more class members arrive, two men needle their way through the swarm, one discussing his chronic bone spurs within everyone’s earshot. One stunned student leaves the classroom, remarking to her friend, “I never thought it would be that hard.” More and more people trickle out, but the 12 o’clock class is still unsure. A few brave souls go ahead and charge in, confident that they won’t be admonished, but most hesitate, not knowing the appropriate time to go in.

This year, I celebrated my 25^th birthday. I can almost hear what’s running through your head when you take in that statement—she’s a member of a lazy, coddled generation, glued to her cell phone and computer, updating her MySpace page five times a day instead of working at an actual job. Believe me, I’ve heard a number of your kind tell me so. And while some of that is true—I’m writing this essay on my laptop at a local café—the rest gives me a headache on a daily basis.

My parents—my mother especially—raised me to think for myself. After all, they were the same way. They graduated from high school in 1967, at the beginning of the Summer of Love. They weren’t hippies or protesters; they went to school and worked hard to make the world and their families better in their own way. My mother has spent the majority of the last 30 years as a resource specialist, a teacher who helps special needs and second-language students.

It was their mindset that prompted me to get started on my own story early. I worked semi-professional jobs as early as high school, when I was a gopher for a local architectural firm. That phase passed pretty quickly, and I ended up writing and interning for magazines while I was out of college for the summer. While my peers were happy partying every weekend, it was my responsibility to earn my own spending money, so I worked hard for it—and was loath to spend it.

While I now support myself, I did live with my parents for a few years after I graduated from college, but I did it to build up my own savings and start planning for retirement before I truly set out into the real world. And now, I have an IRA, and I just bought my first new car. When I went to Rome for the first time, it was on my own dime. Not only that, but I’ve won several awards and honors in my chosen profession, and I’ve written articles on topics that will be hard to top as I grow older—and as I’m told, wiser.

I’ve never been one who enjoys having someone tell them who or what they’re supposed to be. In college, a roommate of mine was so sure that I was going to be so enthralled with my first midnight showing of The Rocky Horror Picture Show that he predicted I would soon be dressing up as Magenta and streaking my way across the stage. I never did. What he said made me that much more determined not to like it.

Perhaps it’s the same way with societal expectations, and once I enter an age where I am supposed to be responsible, that’s when I’ll go against the norm. It worries me that there’s such a dim view of the generation that’s supposed to be spending its time sowing wild oats and generally being stupid, when we’re the ones who are going to inherit all the problems the U.S. and the world is experiencing now. People may not think we’re ready to make a difference yet, but maybe that’s another expectation I’ll have to shatter.

For now, if you see a woman in her 20s waiting to cross the street, listening to her iPod, realize that she may not have been formed from a cookie-cutter. She might wear at least semi-fashionable clothing, but she also reads several newspapers a day (even if they’re online). She might like going to museums as much as she goes to concerts, and the first dial on her car radio might be NPR—but just before the indie rock station, of course.

***

It’s evident, of course, from the mention of my 25^th birthday and MySpace as the website du jour that I wrote this several years ago. What may also be obvious from the first line is that I initially wrote this piece as a potential entry in This I Believe, the now-defunct project from NPR that detailed various contributors’ religious and spiritual beliefs…in all of the forms those could take. Of course, I never actually sent it in.

But honestly, that’s OK. Because taking up this cause of defying ageism against the young is something I’ve done in writing since I was about 13. I sent letters to the editors of Time and the San Jose Mercury News, protesting unfair coverage of teenagers in the media. The latter actually awarded me a Silver Pen Award for my words on the matter when I was 16. I’ve just always been so irritated about being lumped in with the bad stereotypes of my generation that I’ve had to express it multiple times.

Is this piece the best example of that writing? Maybe not, but it’s definitely the most recent…and the most coherent! I could find some angrier examples, but it’s best to let those languish in obscurity.