Thursday, November 18, 2004

Oi ... Shunned. - Do the Propaganda.

So Monday night the president of my fraternity walks into my room and apologetically hands me a sheet of paper formally stating that my pledgeship within the house is being called into question. Joy. I was quasi expecting this. It had to do with a grade report the academics chair of the active house wanted. The entire concept of it irritated me, because in high school the only people who needed to have grade reports filled out were those people not really doing to well in their classes. Given, I could be doing better in mine, but I actually found out I am doing better than I thought I was, especially in Spanish. So I decided not to worry about getting it filled out, because I found it degrading. Then it turned out that anyone who did not turn it in on time was put on academic probation within the house. Again, I got really mad, but oh well. I had to get my grade report in, and make some sort of plan about how I am going to budget my time during the weeks; this time it was threatened that anyone who did not get them turned in would be up for depledging. Well, I got the grade report in, but I never really understood the plan thing, and I did a really shitty job at it, and forgot to hand it in. So after that house meeting that night I received the aforementioned memo. The date was set for the next night. So come this Tuesday night, all the actives meet downstairs and discuss things in general for a while before calling down those in question. I was the first one down. I had so many factors working against me it is not even funny, though ... To begin with, my ability to speak well in front of groups of people is lacking. I did theater, yes, but that just means I can act well in front of an audience. That is the main thing that really hurt me, that and the fact I was really nervous. I could hardly think straight. They asked questions in concern to how well I think I know people in the house, how the house has affected me and vice versa. A big problem is that they often just asked very open-ended questions, and I do not do well with those, because there can be so many other questions they are asking within that one that I do not know where to even start. One of the guys knew me well enough to know that I struggle with that and phrased questions more specifically, but it did not take long before I pretty much lost all hope in my ability to convince the active house to let me stay a pledge. At that point I just started crying. I was just so distraught because the whole situation was just really fucking stupid. I walked back to a corner to try to calm down a bit, at that point one of the actives came over and put his arm around me and asked me to do the same to him. My respect for that guy skyrocketed at that moment. In my experience the past several years, no one was ever really there when I needed them to be, even if they were in the same room with me, they did not seem to care enough to try to comfort me. So the fact this guy took the initiative to come up and put his arm around me really meant a lot. Words cannot express how grateful I was for that. I still knew the odds were against me though. I finished up talking a bit, and I went back upstairs to continue studying and such. Around 11 o'clock to midnight, the active house finished meeting with everyone they needed to and made their decisions. The president and pledge educator had me walk up to a third floor room with them, and told me that the active house voted to depledge me. Again, I just lost any emotional control. They explained that it only takes about a 10% vote of the house to depledge a person, and they keep it that low for a reason, which I could understand. Depledging is just the wrong way to go about things, though. It is not like I was doing anything wrong. They could have just said they did not want me to activate at the end of this semester and I would have been fine, but taking away my membership as part of the house was way too much. As such, I am no longer allowed to attend meetings, social events, etc. I found this really ironic considering one of the main things the house was concerned about was how I do not seem very social within the house. I was seriously just all-out crying the entire time. It was just so much fucking bullshit. I was the first one of the few they brought down that night, so they had the guy that consoled me earlier at the meeting come in and talk to me while they went and talked to the others. It was a good time, though, once I more or less finished crying. We just talked about our families and just got to know each other a little better. The next day when I sat down for lunch, there were two other actives there, and one took the time to say he apologizes on behalf of everyone who voted not to depledge me that night, and that a lot of the actives are pissed that it happened. He said next Monday when the actives have their meeting, he is going to try to make a motion to repledge us. My pledge father told me he was going to make a motion to deactivate himself, just to make a point, lol. It has been nice to see how some of the actives are responding to it, though. Unfortunately for them, they are obligated to support the decision. They do not have to like it, they just have to not speak badly about it to others. I believe that is wavering a bit in this situation. The entire pledge class is pissed off about it, as are several of the actives. So maybe I shall be repledged before I know it. I hope so. Nothing seems to have really changed other than I cannot attend the social events and such. I mean, everyone interacts with me the same way they did before. Nothing is weird or awkward. So that is good. As you can see, my colors changed again. I was reading the Triangle Fraternity Member Manual the other day and they were talking about our colors, Old Rose and Grey. They just so happened to even mention the hexadecimal color code for them, so I decided to apply them here. Old Rose is obviously the red color, the shade of Grey is the one in the background. I may not technically be a member of the house, but my heart still fucking bleeds Old Rose and Grey. I seriously have not cried as much as I did that night since my parents got divorced. I love this damn house. On a more positive note, Green Day's most recent album "American Idiot" is pretty good. I like it a lot better than I did "Warning," the last album of theirs I listened to. One of the guys have it in the house, and I borrowed it and ripped it to my computer. I would reccomend it.

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