I don't have anything against walking. In fact, I love walking. You might even go so far as to say that I have never, in my entire life, been too tired to walk.

There have been times, however, when I was too tired to get out of bed, times when I needed one more click of the snooze button in order to figure out precisely how many more clicks I intended to allow myself before really and truly responding to my alarm.

That's why, in my second year at the University of North Texas, I moved from the relatively luxurious accommodations of West Hall (on the periphery of campus) to the un-air-conditioned confines of a room in centrally located Bruce Hall.

In my second semester, I found that one of the first rules that I had made for myself upon leaving my parents’ house was getting me into trouble in my geology class. I had made a solemn vow never, under any circumstances, to set my alarm earlier than 9 a.m. At first, I was unconcerned about the fact that my geology class started at 9. I thought I could honor my vow and still be just a few minutes late to class. But since West Hall was so far from the General Academic Building, I found that I was consistently fifteen minutes late unless I jogged. (The day I jogged I ended up skipping class entirely; I found that even though I had the effrontery to go to class unshowered in a baseball cap, even I could not justify imposing the odor of a hot and sweaty and unshowered Sloucho on my classmates.)

Although my motive for moving to Bruce Hall was informed by nothing more than a desire to get a few more minutes of sleep, I found that the dormitory had a good deal more to offer than easy access to the most important buildings on campus (the student union and post office, the main academic buildings, and the administration building).

The best thing about Bruce Hall was that it was the dormitory of choice for the musicians on campus. When I tell people that the University of North Texas has a world-class jazz program, they invariably roll their eyes at me. But since this is not a review of the university itself I won’t belabor the point here (except to mutter under my breath, a la Galileo, “Still, it does have a world-class jazz program”). Musicians were first drawn to Bruce Hall because of its location (across the street from the music building), but began to take over the dorm as practice in dorm rooms became more and more the norm. Most dorms have quiet hours (hours reserved for study and sleep); Bruce Hall has practice hours (hours during which musicians are allowed to practice their instruments).

So who, you ask, wants to hear Johnny Bassist thwacking out his latest Les Claypool impersonation at 1:30 in the afternoon? The answer, my friend, is you. When Johnny Bassist is a fourteen-year-old prodigy who took his SAT early so as to move on with his musical career, he’s worth listening to. The musicians who are drawn to UNT are not garage band hacks; they’re generally gifted, competitive, and intensely serious students of jazz. They’re amazing. They’re not at all distracting or annoying; they’re a perfect joy to listen to.

Everyone who’s been through a four-year college program will tell you that the experience itself teaches you lessons that are larger and more important than anything in any of the books or lectures. Then they go on to talk about how they learned how to “interact with people” or “the true Zen of time management” or some such nonsense. I’ll tell you what was most important to me about college that I couldn’t have gotten from any book: It was the experience of being cocooned in jazz, of eating the bland food of the Bruce Hall cafeteria while some members of the 4 O’clock Jazz Band brushed up on their be-bop chops across the hallway in the lobby. It was the experience of returning to Bruce Hall after a stint in the library to find a concert pianist discussing and demonstrating a few things about his technique in that same lobby. It was the way that the contested election between Samuel Tilden and Rutherford B. Hayes (which I was reading about in a book) became inextricably intertwined with the plaintive strains of my sophomore roommate’s cello.

No Trips to the Laundromat
The other perks of life in Bruce Hall pale by comparison, but are worth mentioning nevertheless. Most important to me were the laundry rooms scattered throughout the facility. I spent my last three years at UNT in room A-305 of Bruce Hall, right across the hallway from a laundry room. It was like having my own washer and dryer (except for the fact that I had to feed quarters to the machines). I was also right across the hallway from a water fountain; and Bruce Hall has those great heavy duty water fountains that actually shake when they come on because it takes so much energy to get the water so icy cold. Until you explore drinking in the way that only college freshmen are capable of exploring drinking, it’s impossible to understand the importance of frequent rehydration. And until you learn the importance of downing a few liters of water at the end of a binge, there’s simply no way for you to appreciate the ease with which truly cold water goes down.

It’s a Cafeteria, What Do You Expect?
The cafeteria, open 7 a.m. to 7 p.m., was no better than any of the other cafeterias on campus, but no worse than any except the one in Kerr Hall (the athletes’ dormitory). If you suffer from the rather common human affliction of having taste buds, you’ll probably want to regard it (and any college cafeteria) as your snack larder. Skip the prepared foods and prepare your own from the “fixings” made available. I tended to live on grilled cheese sandwiches and salads (which was a healthier diet than I would have provided for myself in an apartment, let me assure you). Because Bruce Hall is so centrally located, it tends to draw a sizable lunch crowd (i.e. people who live at other dorms will stop in at Bruce for lunch). Perhaps that’s why Bruce Hall always seemed to have one of the better ice cream selections.

Community Bathrooms and a Gentle Reality Check
Precisely because I made the same mistake, I know that many high school seniors will regard Bruce’s community bathrooms as a drawback. But that’s only because they’ve always had relatively clean bathrooms at home. Believe me, unless you like cleaning bathrooms, you don’t want one of those “suite bath” set-ups in which you and your roommate share a bathroom with your next-door neighbors. The four of you will be responsible for cleaning that bathroom up, which means that the finickiest one will end up either doing the chore or walking across campus to use one of the community bathrooms cleaned every morning by a professional janitor (who has, like, you know, equipment and stuff). If you really believe that any foursome of kids straight out of high school will share the work of cleaning a private bathroom equally, you’re not ready for college. You’re not even ready for Mother Goose. Stick to Dr. Seuss and the nifty way in which so many words sound alike.

Yikes! No A/C? I Mean, “Yippee! Ceiling Fans!”
Now for the really hard part: the lack of air conditioning. If I remember correctly, Bruce Hall is the only dormitory on campus without air conditioning. The only disadvantage that stems from this distinction is that it can be uncomfortably hot for roughly two months in the academic year (September and May). But the advantages are many. First off, the rooms are equipped with ceiling fans, which gives them a certain charm. Second, the windows actually open and function like ordinary windows (as opposed to the permanently sealed glass boxes that stud the walls of many of the more “advanced” dormitories). And third, well let’s just say there are certain atmospheric benefits pursuant to having one’s air to oneself. Despite what your sixth grade health teacher may have told you, you won’t seem particularly cool for throwing people out of a party in your dorm room because they’ve decided to spark up a little contraband. You will seem decidedly uncool, but if you’re worried about being thrown out of school for playing host to such a violation, you will have no choice but to throw them out of an air-conditioned room, since the air in your room will make its way to the R.A.’s room in no time. In Bruce Hall, however, anything is possible with open windows and a ceiling fan and maybe a wet towel at the base of the door—though I wouldn’t want to be seen as encouraging any illicit activities.

I’m sure that college changed my life; it’s just that I’m not exactly sure how. I guess what I like best about Bruce Hall is that I can point to the change it made in me. Before Bruce, I didn’t know who John Coltrane was. But when I got married (the summer after graduating from UNT), my wife came down the aisle to Coltrane’s “Naima.” That seems a little more meaningful to me than air conditioning or—sniff!—food.






Recommended: Yes