Blogocentric Formulations

A Betrayal In Higher Education & Heroes

PROMPT: Have you ever been betrayed by someone you trusted? Tell us about it.


Before I can answer this question, I think it's important to differentiate between everyday kinds of betrayal and "big" betrayal. If we're talking about everyday kinds of betrayal (I confided in him and he told someone, she promised to do something and then she didn't do it, etc.), then I think we've all been betrayed at one point or another. Humans are inherently flawed creations and - at one time or another - we're bound to make mistakes, forget things, handle situations poorly, etc. and that can result in betraying someone's confidence, friendship, or trust... even if only in the short term. Then there are the "big" betrayal moments in life: a spouse cheating on you, a business partner stealing money from your joint investments, parents abandoning you, etc. Those are much fewer and far between and hopefully there are far fewer people who have experienced that deep, gut-wrenching, soul-crushing kind of betrayal.

So, to answer the question, yes, I've been betrayed. And I've been betrayed in both ways.

I think this would be a pretty boring blog post if I just told you about that time my boss promised me a promotion and then didn't follow through and kept putting it off... or one of the times I realized that my wife shares a little more about our intimate moments while talking with close friends than I realized... so I'm going to focus on the only real "big" betrayal I've felt in my life, and that was from my parents while I was in college.

When I graduated from high school and headed off too college, I was very fortunate that my parents saved up enough to pay my way through without needing to take out any student loans. Keep in mind this was back community college was $11 per unit and a semester at a state university was like $1,000... but still, that's a very generous gift to be able to give your children. So please don't think that I'm unappreciative of what they provided for me or that I'm in any way disappointed in my education; both would be incorrect.

BUT, my parents made it clear that their support (which included paying for my tuition, books, living expenses, insurance, and everything else) came with the following non-negotiable conditions:

          I was not allowed to work full-time. Half-time was okay for internships or if I wanted extra spending money.
          They would not pay for an apartment if I could reasonably commute from home.
          I had to graduate in four years; no wasting time or taking frivolous classes.

I honestly can't say I disagree with any of those rules. If I could afford to work full time, I could afford to take more classes and graduate early. If I went to school near home (like I did for the first two years of community college), why should they pay for an apartment just so I can live with roommates? And why should they pay for me to dawdle along taking random classes of mild interest when I could be spending that time working dedicatedly toward a degree? Maybe they were a little stricter than I would have preferred (shouldn't some of the college experience be about exploring your interests in addition to doggedly pursuing a degree?), but I agreed with their reasoning and accepted their terms.

I hit two speed bumps during my time in college. The first was when I transferred from a community college to a four-year university. Even though all my transfer requirements were done, my film school program had a prerequisite class that everyone had to take - no exceptions - before getting admitted to the two-year film program. So after two years at community college, I spent my first semester at the university taking a prerequisite class and a few other filler classes. For those of you keeping score at home: 2 years community college + 1 semester prerequisite class + 2-year film program = 4.5 years. My parents made it abundantly clear that I was expected to take winter and summer sessions and essentially cram that extra semester into their four-year graduation plan. It was incredibly difficult, but I ended up squeaking by after taking two winter sessions and a summer session to get me back on track.

The second speed bump I hit was when I submitted my graduation paperwork, the admissions office found a mystery general ed class that I supposedly hadn't taken. Apparently their records indicated I didn't take a "world studies" class or something (essentially a humanities/get-to-know-a-culture-that's-not-your-own requirement). I ended up getting the university to grudgingly waive the requirement (I did, after all, have two AA degrees - one in Humanities and the other in Liberal Studies - with numerous assorted classes in anthropology, sociology, world religion and politics, and art history... and my major even included a concentration in global media studies... so I think I was covered on that lower-level "hey you should learn about non-Western cultures!" class ). Anyway, when we were waiting for the decision about my appeal to have that requirement waived, I floated the idea past my parents of taking one last semester, which would allow me to take that one stupid class I needed, and I thought I could fill the rest of a full class schedule with several journalism classes, which would have ended up getting me a film major and a journalism minor. The verdict from my parents was that they were in no way going to support me taking extra classes just to get an unnecessary minor, and if I couldn't get the requirement waived, I'd have to pay for the summer session class myself since it would be past the four-year deadline they gave me to get my degree.

Ultimately, through hard work (including cramming an entire extra semester in) and not a whole lot of fun times, I met all of my parents demands and graduated in four years.

So where does the betrayal come in?

When my brother went to college (he was a year behind me in school), I assumed the same rules would have applied to him. Instead, my parents financially supported him through eight years of college, including a changed major and an added second major (journalism no less!), and they paid for his apartment even though he held down a full-time job and attended the local state university which was closer to my parents' house than the office that my dad commuted to every day.

My brother has always had a harder time in school than I had, so I didn't exactly expect that we would be treated identically... but I was shocked, more than a little resentful, and felt incredibly betrayed by my parents (who above all else always claimed neutrality and fairness in how they treated their sons) when they essentially gave him twice as long to finish his studies as they gave me, and flat-out broke the only other two rules they ever held me to in exchange for paying for my education. It would have been one thing if my parents had sat me down and said, "We are treating you two differently and this is why," but it took me a long time to get over the hurt feelings and sense of betrayal that came with such a lopsided interpretation of what they claimed was fair and equal for the two of us.

Ultimately, my family and I have gotten to the point where most of this is water under the bridge... but this was probably the most prominent point in my life where I truly felt like someone (or someones in the case of my parents ) completely betrayed my trust by implying they were holding us to a far more egalitarian standard than they actually were.

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PROMPT: Are there any long-running shows you've seen every single episode of? No one-season wonders here; let's say a show has to have a run of at least 48 episodes to count. If you haven't seen every episode of a show, tell me about one you'd like to consider watching from beginning to end.

HEROES
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0813715/

There are so many shows for which I've obsessively watched every episode. Even shows that have aired more than 48 episodes, the titles are many and include: ALIAS, THE NEW GIRL, BURN NOTICE, PSYCH, MONK, THE DEAD ZONE, SEX & THE CITY, HOUSE, VERONICA MARS, THE OFFICE, WHITE COLLAR, MY NAME IS EARL, GILMORE GIRLS, LEVERAGE, etc. etc. etc.

But the series I'm picking for today's blog prompt is HEROES, a show that I religiously followed when it was on. I know it kinda went downhill toward the end, but what can I say? I'm a sucker for super powers and hero mythology. I loved all the characters in this show and how their stories interconnected as they dealt threats like Sylar, who could kill other heroes and assume their powers. It was a brilliantly-conceived series, with some of the craziest cliffhanger endings that made you go "ARGH! I can't believe I have to wait until next week!" (ALIAS was also great about ending an episode with those!)

If you're a fan of superheroes and want to see a show that handles their powers and their mythology right, I can't recommend HEROES enough. Popular opinion seems to be that season one is exceptional, season two isn't bad, and it kind goes downhill from there, but I don't really care... I've seen every single one of the show's 77 episodes across four seasons and I love them all!