#79: A Little Pseudo-Martian Told Me

I found that as March ended and April—my last official month of undergraduate college—began, I was spending a lot more time in the stacks of the Inland Ocean Archeological and Anthropological Institute than I was at the other available libraries to study for classes. Just as Michele had told me, I had ready access to the institute any time I wanted, at all hours; I merely walked into the elevator in the lobby of the Wardell Building and it whisked me right up to the thirteenth floor, express, without being buzzed up, or having a special turnkey. Somehow, the lighted buttons recognized my touch.

#78: Afternoon of the Asp

After my morning art history class at the Detroit Museum of Fine Arts, I found myself chatting with Michele Selket, Doctor Messiah’s teaching fellow. Ostensibly, I had questions of her about the class, but to be honest, I also had much bigger concerns outside of school.
     On the steps, we considered Rodin’s Thinker and watched the water cascade down the steps of the newly-installed fountain pouring down toward Woodward Avenue. After she answered my questions concerning how to distinguish between the Renaissance, Palladianism, Greek Revival, and neoclassicism—her answer in fact didn’t clear anything up for me and I doubt anyone’s ever would—she asked, “Is there anything else on your mind, Clarissa?”

#77: Schroedinger’s Cat

The Wilbert Dunlevy Himmelfarb Presentation Festival of Undergraduate Research is held every year in mid-to late March, depending on when spring break ends and Easter occurrs, on the main campus of Arbor State University. This year, it landed on March 21 through 23, 1984. Sponsored by the Albert Kahn School of Arts and Sciences, the festival took over almost an entire floor of the Modern Language Building, with programming running concurrently in more than two dozen classrooms. Drawing from all the satellite campuses including my own extension in midtown Detroit, the programming featured mostly seniors giving brief synopses of the senior theses they had completed during the fall semester, but ambitious underclassmen could also enter to showcase their research projects.

#76: Who’ll Have You?

A week later, Secret Agent Preston Percy called to summon Avie and I to an urgent meeting of the Y+Thems at their Troy, Michigan headquarters. “Be here this afternoon,” he ordered.
     “Impossible,” I replied. “I’m scheduled at the Union Stripe Café, and I have a buttload of homework…”
     “Call off,” said Preston simply, and hung up.
     I got Nancy, who was back in the employ of the restaurant after quitting abruptly the summer before, to cover for me at the last minute. Avie and I drove up to Troy in her Pacer that evening, our megahero uniforms under our civvies.