Meat and Potatoes

A coatless Princeton freshman tried to explain why he didn't like eating in Commons. All the while he eyed the milk pitcher and bit his dixie drinking cup.

"Now I'm a southerner." You could barely hear above the noise. "I'm from South Carolina," he started again. "Down there Father makes us dress for dinner. WE eat slow and deliberate and we leave the table after everyone's finished.

"Up here it's different." Just then a lad wearing a white cloth coat dropped a plate of meat on the table and asked how many wanted java. Six hands went out.

"See what I mean. No refinement. Hurry, hurry, hurry. I bet some Princeton official has these Commons meals on a master plan. We're like so many consumption machines. Half ton of potatoes here, three hundred pies there."

The freshman frowned. "Sorry," he said." he said, "OI didn't mean to be bitter. I'm just hungry." He slid two chunks of meat onto his yellow plate. "Trouble is... no time...to enjoy food," he stumbled out in un-southern fashion.

"We don't get seconds. You got to go to another dinning room, and then they make you show a gray and green Commons Card to get in. Some of those Yankees swill down three meals a night."

While he talked, the plastic spinach dish went around the table once. The milk pitcher was filled and emptied and the waiter started calling for the dishes. He perched a coffee pot on the table edge as the hall began clearing.

"Weit a year and a half," he said, drinking his coffee. "Than Morther'll be proud. No more dixie drinking cups, no more running around for seconds. Only candle light and silver, with linen table cloths and lots of time to cat. I long to be a clubman," he sighed.