When I was signing up for college, I questioned the selection of classes forced on me.

I wanted to get better at programming, I knew what classes to take...

I asked why do I need all these when I wanted to be a programmer, and the lady said weirdly said “balanced education”.

To me a balanced education was a step down, and she was pushing me into something that she knew was worthless.

And this young lady was doing that, to iron things out, to make me stop sticking out, because she needs to get paid.

This seemingly benign situation, was actually one of the worst things that have happened to me.

I was betrayed, by College, this precious thing, that I held in such great esteem.

I was told to shut the heck up, and take the back seat.

Because balanced education is what they do, and balanced education is what they get paid for.

That is a cult, a cult of education.

---

It is a non religious shit show, where anything that sticks out, needs to be destroyed.

There is no need, for what nobody gets paid for.

---

You might not have noticed, that this student, was exercising her authority over new sign-ups.

I think of her as a movie villain, and call her the lawnmower-woman, in my memories.

The movie lawnmower-man, when it was released in my country of origin…

Had to be retitled, because, the country used to be a bit late, behind the world's advancements.

The movie was retitled, “Mind Scyther”, as we were far more familiar with the scythe.

That is exactly what she did, in her madness to adhere and get paid, she attempted to cut my mind off.

---

I say all these things with a smile, because I did see through it, I lost all faith in education.

I didn’t even take the entrance exam, I took only the classes I liked.

And when I was put on the Deans list, with a perfect 4.0, I dropped out, it was too much.

---

You must never do what I did, because every time I think about that fake college, I love it even more.

I love the evenings, the smart people, that wouldn’t even look at me, ...I loved talking to teachers.

I miss the Art Professor that called me a pig for leaving paint on the easel, ...this is before I took her class.

I miss the Philosophy teacher, who failed to even teach Descartes.

I loved talking to him after class, even though he was fake and said Ms. Rand was not a Philosopher.

I would later learn that’s what the popular kids say, when they want to feel smarter than her.

I loved the evenings, the strange people that flew kites, and the gym, the gym that I was just too shy to go to.

---

This institution has betrayed me, but I made it beautiful.

It is what we all do, it is not just that wherever we go there we are, as High School tried to teach.

Bu that wherever we go, we will bring out beauty with us, and make it more beautiful.

We have to learn to resist inauthentic things, because they are not worthy of what we bring into them.

---

For every day of lectures, I read one less book, for every homework, I wrote one less happy little program.

Each time I disgraced myself by perfectly memorizing for the tests, knowing that a test does not test what I have learned…

But just the questions I was suppose to memorize, I destroyed valuable authentic knowledge that I could have gained by normal means.

By being tied down to a College, I was unable to set off on my Great Adventures.

---

And once I left all the inauthentic things behind, I finally learned to bring my beauty, to beautiful things, like the Ocean and the Great Lakes.

---

We are all beautiful, and we all haul all that beauty with us, and I urge you, not to drag it through inauthentic things.

The concept of “Hoop jumping”, is just as infective and inauthentic, as balanced or standardized education.

Do not waste your beauty, instead, take to narrated books, to get at the wisdom, you can’t just read a book, you have to hear it.

You have to have room to re-listen to it, until you make your way deeply into it, until you inherit the authors wisdom.

---

To summarize this poem and lecture, do not drag your beauty into inauthentic things.

Ms. Rand used to say, “In any compromise between good and evil, it is only evil that can profit.”