Inch One Hundred Sixty-One: My Reedie

I love Reedies.

Reedies are students at Reed College in Portland, Oregon. Twice a year I get a phone call from one of them as part of the fall or spring college fund drive

Tuesday night my Reedie called.

All Reedies follow a script; that's just the reality of fundraising. But what I love about Reedies is how they deviate from the script quickly. My Reedie, looking at my connection to Reed College, asked me about my son Ben (Reed, 2008). That lead to my commenting about my daughter-in-law Alise (also Reed, 2008). She then asked questions about whether they met at Reed (of course) and all but swooned when I said they got engaged on Commencement Day. "That's so romantic," she breathed.

My Reedie this time around is a linguistics major. She knows German and "some Chinese," but the language she is concentrating on presently is sign language. To me, that was a classic Reedie answer.

My Reedie asked me if I'd ever been to campus. Oh, yes, oh, yes. I explained that besides Ben's commencement, I was occasionally on campus during my Portland years (1977-1983). In fact, as I shared with her, when I transferred at the tail end of my junior year to a Portland college, the only reason I applied to Lewis & Clark instead of Reed was that L&C had a three-quarters residency requirement, whereas Reed required six quarters. Wanting to be done with my bachelor's degree, I chose efficacy over quality. It was the right decision for me at the time, but I always had a slight tinge of regret that I skipped Reed.

Maybe that's why I encouraged Ben to look at Reed closely when he started his college search. And when Ben said he was applying only to Reed, I backed him 100%.

Reed gave Ben a lot of thing, starting with acceptance. At Reed, he gained intellectual growth, being a part of a close community, and his wife, among other things. Because of our greatly reduced financial circumstances (Ben went to Reed during the years I was in dire financial straits), much of his education was free.

It is that last point—that Reed paid for much of my son's college—that explains why, when my Reedie asked me if I would give again, I said yes and pledged $25.00.

Under my current stringent financial controls, that small pledge will come out of my "spending money," which currently stands at $74.00, with another week until payday. That might make things a little tight, especially if I end up buying any groceries this coming week, but I can make it work.  It's for a college that set my older son on his path to adulthood.

And besides, my Reedie asked.