On Sunday, someone asked me, "Who do you want to win the Superbowl?"
I didn't care, I said. After all, my wishes won't affect the outcome, and the results won't affect my life. That answer would bring a little irony to my life, later.
Later, I walked through the Student Union at night and saw there were hacky sack players still at it.
"Are they still there?" I asked nobody in particular. It had been at least four hours since I'd first seen them kicking the sack around.
I approached cautiously, wary of bean-filled projectiles, and asked them who they wanted to win the Presidential Primaries.
"Do you think we care?" one of them crowed, stopping the ball (it's called a footbag, sayeth Wikipedia) with the side of his foot and tossing it over his head.
The sack was caught by someone on the other side of the freestyle circle. Later, the person would introduce himself as John, explaining that it wasn't his real name.
"It doesn't matter whether we care," John told me. The hacky sack was spun, amazingly, behind his back and tossed to someone else. He said that their wishes wouldn't affect the outcome, that the results wouldn't affect their lives.
"Besides," he went on, "it's all about the money. It's what the media wants."
I told them I was with the media.
Though their eyes all stayed on the ball, I felt their attention turn on me. One of the players introduced himself as Osama, and told me what he'd heard about how things work in France.
"Every candidate gets equal coverage, equal time," Osama said. He pointed out how little airtime Ron Paul is getting these days, and made a correlation to how little Paul's campaign fund is.
It didn't take me long to gather that these people are feeling an acute dissatisfaction with the way things are run.
I try to focus most of my writing on getting student-age citizens more invested in their communities. Get involved, I'm always telling people - make an informed decision.
But here I was, faced with the idea that there's no reason to participate in the discussion, and that my media-tainted advice isn't trustworthy. What can you say?
"What does the media want?" I asked them.
Readership and ratings, sensation, the power to sway the public, they told me.
"If the media says, 'this guy sucks,' then that's the public opinion and that guy will lose," John said, tossing the hacky sack.
A player who gave me his real name as Kevin stopped it with his forehead and let it fall on his knee, a move that's called a "stall," I think.
Kevin said, "There's no separation between the news and editorial sections anymore."
"It was different a generation ago," someone else at the circle chimed in.
Was it? Did I really miss the generation of journalism with integrity? To people like these hacky sack players, the answer is yes. And in my conversation with them, that was all that mattered.
I implored the circle to take an interest in changing things for the better. I heard someone snort derisively, but in a minute, the conversation turned earnest.
Osama caught the ball in one hand, staring right at me. "I believe in the Constitution, and that it exists to improve our government," he said.
"I'll end up voting, and for someone who will never win, but that's democracy," Kevin said. "At least I can choose."
Behind me, on the television mounted on the wall of the Student Union, the Giants scored a touchdown and ruined New England's perfect record. I couldn't be bothered to care. And neither could the hacky sack players.
I asked the circle if the group had a name. They said they weren't an official club.
"We meet here every Sunday," Kevin said. "We stand in a circle, kick around a sack, and talk."
"What do you call yourselves?" I asked.
"Men," he responded.
Before I left, feeling defeated but enlightened, the group showed me how to set the ball up on my foot and pass it to someone else. I might not have understood what they were trying to tell me, but at least I participated.
"You're part of the circle, now," they told me.
Photo: Courtesy of Laron Fomby
