Click on the map links to learn about my life at CSULB. You can click on anything with a box around it. To start with the introduction, click on “My Beach… My Story” to begin. You can come back to this map from any slide by clicking the house icon.

Cal State Long Beach is, in many ways, my home. However it is sometimes a difficult house to live in.

In 2009 I won the CSULB Halloween Costume Contest for my personification of “Swine Flu.” This was during the height of the virus scare, and I was amusedly fed-up with all the mass “alert” emails, hand sanitizer dispensers and wide-spread panic. Wearing this costume was a silent thumbs down to CSULB’s handling of the flu scare, it was a protest, yet it conversely garnered me mainstream acceptance in front of the faculty and staff here when I won the contest. Ironically, it is one of my proudest memories from CSULB.

William Hope Hodgson’s novel, The House on the Borderland is a Lovecraftian horror story of a man who has to defend his home from terrible demons and monsters including pig people, who he calls “Swine-Things.” The climax of the book occurs when the swine things attack and the house is ultimately destroyed in a supernova. Given my “Swine Flu” costume, and the various difficulties and challenges I have had to overcome in my career at Cal State, it made sense to begin the MyStory here, at the “University on the Borderland”

. . .CSULB is “MyBeach” and this is “MyStory”.

An Introduction . . .

Music A huge, and wonderful, part of my life at CSULB has been my experience in the Music department.

I began playing the bass in high school. I taught myself the instrument in six months and have been in several bands. I enjoy heavy metal music and Cliff Burton of Metallica is my favorite bassist. His edgy style, classical training and phenomenal ability to play the bass as a solo instrument (rather than merely a backing, or rhythm instrument) inspired me and I’ve always had a secret desire to want to major in Music at University. In less than a year I had worn out my first bass (which was an inexpensive Epiphone) and had to get a new one. The current bass I play is a vintage 1970s Rickenbacker, just like Cliff’s.

After entering CSULB as a Bio major, I checked into double majoring in music playing the electric bass in the jazz band. I went for the audition and all, but my style of playing (largely by-ear, although I do read music) was not compatible with what they were looking for. “Rock instruments” as the audition judge explained to me, just weren’t the same as “proper classical” instruments, and why didn’t I just take up the Contra-Bass and go out for orchestra? “Well, I’ve played the violin before” I sheepishly admitted (oh! How their eyes lit up at that!) “but what I really want to play is electric bass.”

. . .so I opted for the Music minor instead.

It was a great choice. I could still take all the music classes I wanted, but didn’t need to conform to fit in a single mold of playing a classical instrument. For the performance requirement, I enrolled in the 49er Chorus. Apart from winning the Costume Contest, appearing in WinterFest 2009 was probably the accomplishment I am most proud of at CSULB.

BookstoreI work at the University Bookstore. I usually take 18 units and since I’m on campus so much, it makes sense for me to work here too. I work as a Frontline cashier– the department where the majority of our customers are rung up. I also occasionally work returns or textbook inquiries. Through my job I get to interact with a large cross-section of the campus community.

I love interacting with our customers. My major is English, and I’ve always wanted to work in a bookstore. Nearly everyone on campus eventually wants to buy a textbook or scantron and they invariably end up coming to Frontline.

Working on campus has been a generally positive experience for me, and the bookstore job is extremely accommodating to my life as a student. I like the work and most of the people there. It is nice to have a sense of community between all of us employees, as we are all students. The Bookstore is a large part of my life at CSULB.

Burial Ground “Puvungna” or CSULB’s Indian Burial Ground, as it is better

known, has always been a bit of a puzzle to me. As a rule, I never park in lot 20 if I can help it, as this site gives me “the creeps.” There is definitely something uncanny about this place.

The burial site is around four acres big and has attracted numerous amounts of controversy from various groups who want to allocate the land for different resources. The land was purportedly a grave site for the Tongva people. My own heritage as a mixed ethnicity Native American and European American make me extremely interested in this site. Cal State hosts its annual Powwow, and this, along with the burial ground indicate CSULB as a center for Native American Culture.

In 1995 President Maxson promised that Puvungna would never be developed so long as he was University President. F. King Alexander, our new President, seems to be following the same precedent.

While I myself can see the benefit of leaving the area “wild” and agree that it should not be used for more parking lots or buildings, I do wonder if some landscaping to beautify the site would really do any harm. It’s a lovely area, situated on the edge of campus, but currently its largely a dusty and unkempt eyesore. I think perhaps a more fitting tribute to the buried tribesmen could be allocated for on that land, or even a permanent monument honoring the Native Peoples of Southern California.

CHH One achievement I am especially proud of at Cal State is my Medieval and Renaissance Studies minor. I am fascinated by the universal human question of where we are coming from and going to. I think that understanding the world of our medieval ancestors can help us understand our modern world. In opposition to the common misperception that the middle ages were also the “Dark Ages,” they were in fact a time of enlightenment and even rivaled the early modern period. The medieval world helped to bring about our present conceptions of art, music, religion, language and culture . It was a turbulent period which endlessly fascinates me.

When I initially changed my major to the liberal arts field, I could have just as easily chosen History as English. In my future career I would like to pursue teaching both subjects at the college and university level as well as doing consultation work with museums internationally. I would love to be a medievalist, and in particular I have a keen interest in the Vikings and their history.

Language, linguistics, the study of human words and their origins is equally compelling to me. I am fluent in French, and have studied Russian, Latin and Old Norse while at Cal State. To me, there is little separation between my linguistic studies and my historical one. To me, its all communication. What is more universal and powerful than human communication, and the way we interact with each other? History is how we communicate the messages of the past to the present, English represents our means of conveying this message, and music is an oral manifestation of this same trend. As humans, we’re driven to tell stories and interact with the world around us. My minor in Medieval Studies is part of my own story, one way I have strived to discover and interact with my world.

Biology

The Biology department at Cal State represents beginnings, dreams and endings for me. At one time I’d had aspirations of going into wildlife conservation as my career. Somewhere along the way I got lost. There is something to be said for the virtue of dreams and the power of the mysterious and wonderful. Sciences, life, creation, where we are coming from, these are what science, what religion, what literally all human thought strives to understand. I went into the program full of dreams and ideals. But severe lack of appropriate mentorship and support helped contribute to my becoming extremely disillusioned with Biology at Cal State. I’d always been interested in history and loved to read, I’m a decent writer– English seemed the safe and logical choice for a change in major.

But I’ve never given up my love for Biology. I still retain a keen interest in wildlife preservation and animal husbandry. I’ll enter the teaching credential program next year as a graduate student. The classes are in the evenings, and while I work on obtaining my credential at night, I may pursue some type of park services work during the day. One day I’ll be a successful teacher, but right now I have some time to experiment and enjoy several different paths.

And Biology has not relegated itself to the back of my personal life either. In my free time I enjoy interacting with ecosystems, and I’d like to do an honest-to-goodness camping trip one of these days. While there is a somewhat strong desire on my part to pursue Biology again academically, I think that right now starting over again is simply not feasible. Along with the English credential, I might also pursue one in Math or Sciences and so escape to Bio that way, but I’ll have to see. Right now, the future is an open doorway.

Poem

Two roads diverged in a yellow wood,And sorry I could not travel bothAnd be one traveler, long I stoodAnd looked down one as far as I couldTo where it bent in the undergrowth.

Then took the other, as just as fair,And having perhaps the better claim,Because it was grassy and wanted wear;Though as for that the passing thereHad worn them really about the same.

And both that morning equally layIn leaves no step had trodden black.Oh, I kept the first for another day!Yet knowing how way leads on to way,I doubted if I should ever come back.

I shall be telling this with a sighSomewhere ages and ages hence:Two roads diverged in a wood, and I--I took the one less traveled by,And that has made all the difference.

Robert Frost: “The Road not Taken” (1915)

EnglishMy major at CSULB is English. This semester I will graduate with a BA in English Rhetoric and Composition. I am often asked what that means and the way I usually it is explain is that I am studying argument and persuasive language in writing. One of my favorite achievements at Cal State was the recent completion of my degree culminating Honors thesis on the work of my favorite author, Edith Wharton.

Wharton’s work is seminal and profoundly important in my life– through my thesis I was able to examine the fall of Wharton’s society, historic Old New York of the 1870s, through the vein of the fall of the mythical civilization of Atlantis. Using a line from her memoirs as a basis for the comparison, I was able to incorporate my love for historical research and ancient history with my study of modern English. Shaking my advisor’s hand at the end of the long semester of drafts, rewrites and proof-readings, stands out as a defining moment in my career at CSULB.

At this year’s commencement ceremony, I was in somewhat of a quandary as to which procession to walk in. My participation in my music minor made me eligible to walk in the Arts procession, while my minor in Medieval Studies and my English major fell under the College of Liberal Arts. I feel strong ties to both colleges and it was an extremely difficult decision. Finally, however, I have decided to walk in the Liberal Arts ceremony with my friends, classmates and teachers from the English department. I am extremely proud of my degree and the wonderful faculty and staff that have helped me attain it through such strong mentorship and support. The department office at McIntosh has become my home at “the Beach.”

Union The Student Union is the heart of campus where we all

hang out between classes, study and live and work together at Cal State. For me, the Union represents friendships, and the best and most awesome people I’ve met at CSULB.

People sometimes refer to us as a “commuter campus.” What I have enjoyed the most at CSULB is all the diverse people I’ve met and the experiences we’ve shared. The term “Union” is really appropriate. Here is where we gather together, a meeting ground for people to congregate– there is a sense of unity here that helps make university life just a little bit easier.

In many ways, the Union also represents my life off-campus as well. How often have we used the Union as a staging ground for memories, trips and adventures?

This is an area for relaxation and fun, but also enclosed in the academic boundary of the University, so we get some work here done too. In every way, this is a microcosm of my larger life: there is always the conflict between pursing an enjoyable personal life and a rigorous academic one. The Union is where these two come together and interact.