The Capital Times
By Crispin Sartwell
Marion Winik and I called our
wedding,"Woodstock 3: The Love-
In." It had a flavor of ersatz nostal
gia: we were a bit too late (only 11
in 1969) to have been hippies the
first time out. And our festival was
more bourgeois than the original:
we got married at our own largish
house, and there were more people
in twelve-step programs than on
drugs, though it was a close call.
Her 11-year-old son Hayes was my
best man; my 11-year-old daughter
Emma was her maid of honor.
But the festival had a homemade
flavor: no caterers or servers, rock
and roll handmade by the partici
pants. The mysterious Coco
emerged from the cornfield and
slithered suggestively to "Groove
Me Baby." Pete Laßonne played
his new hit song "We Made a
Mountain Out of a Molehill (of
Love)." Naomi Shihab Nye sang
Welcome Back!
By Roderick L. Lee
On behalf of the Student Govern
ment Association, I welcome back
all returning students and extend a
special welcome to all new stu
dents. You have chosen an excit
ing time to be at Penn State Harris
burg (PSH) because of the aca
demic programs as well as expan
sion of the facilities.
During the fall, PSH will hold
groundbreaking ceremonies for the
Community Aquatic Center and
new Student Housing facilities and
dedication of the new Library dur
ing the winter. These events are
sure to mark their place in Penn
State Harrisburg’s history.
The SGA’s goal this year is to
enhance campus life for present and
future students. This year we spe-
Photo by Matthew McKeown
SGA President Roderick L Lee
Woodstock 3: The Love-In
about lullaby rafts and rutabagas.
The four-year-old Juliet Mallouk
did her version of "Hey Mr. Space
man," accompanied by her father
the research chemist on guitar.
The ceremony was cobbled to
gether out of traditional and space
cadet elements narrated by Robb
Green, the mayor of Jefferson, Pa.,
and Dana Ellinger, a shamanic
priestess from Austin, Tex. I played
"Here Comes the Bride" on a cajun
squeezebox as Marion came down
the aisle. And I kissed the piss out
of her, persisting until our mothers
raised a little howl.
By the time we reached our sum
mer of love we were a bit more beat
up than the kids who gathered in
upstate New York to see Jimi
Hendrix destroy the Star Spangled
Banner. On a little table or altar
were pictures of the people we had
to let go of along the way: our fa
thers; my brothers, killed by drugs;
her husband and brother-in-law, lost
cifically want to address the needs
of the non-traditional students, and
those students who live on campus.
Because this is your college, each
of you is encouraged to become in
volved with SGA and the various
campus clubs and organizations that
offer opportunities to gain practi
cal experience and skills that are
readily applicable to the workforce.
Finally, the first SGA meeting
will be held on August 31,1999 at
12:30 p.m. and each Tuesday there
after at the same time in Room 216.
Please be sure to find out who the
senators from your perspective di
visions are and visit them during
their posted office hours.
(Roderick L. Lee is president of
the SGA. You can contact him by
e-mail at ri1142 @psu.edu or by
calling 948-6137.)
Policies of The Capital Times
The Capital Times is published by the students of Penn State Harris
burg. Opinions expressed are solely those of the author and are not
representative of the college administration, faculty or student body.
Concerns regarding the content of any issue should be directed to the
editors.
The Capital Times welcomes signed letters from readers. No un
signed submission will be reprinted. However, a writer's name may be
withheld upon request and by approval of the editors.
You may reach The Capital Times at Penn State Harrisburg Campus,
W 341 Olmsted Building, 777 W. Harrisburg Pike, Middletown, Pa.,
17057. You may phone at (717) 948-6440, or email at
capdmes@psu.edu.
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the expressed written permission of the editors.
The Capital Times does not endorse its advertisers.
COMMENTARY
to AIDS. Somewhere deep we prob
ably both still believed in free sex
and good drugs, but both the sex
and the drugs had at some point
started costing more than we had.
But even with all the damage, all
the loss, all the carefully cultivated
cynicism and exhaustion and isola
tion, love is still possible, still
needed, still miraculous. By the
time I reached Marion, I thought it
was too late: I had people to love
and screwed it up, or I had watched
them die, or the love had been re
placed one molecule at a time over
decades with anger and pain, so that
imperceptibly love had mutated
into its opposite. I'd been jealous,
judgmental, vicious. The people I
loved had been irresponsible, faith
less, ill.
Love was the last thing I expected
or wanted. Marion was giving a
reading at a bookstore in Baltimore
when I met her; we went to dinner,
then had a drink at her hotel. I gave
Wanted:
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pus life. We also need a person to
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If any of these positions sounds
like something you would like to
do, then please join us for our staff
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p.m. in W 341 Olmsted Building.
The Capital Times is open to all
students, so please join us!
her a quick hug and drove back
home, thinking: you should have
kissed her. I wrote her an e-mail to
that effect and then some, held my
breath, and hit send. Two weeks
later we were sharing a room on
Rittenhouse Square. Then we were
walking around Philly, telling our
lives and falling in love.
When love arrives, it's always
shocking, and this time it was so
strong and so fast. We weren't look
ing for it; but it found us anyway.
And we watched it happen or al
lowed it to happen; we didn't make
it happen. I didn't want it until I had
it, and then I didn't want anything
else.
By the time we arrived at that
wedding, we were famous for be
ing stupidly in love, for talking only
about one another, for spending all
day e-mailing, phoning, exchang
ing Hallmark schlock. Our friends
seemed tolerant no matter how ir
ritating we became, and hence
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Wednesday, August 25,1999 5
earned their invitations the hard
way.
It reached a kind of insane ecstatic
crescendo at The Love-In; we
couldn't stop staring into each oth
ers' eyes, couldn't stop kissing,
couldn't control those ridiculous,
blissed-out, drug-free grins. Over
the next few days, couples that at
tended broke up, realizing that it
wasn't the real thing, or re-plighted
their troth, getting an injection of
love juice.
So today, as you log on to
match.com, or have that same old
fight, I want to tell you what I've
learned. You never can tell what
might happen. Love is the real,
pure, bizarre stuff that no one un
derstands. It might find you today,
or maybe in thirty years, or maybe
in eternity. But I'm betting that it
will find you.
CrispinSartwell (mindstorm
@pipeline.com) married author
Marion Winik on June 19, 1999.
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