The Campus Cafeteria:
John, Joe, and Dom.
Of Brothers Three,
Chocolate Oranges,
And The King Triplets.
By Jennifer McGee
Saturday, February 24, 2001.
DATELINE: Fayetteville, Arkansas
Special to corndancer.com
(This is the second installment of a three-part series set in the university cafeteria. The first installment, A Mecca for Body, Mind, and Soul, is archived for your enjoyment.)
About 11:30 on a recent Saturday morning, not long before I had to be at work, I decided to take advantage of a free repast (music to the ears of any college student), courtesy of my meal plan, instead of spending precious cash for a quick meal out. So I trekked to Brough Cafeteria to partake of its pre-paid-yet-none-too-exceptional fare. Granted, a burger or taco would have been more satisfying, but at least something edible can always be found there at the mere cost of the scan of an ID card.
I found some grapes, mashed potatoes, and mac-n-cheese (three entrees even Brough can't seem to spoil) and took a seat alone in the corner, facing the entrance. I watched the people ramble in, hoping to see a familiar face. One face did come through the door, but for the life of me I couldn't decide if it was familiar or not. It seemed to remind me of my friend John, but from the distance I couldn't tell. Not wanting to stare, I shot a few fleeting glances in his direction to see if I could confirm the identity, but I could not.
Then I saw my friend Dominic come 'round a corner. He waved and smiled in my direction, and I returned the greeting as he went to forage for his own meal. Aha, I thought to myself. Now I could safely deduce that the mysterious man who had come before Dominic was indeed John, Dominic's older brother. Nine times out of ten you can find Dominic in the cafeteria eating lunch with his blood. My logic was impeccable: If someone who reminded me so much of John happened to be in Brough at the same time as Dominic, odds were pretty much in favor of him actually being John.
As I hurried to finish my meal, I happened to look up from my plate to spy a young man placing his tray on a table close-by. My grape halted in the space between plate and mouth. Triple whammy! There was no denying the identity of the third; he was Joe.
Joe is Dom and John's brother.
Like Spontaneous Combustion,
The Three DiMaggios
Materialized before Me.
What force of the universe caused all three DiMaggio brothers to materialize in the cafeteria at the same time? More than likely, the universal hunger pang, I guessed.
I quickly finished my meal, returned my tray, and sought Dominic's fellowship. He smiled a be-dimpled smile and greeted me warmly with a hug. He had just finished scrambling some eggs and was scooping the fluffy yellow mounds onto his plate. He convinced me to stay and visit a while before I had to leave for work. Seeing an amazing opportunity here - not often does one get to see the antics which manifest like spontaneous combustion when all three DiMaggio boys occupy the same space at the same time - I agreed. I wouldn't miss it for anything.
At the table with the brothers three, I realized why I was so reticent to recognize John before - he had shaved his goatee. The one identifying feature of the eldest brother had been eradicated from existence by the swipe of a razor blade. Without the whiskers, he looked even more eerily and undeniably similar to his brothers.
John is the no-nonsense elder, who doles out sage advice to his siblings about the complexities of academics, social life, love and relationships, and finance. The 22-year-old engineering major is father Joseph DiMaggio's eyes and ears on campus, reporting to dad about the significant episodes in the life of the three. Older brother dishes out stern warnings about the horrors of bleaching one's hair or piercing one's something or another - acts for which the eldest would most certainly be held accountable, as he seems to be his younger brothers' keeper.
A Fashion Statement.
Joe, the middle brother, 21 years of age, follows in his father's and elder brother's footsteps; he, too, is on track to become a mechanical engineer. Joe in his special way is the more fashionably inept of the trio. Unlike his brothers, who sport marching band t-shirts and sharp tennis shoes with a sense of pride and place, the middle brother opts for a tucked-in shirt and sensible shoes. Surely becoming a blond never crossed his mind.
Dom is the endearing baby brother, oozing with a sparkling personality that makes little old ladies want to pinch his cheeks. At 18, he is the black sheep of the family, pursuing not the lofty goals of engineering, but the trifling discipline of physics. While generally laid back, he does like a touch of spice now and then; fortunately for John, little bro' decided against bleaching his hair. Unfortunately, he opted to keep his earring.
Despite these differences, all three look alike, act alike, and talk alike in the most fundamental sense of blood and family. However, their most defining familial trait is the way they talk: incessantly and unceasingly, giving precious little room for anyone else to put in their two cents worth.
With this in mind, I anticipated with eagerness the path of the conversation soon to follow:
The Conversation Begins.
"Hey, John," Joe said as his brother sat down. "Can you believe the trouble I'm having getting my new hard drive? I talked to this one place, and they said they couldn't get it, and so I cancelled the order. Then I ordered another one from this other company, and I get a call yesterday that the other company didn't cancel the order after all and they're shipping it to me. What am I gonna do with two new hard drives?"
"I dunno," John replied. "I guess you could always have a spare, just in case."
"Yeah, keep it in your car," Dom joked.
"I know. You could put it on a scooter and have a motor," I quipped. They all laughed.
"Man, that would be funny!" Joe smiled.
"Hey, I actually did see this commercial about a scooter with a motor," John replied. "A chick on a motorcycle with some big biker guy ran off with some corny guy on one of them. I swear that was the stupidest commercial I've ever seen."
"I'd almost like to have one on campus except it's hard to scoot up hills," Joe commented over his French toast. "But I would like my car once in a while, too. Dom."
"What?" Dominic just smiled. "I had to borrow it. I was watching some anime with my friend, and he got a call that a new episode was out on DVD. So we ran to the mall to get it."
I laughed. "You sure did. I can't believe you ran that fast just to get a new Japanese anime DVD. No, wait…I can."
"Hey, I did come and see you at work. So you should at least be grateful that it got us to the mall where I could drop by the department store and say hi."
The Lingerie Department!?
"Oh, I am. And thank you, that was very nice. It helped pass the time since work is so boring now. Nobody comes shopping after Christmas, and believe me, having boys in the lingerie department spices things up considerably."
"Dom?" John looked at him questioningly.
"What?" he replied with a smile. "It was only to see Jenn."
"Yeah, sure." John continued, eating his scrambled eggs.
"Well, you could have at least told me you were taking it," Joe continued. "I was going to go somewhere with my friend, and we got out in the parking lot, and I was like, 'dude, where's my car? Dude, where's my car?' " We all laughed, and Joe continued emphatically (writer's note: this is a reference to the conspicuous title of a recent pop flick). "Dude, WHERE'S MY CAR?"
Dom laughed even more. "Sorry. Next time I'll ask first. But it's parked in the next row. You can't miss it."
They proceeded onward, conversing about various subjects of interest to each. Then I observed an interesting phenomenon and came to a startling revelation: each brother could be talking about something completely different and unrelated and still be able to listen to and fully comprehend what the other two were saying. It was amazing.
John: "I remember being a junior and not having my car because my little brother had borrowed it. Then you finally got your own car."
Joe: "So I had the weirdest dream last night that I was a dinosaur. It was too strange!"
Dom: "Dude, I have so much physics homework I have to do today! And then I have to finish my differential equations problems and my French stuff before Monday."
I could hardly keep up. Then the conversation shifted like a jerky standard transmission.
"... and I was talking to these girls," John began.
"The King triplets?" I slyly asked, elbowing Dominic.
Haley, Jennifer, and Brooke.
"Hey, I'm sorry! I don't remember them! I was, like, one year old when we lived in Oklahoma!" The King triplets, Haley, Jennifer, and Brooke, were friends with the eldest DiMaggio children when they lived in Oklahoma. In a previous lunch conversation, John had mentioned them and had bugged Dom about not remembering them, even when he was so young. So we all continued in the fun.
"No, you were not one, Dom," Joe answered. "Elizabeth was born there, so that made you at least three."
"Well, I was three! I still can't remember those girls! They were John's age, for crying out loud!"
"But they were the King triplets, Dom. Who can forget the King triplets?" I inquired sarcastically.
"I can!" He smiled.
The transmission jerked again into another gear.
Engineering the Chocolate Orange.
"Hmm. This looks like a good orange. I think I'll take it with me and save it for later," thrifty John commented. It seemed Brough had miraculously conjured up another edible entrée.
Joe took the orange from his hand and rapped it on the tabletop. "Man, you know those chocolate oranges? They are so good! And you have to hit them to break the pieces apart so you can eat them. I love those things!"
"No, those things are nasty!" John replied, snatching back his fruit. "Orange and chocolate together? Yuck. That's horrible."
"How do they make those things? Are they like real oranges covered in chocolate or is it just orange filling?" Dom inquired.
"It's orange filling. They have this neat machine that makes the chocolate shell and they squirt the filling into it and voila, a chocolate orange," Joe explained.
"Neat machine? It's not rocket science to engineer some machine to squirt fruit filling," John mocked.
"But it's a chocolate orange!" Dom exclaimed.
The debate raged on for a few more moments, and then I leaned over to Dominic. "Is this what it's like at home?"
At Home It's Even Wilder.
He smiled. "Yeah, only our dad gets involved, too, talking about the engineering of it. Then my older sister Rosie, the lawyer, tries to get into it and argue the case. Then Elizabeth starts in talking about some totally unrelated high school thing that none of us understands. And our mother is smart enough to stay out of it."
Wow, what a family! I thought. It would be interesting to observe a true family discussion sometime, but not yet. I still needed more preparation with the three brothers before I ran headlong into the whole family.
Sadly, my time had passed, and I had to leave to go to work. Joe decided he needed to go, too, so we left Brough in each other's company.
"Good talking with you, Jenn," he said as we parted ways.
"You, too. I'm sure we'll talk again." I smiled. No doubt; I would continue my observation of their brotherly interaction in the future while striving towards the goal of encountering a whole-family free-for-all some time in the future.
Oh, yes. He could count on it.
Jennifer
McGee
A
Personal
Note
Written
at
CornDancer's
Request.
I am a freshman at the University of Arkansas at Fayetteville. This is the beginning of my second semester, and I'm really starting to get into the swing of things. As you can tell from my writing, my college experiences provide excellent fodder for stories. So much goes on around a school campus. From late-night soirees in dorm rooms to the mall food court, from the classroom to the cafeteria, there is always something going on.
Probably the most significant thing I have learned from being here so far is to just look around. You can tell so much about yourself, your peers, and your world in general if you just pay attention. Take the time to sit and watch what goes on around you, and you will realize how rich, full, and interesting everyday life is and how much it has to offer.
Signed:
Jennifer McGee
Todd Alden Marshall
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