Assumptions
Dayle is an interesting character. Resident of fifth floor since my first year here, he is an institution around Cretin Hall. While I can’t fully disclose the many facets of his personality, I believe he is from Jamaica or somewhere geographically close - he has this really cool accent. I also learned the sport of cricket from him one early Saturday morning last year. I played with people still slightly tipsy from the night before, marveling the whole time at the subtleties of such a simple game. Dayle has always surprised me, intially from his accent, to his smoking, to his position as a senior contributing writer on our school’s newspaper.
He’s a big tough guy who keeps his cards close to chest; I wouldn’t want to anger him in a dark alley any night. Indeed, I wouldn’t want to anger him period. So, one afternoon this past week, I had Enya playing in my room with my door open. Let me first extrapolate on my corner room’s acoustics: my ceilings are steeply raked as they are the flip side of the roof. Because of this, they aim sound down the hall so well that I can listen to music playing in my room while taking a shower (3 rooms down the hall) without turning it up loud. So Dayle, hearing the ethereal music wafting down the hall comes down to my room; “I was wondering who was playing that.” I turned suddenly at his comment, seeing him in the doorway. Suddenly I wished I hadn’t been playing music. “He probably hates this ‘new age crap’ and is going to toss me and my speakers out the window,” I thought. To my surprise, he took a different conversational route, “that shet rocks mahn,” he observed, his words filtered through his accent. Relieved, I agreed.
I once wrote something like this: “Everybody is truly Good at Something. Always remember this. Keep an open mind when you encounter strangers or even people you know well. Especially people you know well. It’s not possible to know everything about somebody. People will always surprise you.” This statement, written when I was younger and wise only be dumb luck, has continued to prove itself to be true.
Comments
Sagert
Dayle’s a hell of a guy. I was scared of him my freshman year, mainly because I never saw him do anything other than grimace as he smoked. My sophomore year, I got to know him and had a J-Term class with him, and he’s a surpisingly impressive academic character, as well. Since then I’ve learned that he’s an all around good guy, and despite any fronting or complaining he may do, he’s not in a hurry to do harm to anyone. I’m not even sure if he’s capable of it. He’s actually from St. Vincent, which is near (but not in) the US Virgin Islands (which include St. Thomas).
caley
So my first encounter with Dayle left me unsure of how to think of him but I have since come to respect him. See, one of my first nights on campus as a freshman I went to visit a new friend in Cretin. On my way out I was unsure of the procedure for visiting hours and did not know if I needed to make sure the desk worker new I was leaving so I said (to big, scary looking Dayle who was working that night), “Do you need to, um, check me out or something?” His response (for which I admit I totally set him up) was, “No but I can ‘check you out…’ ” as he looked me up and down. Intimidating, especially for my first experience with visitation hours but since then I have to laugh every time I see him even though I have no idea if he remembers me or not. He always says hello, opens doors for me, and is nothing but polite. My opinion? Good guy, bad line.
Ryan Markoe
Dayle tried to use a line on me like that once…then he fanned away the pot smoke and realized i was a guy….we had a good laugh but he’s never looked at me the same way again.
But seriously I cannot imagine that cretin hall is going to be the same without him next year…he just fills some “big foreign angry looking guy” hole in our lives that will not be easily filled.