SUBURBAN LEGENDS: Is It Cold In Here?

As I walk along the Boston University campus, a chill often runs up and down my spine. I shiver and pull my coat tighter around me. However, these frosty bouts do not result from the blustery Boston wind or even from the brain-freeze that usually accompanies a hastily eaten cup of ice cream while hurrying to class. No, I’m talking about a different kind of coldness — the kind that comes from angry looks and vacant expressions, from the impersonal, distant and aloof denizens of Boston University whose every smile is forced and who can only be labeled as one thing, even if they themselves have no idea what I’m talking about: cold as ice.

I hate to say it, but BU has more cold people than PAX has reruns of Remington Steele. Classmates, professors, random riders of the T — many seem strangely soulless. It makes me think back to my first experiences with so-called coldness, in my camp counselor days at scenic Camp Shalom in the fine state of Connecticut. There worked a girl whose very presence was enough to drop the room’s temperature to absolute zero. She did not laugh at jokes or make small talk. She showed no identifiable emotion whatsoever. And so the running joke began. When she walked in the vicinity, I would comment to my friend how chilly it was that day. “Is it cold in here, or is it just me?” I’d ask knowingly. “Yeah,” my friend Mike would say. “It’s a little drafty.” From that day forward, I’ve encountered all manner of “cold” people — the Ice Queens, the Chilly Willies, the Stone Cold Killahs. But BU’s urban cityscape seems to attract these frosty folk like a Dave Matthews Band concert attracts every spoiled wannabe hippie in West Chesterfield (put down your machetes, Dave fans).

In our culture, having ice water running through one’s veins is often a celebrated and esteemed quality. From wrestler Stone Cold Steve Austin to NBA legend George “The Iceman” Gervin to rappers Ice T, Ice Cube and Vanilla Ice, we cannot help but admire those who maintain an uncannily cool exterior. But in the real world, where most of us expect some sort of social interaction with our fellow human beings — not to mention some effort at friendliness — such behavior simply isn’t cool. Throughout Boston, I’ve encountered countless T drivers who do nothing but yell unsympathetically for the cramped passengers to move all the way into the car. I’ve seen BU security guards shout at students who walk past them hundreds of times a week to stop and flash their ID picture. If it wasn’t for the amazingly friendly and always smiling card-swiper in the Warren Towers dining hall, I think the towering buildings of BU would soon begin to resemble the Polar Ice Caps.

I had one professor who was teaching a class of no more than 20 students, only four of whom were males. Still, she could not manage to get any of our names correctly a good three months into the semester, and she put no time or thought into correcting herself. You would think the normal thing to do would be to simply take a few minutes to get everyone’s name down and add a small shred of humanity into the typically impersonal classes of BU. But no: Let’s jump right into Joseph Conrad or Soviet foreign policy or quantum theory. Who cares about knowing the names of people who sit staring at you for six hours every week? It’s the little things like smiling, joking, waving or even remembering someone’s name that distinguishes a Mr. Freeze from a Joe Niceguy. Now do you want to be a third-rate super villain with blue skin, a freeze gun and a dearth of bad puns? Didn’t think so.

Then there are the other cold people, the kind you see smoking in huddled masses outside of SMG or sitting grouped together, staring each other down as if they’re playing the home-version game of Survivor. These guys and girls brush off so many people they probably look in the mirror and give themselves the cold shoulder just for kicks. They draw in others by association, too. Quickly — go give a friendly hello or, at least, a polite nod to the person across the hall before they get sucked in. I hear once you go ice you’re stone cold for life. It’s like the guy or girl in high school who suddenly decides that they are oh-so cool even though they are still the same old Jill or John you traded peanut butter and fluff sandwiches with in fifth grade. Well I have news for all the cold people out there — with your bone-chilling glances and humorless laughs and unfriendly dispositions — chill out, lighten up and make just a tiny little effort to be a human being.

Don’t be the security guard who harasses the mild-mannered student who comes home from class every day at 4:15. Don’t be the professor who can’t take five minutes to learn the names of his or her students. Don’t be the T-driver who yells at someone for handing them a dollar bill (why do they have a slot if they don’t accept bills?). Don’t be the person who conveniently forgets that the guy or girl sitting across from you at lunch sat next to you last semester every day in philosophy class. Unless you’re last name is Cube or your first name Vanilla, don’t be cold like Ice. Next time I walk down Commonwealth, I want the cold shiver I get to be from Boston’s 50 mph gale-force winds and not from my latest encounter with Captain Cold.