GUYS I KNEW IN COLLEGE
1962-1966
by Claude Clayton Smith
​Fissured Tongue Series Vol VII  |  May 2026​
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Picture
"Untitled Stills," S. Okorefe. 35mm gelatin silver negatives arranged on paper, 11 × 15 in., 2026.
Picture


​GUYS I KNEW IN COLLEGE
1962-1966
Duality is not a story. Duality is just a complexity.
                                                           —Edward Norton 
DAUCHY tucked his tee-shirts into his whitey-tighties. Dinwoody looked like a duck, so we called him “Duck.” Ojo was from Nigeria. Luke lived on Diamond Head. Thompson had a Corvette. Wilson drove a TR4. Gernert got arrested for mooning. Sloane screwed a girl in the library elevator. McKenzie was the New England heavyweight wrestling champion. Van Kennen won the national championship in the 50-meter free-style. Burfort was a marathoner. Reiss organized the first All-Collegiate National Skateboarding Competition. Boynton rewired the radio station. Faerber DJ’d for seventy-two hours straight. Chorba’s on-air name was “Gary Soul.” McMillan brought the Chiffons to Fall House Parties. Zetterburg organized Spring Sing. Berger flunked out second semester.  Stelle was so big his golf bag looked like a quiver of arrows. Brundidge married a Black girl. Spoehr had to get married. Cosell was Howard’s nephew. Darius was Brubeck’s son. Davenport would father Lindsay. Lilly stood to inherit a chain of pharmacies. Rich was blind. Sehlinger died beneath his VW.  Fluegelman jumped off the Golden Gate Bridge. Hauser’s parents went down in that plane over Tenerife. Richter sold engagement rings. Bensinger didn’t drink. Carrithers stuttered if he didn’t drink. Werle had rhinoplasty. Geer was a genius. Carver was an enigma. Ibargüen was full of himself. Millett was a legacy. Dardani supplied beer during the Cuban Missile Crisis. Ingraham joined the Peace Corps. Holdt was my Big Brother. Hawley hitchhiked to D.C. for Kennedy’s funeral. Longacre left for the Army. Bickford died in Vietnam. Carlson died in Vietnam. Branigan fled to Canada. Amarant’s photo appeared in the June issue of Life Magazine, his mortar board high atop his
​frizzy red hair.


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About the Author
Claude Clayton Smith is the author of eight books and co-editor/translator of two others. His books have been translated into five languages, including Russian and Chinese. Smith has an MFA in fiction from the Writers’ Workshop at the University of Iowa and is Professor Emeritus of English at Ohio Northern University. For further information visit claudecdaytonsmith.wordpress.com.
About the Work
​My piece was inspired by brainstorming about the guys I knew in college, in the face of my upcoming 60th reunion.
About the Process
​As for my writing process, all of my books have come out of my own backyard. As the cliché goes, "Write what you know." When asked during a recent reading about my favorite genre, I said, simply, "Words."

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About the Artist
​S. Okorefe, is a an A-level student photographer based in London, mostly chasing real life as it happens. Their portfolio includes a series of photographs across London bus routes, a long-term study of students at rail road tracks, and a set of 35mm film portraits taken of friends in motion rather than posed. Their photography is influenced by artists such as Nan Goldin, Martin Parr, and Wolfgang Tillmans.

Okorefe writes, "I had open-heart and spinal surgery before I was 16 and this changed how I notice things, in the sense that I don’t really take ordinary moments for granted anymore."

"This series of negatives is laid across the page as a single image. It feels closer to how I experience shooting anyway, not as separate photographs but as a continuous strip of attention."
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