CLASS OG 2000: Dave Freedlander

Blues BrotherBlues Brother"There are probably some really cool people here. I just haven't seen them around." Piercing beats of jazz music break the silence of the short, hushed hallways of the Upper Quad. For Dave Freedlander, it's just another quiet evening at home -- time for a good book (he's reading Catcher in the Rye for the third time), trumpet practice or a little shut-eye. His room resembles a carefully thought-out war zone. Clothes are strewn across the floor, newspapers cover the blue carpeting by his bed (sans sheets), posters are peeling off the walls, and a "bad ass" dragon mask purchased on a trip to Asia last summer hangs from an exposed water pipe near the ceiling. A rooster lamp bought at an antique shop graces his desk, his younger sister's crayon drawing is taped to the wall ("She's the coolest 11-year-old in the world," he says. "Add 8 million exclamation points to that."), and crumpled garbage lies in a semi-circle just short of the trashcan -- missed basketball shots, no doubt. On the opposite wall hangs the standard poster of Dave's purported look-alike, John Belushi, in the 'College' sweatshirt. "I can find anything in this room in minutes. There's nothing here that's not in my grasp." This sort of contradiction is Dave's trademark. "I needed a single," he explains dramatically. "I know I would have hated my roommate no matter who he was. It would make me so mad if he was even half as messy as me. "I'm the kind of person that has to put my newspaper together before reading it," he indicates the pile on the floor. "If I listen to a CD, I have to listen to it all the way through. Even if it's a three-CD set. They were put together as a part. They're an entity." But he doesn't use the same precision in all aspects of his life. "I've washed my sheets twice. I do laundry when I have the quarters. Last week, I ran out of socks, so I just bought more. "I buy my clothes at Sunny's Surplus. I like it there -- you just get 'em and kind of leave." Dave attributes some of his love for the chaotic to his straight-laced private high school experience in Baltimore, Md., where he was on the lacrosse team and editor of the newspaper. "In high school, I had to shave in the middle of the day. They'd say, 'Go home. Tomorrow, shave that scruff.' I've always had hair issues," he says, scratching his now full-grown goatee and moustache. "And I always had to wear a tie. The first day here, I didn't know what to wear. I had to ask someone on my hall. I wore flip-flops until November. It was so novel." A Penn legacy (his father is a "pretty involved" 1962 alumnus, his uncle is an alum, and his brother, Jed, is now a senior), Dave says he always wanted to come to the University. "Now, though, I think my classmates are a bunch of bastards. Universities should be judged by the kind of person they turn out rather than the kind they take in," he says with a grin. "There are probably some really cool people here. I just haven't met them yet and I haven't seen them around. "Sometimes I'm not even sure I should be in college now. I just sort of came from high school to college and I never really thought about why. Things go in cycles for me. A couple of days are good and then a couple of days are bad." Instead of hanging with hallmates, Dave waits for them to leave and plays "Dylan 'till the walls shake." Or he heads for downtown night spots -- "90 percent of the time I go by myself." He even briefly considered joining his brother's fraternity, Theta Xi, but decided against the idea. "[My brother] really wanted me to do it," he explains. "I didn't rush and I got a bid anyway. I don't think I could have been in a frat. They're dumb. It's so provincial in a sense. I thought, 'Why are you doing this to make friends? Why are you doing this at all?' So I didn't sign my bid." Dave has kept himself busy in other ways -- he takes trumpet lessons downtown (he began at 18 and describes himself as "awful") and wrote for the DP once. And he is planning to double major in Folklore and Creative Writing. But where that will lead, he is still unsure. "I'm really worried about getting a job in that I really don't want one," he quips, glancing at the wall where a hand-written sheet of paper reads: "To the question of your life, you are the only answer." "I guess we'll see." n

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