This New England

-- Clarence Chatteron, "The Road to Oguinquit'' (circa 1940), at the Portland Museum of Art show "Call of the Coast: Art Colonies of New England.''

Sunlight on the New England coast as it shines on old buildings can be breathtaking, when it's there. Will it ever return for more than a day?

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It seems that every little college wants to be a "university'' now because it sounds more important than "college.'' It's rather like people saying "utilise'' instead of "use'' and "appoximately'' instead of "about'' or "finalize'' instead of ''finish.''

Using heavy words makes the speaker/writer feel more important. Consider that everyone calls himself a "professional'' these days -- as in "health-care professional'' (nurses and doctors) or "early-childhood professional" (schoolteacher for little kids).

So Endicott College's president, Richard Wylie, says the Beverly, Mass., school will seek "university'' status because it plans to start a doctoral program in "small-organization administration.'' (See the very useful New England Board of Higher Education Newslink.) The proliferation of courses as our many, many colleges struggle to stay in business is impressive.

This is a cousin of the ridiculous idea that all young people should go to college because, well, it's good for their self-esteem, regardless of whether they'd learn anything there and in spite of the fact that they'd would generally gain more honorable, useful and remunerative work by taking up a trade such as plumbing. or computer repair.

Politicians push the "everyone to college'' idea because many in the public have been conned into thinking that going to college per se means something. Of couse, by saying that everyone should go, our leaders ensure that it means very little to go.

It's pompous pandering leading to disillusionment.

Meanwhile, I have always enjoyed the old line about Boston College -- "it is neither a college nor is it in Boston.'' (It's a major university in Newton.)

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The frequent stories about nude bikers in Vermont at this time of the year are more likely to elicit winces than smiles.

Human plumbing suggests that such activity would be painful if conducted for more than about a mile.

The whole thing sounds like a throwback to the late '60s and early '70s, when the Green Mountain State was the home to innumerable communes where open-air nudity, very casual sex and mind-altering substances were readily available. But wait, the last two still are --- but now everywhere!

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Word that the North Koreans are targeting a missile at Pearl Harbor for launch around the Fourth of July is more likely to arouse American patriotism than fear.

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There's a rumor that new legislation in the Rhode Island General Assembly would effectively allow the teachers' unions choose school principals. Pure democracy in action!

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