Thursday Night Club

My freshman year in college was a magical time for me. I hadn’t yet received the Frictional Impact Explosives pamphlet, but things were exciting all the same.

Somehow this introverted, fairly mild mannered young man managed to be the only person from the Houston area that I knew of to attend this small Baptist university in Abilene Texas.

I spent the first few days of freshman orientation hoping to meet someone, anyone from the Houston area, but it was not to be. As it started to become apparent that I wasn’t going to find anyone from the southeastern part of the state, I began to realize that being cut off from my world could prove to be interesting dilemma.

I was far from home in a land where nobody had any preconceived ideas about who Hugh is, was, or should be. That’s when I realized that no matter what I said, what I did, or how I acted the people wouldn’t have the slightest idea if I was being myself.

I realized that, if I were so inclined, I could change my whole personality.

Changing my personality sounded fun and easy. All I had to do was choose the personality traits I enjoyed in others and mimic them until they stuck. It was an easy plan.

So there I am, fumbling through my first few weeks of my freshman year and trying to reinvent myself at the same time.

That’s when I met Gregg. Although I was quite sure he had one, I couldn’t have told you Gregg’s last name to save my life. I don’t think I ever even heard his last name until my senior year when we were roommates. To me he was just always “Uncle Gregg.”

I don’t remember exactly where the name came from, but I think it had something to do with my calling his then girlfriend, now wife, “Cousin Lisa.”

Anyway, Uncle Gregg tells Dan (from my explosive adventures) and me about The Thursday Night Club, of which he was a member in good standing. And we decided that we should go check it out, just to find out what it’s all about.

As the name might suggest, this club met every Thursday night. The location of choice for the TNC was a frozen yogurt shop on the east side of town right near Abilene Christian University. The fact that the club had chosen this particular place as its meeting place was a big enough honor to the owner of the establishment that he bought and paid for a plaque for the wall that had each member’s name engraved on it. Along with our motto and sacred words.

As we arrived, the first thing I noticed was the lack of pomp and circumstance. This was no formal ceremony. They didn’t even own a copy of Robert’s Rules of Order.

The first thing I had to do was stand up and in 10,000 words or less (and the words “or less” were strongly stressed) tell why I was there and what, if any, good would my being a member of the TNC bring to myself, the TNC, or the world in general.

I said something like, “I’m not quite sure what good will come out of this...but”

And I was cut off mid-sentence by thunderous applause and an earnest plea for me to have a seat.

And that’s when I realized that, without knowing or even asking, I was being initiated into the TNC. At first I wasn’t too sure if I wanted to be a member, but then I just shrugged and thought “ what the hell”.

The next phase of my initiation was the memory test. I had to memorize the motto, the sacred words and the official TNC song.

The motto: Apathy and Undiscipline


The sacred words: Riloto Wue Mugabe - pronounced, ri-loe-toe, way, moo-ga-bay - (Nobody’s really clear about what they mean)

The song: “It’s been lonely on the saddle since my horse died…and we don’t give a rip!”

After taking two minutes to memorize these very important pieces of the TNC’s heritage, I found myself starting the third and final stage of the initiation.

The reflection stage.

For the reflection stage I simply had to take my yogurt, stand in the corner facing a kind of a palm tree plant and silently reflect on my new life as a TNC member.

As I stood there reflecting/listening to the conversation of my brothers I was suddenly struck by the thought that I had no idea how long the reflection part of the initiation needed, or was supposed to last. Then I thought about the motto – Apathy and Undiscipline. That’s when I turned around and had a seat with my new Thursday Night Club brothers.

My time of reflection took only about 30 seconds, but I did some good thinking.

I sat down and asked, “If apathy and undiscipline are truly cornerstones of the TNC, then it seems that if I don’t care enough to have the discipline necessary to remember to come to the meetings, then I’m being the best possible member I can be…is that right?”

Through mock tears they welcomed me into the brotherhood and told me of the current TNC president. They pointed to one of the first names on the plaque and said he came the first couple of meetings, but hasn’t been back since. To tell the truth, nobody was even sure if he was in school anymore. For all they knew he might be dead.

And so began my life in the Thursday Night Club. The guys would turn out to instrumental in the whole “reinvent myself” phase of life that I was in.

On occasion, we would have theme night. Where you’d bring something, or dress a certain way…or maybe not. It really didn’t matter.

Then there was the time the producers of the school’s musical theme show called “Sing,” asked the TNC to pretend to be terrorists and storm in between acts and take over. The dress rehearsal just happened to be on a Thursday night, so after the rehearsal we went straight to the yogurt shop, still in costume.

We parked a little way down the street and snuck up on the shop with guns drawn sneaking between cars, diving, rolling and doing covert kinds of stuff.

After about 30 minutes of eating yogurt we noticed a police officer with gun drawn poking his head around the corner and cautiously looking in our direction.

As it turns out, somebody saw us and just assumed we were robbing the bank that was in the same strip shopping center and called the police. I don’t remember much more than an extremely agitated officer radioing back to his comrades telling them it was just a bunch of college students and that they can unblock the streets.

I had lots of fun adventures with my TNC buddies. All of which were impromptu attempts on somebody’s part to break up the monotony of the day.

I never joined a fraternity. It just didn’t seem like something I needed to do. I had camaraderie I needed without all the stupid stuff.

I came back to school after a summer break and found that the yogurt shop had been sold, or gone out of business, or burned down or something…I really don’t remember. Whatever the case was, it was gone and Thursday Night Club never had another official meeting.

Oh, we’d get together. We’d sing the song, or quote the sacred words or even do the secret handshake, (I forgot to tell you about the handshake!) but we never had anymore Thursday night meetings. We talked about it. I think it’s just that everybody seemed a bit too apathetic to go out of the way to set it up. A fact that I think makes us all the president.

As it turned out, It wasn’t really in a reinvent myself time of life, as much as it was a “find myself” time of life. I don’t know, maybe that’s what college is supposed to be. However, the TNC turned out to be a very easy going, unassuming group of friends who, possibly without even knowing it, allowed me to celebrate and enjoy being whoever it was I decided I wanted to be.

Thanks Uncle Gregg!

Thanks for introducing me to the Thursday Night Club.