Taz,
It's a real bummer that you have to go through this when you are trying to learn. I guess this is a learning experience. The situation is not completely hopeless though.
Here's my suggestion--
Go to the Dean's office in person, dressed conservatively but not in a suit, and explain to him/her what happened. (Make an appointment if they won't see you then, but some deans have open office hours scheduled.) Explain that you are an athlete for the school, and why you needed the knives. If one of your coaches would go that would help also. Also tell the dean about your knifemaking. Having some pictures of finished, utilitarian knives you have made might help too. I realize that it is a school rule (no knives) but it couldn't hurt to calmly and rationally make your case. You seem like a calm and rational person so I don't think that would be hard. School officials are often impressed by young people that can articulate their position.
My first year of college I was pulling an all nighter finishing a paper in the office of the student run radio station. A female friend came by and asked me to go get breakfast with her. I explained that I couldn't but told her to take my meal card and buy us both breakfast and bring it back to the office. It was verboten to let someone else use your card, but people did it constantly so I had gotten to believe that it was an unenforced rule. Well, my friend happened to give it to the cafeteria manager who promptly confiscated it. As soon as I finished typing my paper I walked over to pick it up. I had not slept in about 24 hours, eaten in about 10 hours, or had any caffeine that morning. Let's just say I was in no mood to be messed with. I calmly asked for my card and the manager went off on me for 2 or 3 minutes straight. I was irritated but calm, and asked "Can I have my card or not?" She said I could but yanked it back as soon as I got within 6" of it and gave me this smirk that pushed my button. I snatched it out of her hand before she could say another word and said some ungentlemanly things to her.
I am not proud that I did, but I did. I called her a forking female dog. Bad move. When I went to use my card elsewhere 30 minutes later I was told it was blocked and I would have to go see the Dean of Students to get it unblocked.
I called and made an appointment with the Dean for the next day. I put on my jeans without any holes and a T-shirt from an academic honor program I had participated in in high school (instead of my usual punk rock t-shirt and falling apart jeans). I went in to the Dean's office expecting to get reamed. Instead I explained to her what had happened from my point of view, and how I thought I had been mistreated and the rules had been selectively enforced. By the time I left she had unblocked my meal card, waived the usual fee to do so, yelled at the cafeteria manager on the phone, and apologized to me. She always said hello every time I saw her on campus after that.
To finish up this overly long story, I didn't kiss her butt or do anything other than calmly explain what had happened from my perspective. I think the academic T-shirt helped. Surprisingly I found out later that that Dean had a rep as a hard case.
My story is not like yours in a lot of ways, but the approach is worth a shot. The best thing for me was that I never had to explain to my parents what a little cretin I had been in my "reply" to the cafeteria lady.
Of course, my first day moving into the dorms I had a cheap POS Italian OTF auto fall out of my cargo pocket onto the stairs as I was running some stuff up. My RA reached down to pick it up and got this funny look on his face when he realized what it was. He just grinned at me and handed it back, and told me not to lose it. He later asked me to keep it discrete which I did. I'm pretty sure he knew about the Gerber Mark I that I kept in my room, along with a small "bat". There were actually lots of weapons floating around my dorm, including handguns, hunting rifles, knives, martial arts stuff, and at least one compound bow (an aluminum arrow was mysteriously shot halfway through a door, before the year was over). I guess I went to school in a "simpler time"!
Later when I returned to school to study anthropology, all of my profs (male and female) carried some sort of pocket knife.
Good luck,
Paul
[This message has been edited by Paul Davidson (edited 05-04-2001).]
