Here at college...
The first week was undeniably rough; nothing to do but endless lectures, orientations, introducing yourself over and over and over and never having a real connection. But classes have started... French sucks (completely grammar and ridiculous exercises, but i need it to refresh), but my Lit professor is amazing and insane, words pour from his mouth quicker than i can catch them. Introductory art class is such a shock after all the individual attention i received last year- the other students on the whole aren't very helpful during critique, but the professor knows what she's talking about, beleives in maintaining the structures within experimentation before you're ready to intentionally break the rules. Early Chinese Philo is fascinating, actually we're studying Japanese Shinto traditions at the moment... part anthropological, part philosophical, part historical. Biology is largely lab, which would have been a death sentence last year, but this year we're actually researching areas that we will not know the probable results, and the professor is focused upon ecological diversity...
And somehow, among all the introductions and... 'I'm from New Jersey, I'm probably an art studio and literature major, i live in Jewitt, my favorite colour is green...' I managed to find some really amazing people to become friends with- My roommate is one of them; the ways in which we're different make it easier for us to get along, and we're curiously similar in other ways. Mostly girls, alot of the guys seem a little out of place, especially the straight ones... But people are relaxing and becoming more interesting as a result. I think this year while be an interesting experience.
So, it's lovely here- breathtakingly beautiful in parts. ( Last night we climbed into the tower of our dorm that is being renovated and sat around and drank and watched the moon climb higher and higher over the hills and the quad and the buildings with lights like jewels) And i'm consistently happier than i've been in a long time, but i cannot shake the feeling that this is simply a lovely dream. I know that Vassar is so far removed from what life is like for so many people, and exists almost in a universe of its own. I think about this especially when we walk through downtown Poughkeepsie to the market or the deli- a few feet off of campus, and the sidewalk begins to crack, the buildings begin to sag, the garbage accumulates, and you're in another world. It amuses me when i encounter the anarchists on campus, waiting to destroy the system, but living in such comfort, recipients of the hierarchy that the purportedly wish to destroy...
Reread 'A Moveable Feast' this week- the beauty and clarity of Hemingway's experiences never ceases to amaze me- people and tastes and feelings so simply explained, so that you feel and experience even the details he never mentions.
And somehow, among all the introductions and... 'I'm from New Jersey, I'm probably an art studio and literature major, i live in Jewitt, my favorite colour is green...' I managed to find some really amazing people to become friends with- My roommate is one of them; the ways in which we're different make it easier for us to get along, and we're curiously similar in other ways. Mostly girls, alot of the guys seem a little out of place, especially the straight ones... But people are relaxing and becoming more interesting as a result. I think this year while be an interesting experience.
So, it's lovely here- breathtakingly beautiful in parts. ( Last night we climbed into the tower of our dorm that is being renovated and sat around and drank and watched the moon climb higher and higher over the hills and the quad and the buildings with lights like jewels) And i'm consistently happier than i've been in a long time, but i cannot shake the feeling that this is simply a lovely dream. I know that Vassar is so far removed from what life is like for so many people, and exists almost in a universe of its own. I think about this especially when we walk through downtown Poughkeepsie to the market or the deli- a few feet off of campus, and the sidewalk begins to crack, the buildings begin to sag, the garbage accumulates, and you're in another world. It amuses me when i encounter the anarchists on campus, waiting to destroy the system, but living in such comfort, recipients of the hierarchy that the purportedly wish to destroy...
Reread 'A Moveable Feast' this week- the beauty and clarity of Hemingway's experiences never ceases to amaze me- people and tastes and feelings so simply explained, so that you feel and experience even the details he never mentions.