TGIF...the most contemplative Friday of the year...
Everything I've been working towards, in so many aspects of my life, for the past year comes to fruition this weekend.... I can't even begin to explain how nervewracking this Plenary is for me, knowing that the next three days essentially determine my impact on this community. Three years ago, I would have laughed in your face if you told me I would have been sitting in front of nearly 500 people talking about the importance of self-governance, student leadership, and a 27-page document that I now really do have memorized, and am trying to make into 25 pages I really believe in.
Also, this is turning out to be one of my least-favorite Hell Week's ever, but for a lot of reasons other than the people who matter the most -- my frosh. Now I know why so many seniors feel disconnected from all of this -- the frosh really are the driving force behind a lot of the emotion and connection to this tradition, and I really don't know what I would be doing at this point were it not for my 18+ amazing frosh. No really, I cannot think of one single group of people I've liked more on this campus during my time here than my frosh -- they make me smile, no matter what, and most of them still care about the things I care about 4 years in -- the things that the jaded ones long ago left behind, and the uninterested ones never cared to find out about.
I hate having to be the "bitchy/no fun/responsible" one, when everyone else gets to walk around all sloppy-drunk and completely ignorant of everything on the planet. Not that I want to be sloppy-drunk, mind you, but the fact that people tend to forget around this time of the year how much work it is for everyone else to pick up the messes, and the pieces of their lives, string them all back together with a little glue and some love, enough to keep it all together until the end, bothers me -- a lot. We're grown-ups -- all of us, despite what you want to believe. Yes, this week is the excuse we all use to do stupid shit, leave places a mess, break promises, and generally fuck over every relationship we all have with each other by blaming it all on something else, but it's also one of the best week's of the year -- when everyone can forget about the reason why they hate that girl in their class and watch her propose to her prof with a Ring Pop; when you can ignore the fact that you haven't spoken to your best friend in three weeks just because you haven't so you can go watch each other read Bedtime Stories.
Funnily enough, it was around this time last year that I completely lost my mind and my ability to do anything, at all, really, and I was lucky enough to have one person who put me back together, for the most part, and kept me here for this last year. The thing that makes me the most sad right now is that they aren't here to see everything I've done over the past year, despite the fact that none of this, none of my life the way it is right now, the whole lotta good and the little bad, would be my life if it weren't for that person -- the one who made me realize why I came here, and eventually why I stayed, and why I will always be a Mawrtyr :)
Also, this is turning out to be one of my least-favorite Hell Week's ever, but for a lot of reasons other than the people who matter the most -- my frosh. Now I know why so many seniors feel disconnected from all of this -- the frosh really are the driving force behind a lot of the emotion and connection to this tradition, and I really don't know what I would be doing at this point were it not for my 18+ amazing frosh. No really, I cannot think of one single group of people I've liked more on this campus during my time here than my frosh -- they make me smile, no matter what, and most of them still care about the things I care about 4 years in -- the things that the jaded ones long ago left behind, and the uninterested ones never cared to find out about.
I hate having to be the "bitchy/no fun/responsible" one, when everyone else gets to walk around all sloppy-drunk and completely ignorant of everything on the planet. Not that I want to be sloppy-drunk, mind you, but the fact that people tend to forget around this time of the year how much work it is for everyone else to pick up the messes, and the pieces of their lives, string them all back together with a little glue and some love, enough to keep it all together until the end, bothers me -- a lot. We're grown-ups -- all of us, despite what you want to believe. Yes, this week is the excuse we all use to do stupid shit, leave places a mess, break promises, and generally fuck over every relationship we all have with each other by blaming it all on something else, but it's also one of the best week's of the year -- when everyone can forget about the reason why they hate that girl in their class and watch her propose to her prof with a Ring Pop; when you can ignore the fact that you haven't spoken to your best friend in three weeks just because you haven't so you can go watch each other read Bedtime Stories.
Funnily enough, it was around this time last year that I completely lost my mind and my ability to do anything, at all, really, and I was lucky enough to have one person who put me back together, for the most part, and kept me here for this last year. The thing that makes me the most sad right now is that they aren't here to see everything I've done over the past year, despite the fact that none of this, none of my life the way it is right now, the whole lotta good and the little bad, would be my life if it weren't for that person -- the one who made me realize why I came here, and eventually why I stayed, and why I will always be a Mawrtyr :)