Of Music and Milkshakes

So what if your pun-intentional specially flavored milkshake arrives 30 minutes after you order it? At least it’s still as rich as ever, thanks to the ice cream’s New English provenance—specifically, to the Jersey cows from Vermont whose resemblance to big buttery scoops of caramel-flavored ice cream helps produce the best artery-clogging shakes on either side of the river. Location: one Lone Pine Tavern but two straws.

Actually, it’s hard to focus on the person sitting across from you, sharing your oh-so-delicious milkshake, because you can’t decide whether you have a bigger crush on Ryan Dieringer or Tica Douglas. Together, they form the campus band The Making of San Bernadino. Though I’ve witnessed Kevin Barnes of Of Montreal professing love and proposing marriage in a wedding dress on stage, for me, Lone Pine will always be for Platonic lovers.

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Final Frustrations and Thank Yous

On the top of a hill, behind the white buildings and Green that define Dartmouth so well, are an old tree stump and a statue of Robert Frost. Dartmouth students know the tradition and meaning of these relics well. These days, we take pictures in front of them as part of scavenger hunts and sorority pledge missions. Robert Frost, whose statue I’ve spent time studying by on sunny afternoons, once famously wrote that “Two roads diverged in a wood, and I, / I took the one less traveled by, / And that has made all the difference.” Ok, but Led Zeppelin also famously sang, “Yes there are two paths you can go by / But in the long run / There’s still time to change the road you’re on.” Forgive me Mr. Frost, but Led Zeppelin has provided me with the mantra these days that I repeat frequently when gazing into the unknown and the terrifying future.

I lived the words of Led Zeppelin three years ago when I transferred to Dartmouth. I made my decision in the middle of the summer of 2006 after touring Baker Tower and seeing mountains roll on forever —it felt like home. These days, I think transferring was both the dumbest and the smartest thing I have ever done. I missed out on freshman year here, and because of that, I was not on campus-wide e-mail lists, I never got an academic advisor, and I didn’t learn what an NRO was until after it would have been helpful. I feel that another year here would have given me time to actually effect change on campus. I also know that if I hadn’t transferred, I would have missed out on an experience that challenged me in ways I did not think were possible. I would not have met the people I now call my best friends. I would not have found out how exhilarating it was to run 109 laps around a bonfire.

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From Shakespeare to the Matrix

The Journey”
One day you finally knew
what you had to do, and began,
though the voices around you
kept shouting
their bad advice—
though the whole house
began to tremble
and you felt the old tug
at your ankles.
“Mend my life!”
each voice cried.
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Finding Something to Believe In

Last fall, my poetry professor told me: you like to label yourself.

You figure it’s a bad sign when that comment comes up in a creative writing workshop—poetry should be more about exploring your identity than rigidly identifying yourself—but her insight was spot-on, as always. I like to define myself, to be open and assertive—occasionally even too aggressively—about what I believe in. I had prefaced my comments on a poem with, “I probably like this because I’m an atheist”; I labeled myself at other times as a feminist, an activist, or a New Yorker. I have a “Proud to be a Feminist” sticker on my laptop, wear a PRIDE bracelet on my wrist, and recently added the term “sex positive” to my collection—and for this last one I need to thank Cody Lavender ’10, who (half-)jokingly called sex positivism his religion.

But thinking of Cody, I remember how desperately I sometimes don’t want to be identified.

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I Was Wrong Being “Right”

The moose looked at me like he might just want to devour my face. He wandered about, sniffing at the grass, staring at cars, ignoring the Dartmouth students crowding around—most of them, anyway. He kept glancing back in my direction, seemingly debating which of my limbs would be the most delicious. I kept my distance—this giant beast of a thing looked like it could do some damage—but the students smiled and giggled and laughed at the moose, searching for signs of a possible (and deadly) charge at the crowd. But the moose just sauntered about, paying attention to no one, lost in its own lack of concern, the kind of confidence brought about by years of being the baddest motherfucker in the New Hampshire wilderness.

I was thus introduced to Hanover, the pinnacle of civilization, the place where a moose can so casually take up space between the East Wheelock residential cluster and the gym. During my first two years at Dartmouth, I can’t quite say I was as comfortable in Hanover as the giant moose.

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Lessons From Philip Seymour Hoffman

It’s hard to condense four years of Dartmouth into one senior article. I want to write about the politicians and journalists the New Hampshire primary brought to town. I want to sing praises of my favorite professors and staff members. I very much want to be the 84,173rd person to warn underclassmen of how little time they have left.

However, after four years, 26 DFP articles, 37 courses, and countless extracurricular activities, one of the most important things I’ve learned here is summed up not by a list of things I wish I’d done, but by a short quote from Philip Seymour Hoffman’s character in the movie Doubt (thank you, Dartmouth Film Society):

“Certainty is an emotion, not a fact.”

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Destination: Dartmouth and Beyond

During the summer before my senior year of high school, I received an invitation from an obscure place in Hanover, NH known as Dartmouth College. The invitation was to “Destination Dartmouth,” a 3-day program for promising students of color to visit the College and explore what it had to offer. I was blown away. Dartmouth offered everything I looked for in a college: excellent off-campus programs, extensive social justice and community service opportunities, and an intimate campus community where I would be more than just a number and instead an individual who could impact the lives of other students. I was ready to submit my application right away, but what I heard from some students made me question my Dartmouth experience.

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I don’t know exactly when it began. Maybe it was when people gushed over my Dartmouth sweatshirt while I rushed through Boston’s Logan Airport to catch a bus headed for my Freshman DOC trip. Or maybe it was when my peers would mock me when I did something they deemed odd: “You’re an Ivy League student and you don’t know how to cross the street?!” (As a matter of fact, I do know how to cross the street. I just like waiting for the walk signal —besides, I try to set a good example for the children). Whether it sprang from the positive comments or the negative backlash, I may never know. But some time after matriculation, perhaps during Orientation week, I realized that being a Dartmouth student was something to be proud of. I learned the alma mater quickly, throwing my arms around the shoulders of ’09s, ’08s, ’07s, ’06s and other alums, praising the granite in our muscles and our brains.

We all remember our first crush on Hanover: the quintessential New England town, small enough that everyone knows everyone else, the congenial aura of students and townies alike. Because I didn’t get a chance to visit Dartmouth before I decided to attend (for some reason, I thought the virtual tour would suffice), my introduction to Hanover was on a warm September day, the sunlight hours still long, the air lacking the crisp bite of autumn, the campus alive as people introduced each other with a “Hey, remember me? We’re Facebook friends. I saw that your favorite book is To Kill a Mockingbird and I also listen to Dave Matthews…” Oh, Hanover. It was love at first 5:45 wake up call.

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Dartmouth’s Most Important Lessons

Today, I handed in my thesis—a monstrous, blood-sucking 150-page short story collection that consumed my life for five months—and now, in the wee hours of the morning after a margarita and a beer, I’m sitting down to write 1,500 words about my “Dartmouth experience.”

For some reason, my thesis seems like nothing compared to this. I pretty much made everything up in my thesis. Something tells me I can’t do that here.

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