It has been a long long time since I have updated this blog. I owe the delay to a particularly eventful and productive senior year of college, as well as the summer that followed. Currently I am thrilled to report I am a full-fledged New Yorker! I am living and working and paying rent in Brooklyn alongside my roommate Jamie and many of my other friends. Life is bizarrely without structure after years of focused routine. But I am hoping to fulfill my dream of becoming a writer/journalist/theatergoer, and to do so I may set up a new blog full of my writings and musings. So this belated post will probably be my last at Brewers Digest - thank you for joining me in remembering the moments from my college years. It's so exciting to think about what's ahead, or I should say, what could be ahead!
Upon arriving at Vassar for my senior year, I dove headfirst into acting in an amazing production of "Alice in Wonderland." The process involved insane human set pieces, live lights and sound effects, and a truly creative collaboration with people like Sarah and Julia, our director.
The weather this winter was totally weird! Almost no snow all year, oh except that one time we got a blizzard on Halloween. This is the view from TH96, my home.
Ian, Greg and I led our swim and dive team as captains this year. It was the culmination of four years of hard work. We had some excellent moments with our team/family despite aggravatingly petty drama. In many ways I was glad to finish the season this past February, and call myself an ex-swimmer.
Willa and I went shopping on Fifth Avenue. We have matching sweaters. We match.
For winter break, I joined my awesome family for skiing and frolicking in Mammoth! There wasn't much snow but there was much fun to be had with my siblings.
And parents.
And grandparents! They are wonderful. (Isn't this picture adorable?)
The VCSD seniors! We celebrated our last grueling training trip in Fort Lauderdale, FL.
It's been a long journey. And of course, for the fourth time, it had to end in a shaved head. I swam pretty fast at States! But sophomore year Jack outswam me in all my individual events.
Jamie, Neal, me and Joe kicking off Spring Break 2012 in Montreal, Canada. We spent four days cruising the beautiful city and discussing our imminent adulthood.
And then Julia joined me in Hawai'i. :) Sharing places like Moloka'i with her was of course a joy. She could not get over the fresh-picked papaya.
One of my favorite parts about senior year was participating in my friend Carly's radio program, which was an hour a week devoted to telling stories. I got to be there for the first and last shows and many in between, and loved feeling like a kid reading aloud with friends.
As graduation approached, my housemates and I spent as much time together as possible, including playing squash. With the exception of Meg, who was captain of the squash team, we were all enrolled in the class Beginning Squash. So. Fun.
We also wrote theses! Here are the "word clouds" from three of them. Mine was entitled "Smart Reviews: An Exploration of the History and Theory of Theater Criticism". I learned a lot, especially about my own ambitions and potential. My advisor also put me in touch with an amateur theater critic site called playstosee.com. You can read
one of my published reviews there, and expect more!
Mr Nate Silver was among the visiting Vassar alumni who attended Shakespeare Troupe's outdoor production of "Romeo and Juliet." The show was a hit! I had the honor of taking a crack at an incredibly fun role: the Nurse.
This is Julia and I celebrating that play and our other theatrical endeavors this year.
Then it was Senior Week! Don't we look good??
The formal was the first of many post-classes, pre-graduation offered. It was a week of fun and debauchery with my housemates and other classmates.
Freshman year feels like a long time ago - it's weird to think it's been four years since Amy, Neal and I were at Orientation.
And then, as if as an afterthought, we graduated. Leymah Gbowee was our Commencement speaker, and she
advised us to "blossom where we are planted". It was a memorable and extremely dehydrated day.
Again, the six of us are so photogenic! By the very next morning, we were packing up our Town Houses and saying goodbye - but not for long.
Jamie and I moved into a Crown Heights duplex apartment within two weeks of graduation! Our exposed brick is wonderfully Brooklynish, and on weekends we stroll over to Prospect Park or go looting.
But before settling into my apartment, I spent a second summer as a Treetops counselor. My almost-three months there were characterized by little connection to the outside world, meaning I was fully and happily immersed in taking care of all those kids.
Here are some of them! I was in charge of four little thirteen year-olds once again, and they were my favorite part about the camp experience.
That and my fantastic, smart, talented, inspirational colleagues.
See? Oh and I love the organic garden (that's a cabbage).
On my five-day canoe trip one of my campers told me, "You're not incompetent. You're childish, but you're not incompetent." Although it was said in another context, I've sort of adopted that quote as my motto for adulthood.
Treetops really is one of the most beautiful places in my world. Its sense of community balances me and grounds me like nothing else can. Plus there's no better place to learn the guitar! I'm already looking forward to returning there next summer with my family.
For now I am poised to take over New York City, and because I am young and haven't yet tasted failure, I feel invincible and ready. I agree with Robin Marantz Henig when she says, "To be a young American today is to experience both excitement and uncertainty, wide-open possibility and confusion, new freedoms and new fears." I'm already experiencing some of that and it's helpful to look back on these snapshots of my life's biggest transition.
P.S. When I see this picture I smile remembering my Grandpa Carter, and his constant love and support. Saying goodbye to him this summer was painful, as it was for everyone who was lucky enough to know him. I will miss him and think of him often.
It has been a long long time since I have updated this blog. I owe the delay to a particularly eventful and productive senior year of college, as well as the summer that followed. Currently I am thrilled to report I am a full-fledged New Yorker! I am living and working and paying rent in Brooklyn alongside my roommate Jamie and many of my other friends. Life is bizarrely without structure after years of focused routine. But I am hoping to fulfill my dream of becoming a writer/journalist/theatergoer, and to do so I may set up a new blog full of my writings and musings. So this belated post will probably be my last at Brewers Digest - thank you for joining me in remembering the moments from my college years. It's so exciting to think about what's ahead, or I should say, what could be ahead!
Upon arriving at Vassar for my senior year, I dove headfirst into acting in an amazing production of "Alice in Wonderland." The process involved insane human set pieces, live lights and sound effects, and a truly creative collaboration with people like Sarah and Julia, our director.
The weather this winter was totally weird! Almost no snow all year, oh except that one time we got a blizzard on Halloween. This is the view from TH96, my home.
Ian, Greg and I led our swim and dive team as captains this year. It was the culmination of four years of hard work. We had some excellent moments with our team/family despite aggravatingly petty drama. In many ways I was glad to finish the season this past February, and call myself an ex-swimmer.
Willa and I went shopping on Fifth Avenue. We have matching sweaters. We match.
For winter break, I joined my awesome family for skiing and frolicking in Mammoth! There wasn't much snow but there was much fun to be had with my siblings.
And parents.
And grandparents! They are wonderful. (Isn't this picture adorable?)
The VCSD seniors! We celebrated our last grueling training trip in Fort Lauderdale, FL.
It's been a long journey. And of course, for the fourth time, it had to end in a shaved head. I swam pretty fast at States! But sophomore year Jack outswam me in all my individual events.
Jamie, Neal, me and Joe kicking off Spring Break 2012 in Montreal, Canada. We spent four days cruising the beautiful city and discussing our imminent adulthood.
And then Julia joined me in Hawai'i. :) Sharing places like Moloka'i with her was of course a joy. She could not get over the fresh-picked papaya.
One of my favorite parts about senior year was participating in my friend Carly's radio program, which was an hour a week devoted to telling stories. I got to be there for the first and last shows and many in between, and loved feeling like a kid reading aloud with friends.
As graduation approached, my housemates and I spent as much time together as possible, including playing squash. With the exception of Meg, who was captain of the squash team, we were all enrolled in the class Beginning Squash. So. Fun.
We also wrote theses! Here are the "word clouds" from three of them. Mine was entitled "Smart Reviews: An Exploration of the History and Theory of Theater Criticism". I learned a lot, especially about my own ambitions and potential. My advisor also put me in touch with an amateur theater critic site called playstosee.com. You can read one of my published reviews there, and expect more!
Mr Nate Silver was among the visiting Vassar alumni who attended Shakespeare Troupe's outdoor production of "Romeo and Juliet." The show was a hit! I had the honor of taking a crack at an incredibly fun role: the Nurse.
This is Julia and I celebrating that play and our other theatrical endeavors this year.
Then it was Senior Week! Don't we look good??
The formal was the first of many post-classes, pre-graduation offered. It was a week of fun and debauchery with my housemates and other classmates.
Freshman year feels like a long time ago - it's weird to think it's been four years since Amy, Neal and I were at Orientation.
And then, as if as an afterthought, we graduated. Leymah Gbowee was our Commencement speaker, and she advised us to "blossom where we are planted". It was a memorable and extremely dehydrated day.
Again, the six of us are so photogenic! By the very next morning, we were packing up our Town Houses and saying goodbye - but not for long.
Jamie and I moved into a Crown Heights duplex apartment within two weeks of graduation! Our exposed brick is wonderfully Brooklynish, and on weekends we stroll over to Prospect Park or go looting.
But before settling into my apartment, I spent a second summer as a Treetops counselor. My almost-three months there were characterized by little connection to the outside world, meaning I was fully and happily immersed in taking care of all those kids.
Here are some of them! I was in charge of four little thirteen year-olds once again, and they were my favorite part about the camp experience.
That and my fantastic, smart, talented, inspirational colleagues.
See? Oh and I love the organic garden (that's a cabbage).
On my five-day canoe trip one of my campers told me, "You're not incompetent. You're childish, but you're not incompetent." Although it was said in another context, I've sort of adopted that quote as my motto for adulthood.
Treetops really is one of the most beautiful places in my world. Its sense of community balances me and grounds me like nothing else can. Plus there's no better place to learn the guitar! I'm already looking forward to returning there next summer with my family.
For now I am poised to take over New York City, and because I am young and haven't yet tasted failure, I feel invincible and ready. I agree with Robin Marantz Henig when she says, "To be a young American today is to experience both excitement and uncertainty, wide-open possibility and confusion, new freedoms and new fears." I'm already experiencing some of that and it's helpful to look back on these snapshots of my life's biggest transition.
P.S. When I see this picture I smile remembering my Grandpa Carter, and his constant love and support. Saying goodbye to him this summer was painful, as it was for everyone who was lucky enough to know him. I will miss him and think of him often.
2 comments:
Soooo glad you caught us all up in that brief synopsis of the last year. Keep writing. You're good at it! I think you're delightfully childish in your competence. Rock on!
Lincert 24We all miss him. He was such an outstanding teacher, and older brother. Good luck.
Jim Smart Joshua Tree
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