Perspective

Everything we feel is born out of the perspective we come from. There is some truth in what everyone feels - even if different people feel contradictory things.

When I was in high school, Stern was seen as the "frum" college choice. When I was in Stern, I met people who came from the opposite end - they came from worlds where Stern (and YU) was seen as a more "modern" college choice. The same Stern and YU.

In certain circles, I hear people complain about YU and how it's growing so much to the right. In other circles, people are afraid of YU shifting too much to the left.

So which is it?

YU (and the CJF) has many different kinds of events: the seforim sale, Torah Tours, etc. Sometimes, YU has events that are more questionable or more "to the left." The Gay Panel was one of those events. Here are my thoughts on the gay panel event.

1. I believe that we have an obligation to be sympathetic to the plights of any of our Jewish brethren. Jewish homosexuals have a particularly difficult struggle in that they can never really get married and have children.

1a. Getting married and having children is only one major aspect of living a Jewish life. Devoting one's self to Torah and to the community can be another. There is more than one way to find meaning in life, and there is more than one way to have a fulfilling Jewish future. That said, I am completely sympathetic to the pain of knowing you will never marry and raise a family.

2. As harsh as this sounds, there is nothing the public Jewish community can do to help homosexuals. All we can do is feel sympathy. We cannot decide to make something halachikly okay when it is clearly not. We cannot turn a blind eye to any halachik transgressions because we feel bad. As R' Twersky said, there is such a thing as having too much sympathy. The more sympathetic a person is, the more that person wants to lessen someone else's pain, and then the more that person might allow certain things to slide that should not. Our sympathy has to remain only in the "feeling sensitive" category, not "feeling so bad that we'll do anything to lessen the other person's pain." We just can't make things okay that are not okay, no matter how badly we feel.

2a. Therefore, a public event like the panel serves a confusing purpose. It brought about some good - I have heard a bunch of people say that they used to not have any feelings towards the homosexual issue and now they feel sympathetic, which is a valuable outcome (if it is a healthy amount of sympathy). It also has the potential to bring about harm - someone might feel that YU is condoning homosexuality, that YU students support homosexuality, and/or that this is just one step forward down a tricky road of possible serious halachik transgressions. Do we really think the subject of homosexuality at YU will remain in the area of just discussing how difficult it is for Orthodox homosexuals? Or is this only the beginning towards a questionable future? I don't know. I don't think anyone can know. It remains to be seen. Am I offended by the event? No. Am I angry it occurred? I wasn't. After reading the notes of R' Reiss's speech, however, I feel his deep sadness that something like arayos needs to be discussed in this manner at YU - a makom Torah. I do find it upsetting that we should need a reminder that such a thing is not allowed. But I also believe that not all the panelists, and certainly not the people who organized the event, or R' Blau, or those who attended the event, ever intended to give off the impression that acting on homosexuality was acceptable. Such a perception grew out of the reactions of those against the panel. Now that this perception exists, however, YU and the Orthodox world must combat the idea that an Orthodox institution could ever condone such a thing, and we all must remind ourselves that no matter how sympathetic we feel, we can never be supportive of actual homosexual behavior.

3. Homosexuality is a private, personal issue. A person dealing with homosexuality 100% should receive guidance and inspiration on how to continue to lead a frum Orthodox life while grappling with this struggle, but that person should be turning to rabbonim, friends, and family for this guidance and support.

Saying homosexuality is a private issue is not the same as sweeping it under the rug. When something is accused of being "swept under the rug," it is when there is something that ought to be exposed and is not. This goes for abuse, molestation, etc. When it comes to homosexuality, there is nothing to expose that is being hidden away. There is no evil we as a community ought to bring out into the open in order to deal with and protect people from. Homosexuality is a personal issue. It involves the person and the people in that person's personal life. Such an intense struggle is something sensitive that ought to be treated as such, not by airing it out for the whole community to hear but by dealing with it discreetly and respectfully. That is also the most productive way to deal with it: the way a person will actually receive the most help and guidance.

4. There has been a lot of outcry about the direction Orthodoxy is headed. Some say it's heading too much to the left, some say too much to the right. I say this: Throughout Jewish history, we as a religious entity have had to deal with various difficult issues. We have survived and survived and survived. And we will survive this, too. Orthodoxy will not disappear and it will not turn into something unrecognizable. Things change all the time, but our core values are always the same. The Torah is truth and that is what guides us. As long as the Torah and halacha is still the focus of how we live our lives, we will be okay. The thing we have to watch out for, which is something that R' Twersky mentioned briefly, is being true to what halachos really are, not reinventing them to make things okay that are not actually okay just because we would like them to be okay.

And that's another thing. We are not entitled to anything we feel like we ought to have. As Orthodox Jews, we should know better than to think that way. This extends far beyond the issue of homosexuality. You know the slogan of Hebrew National - "We answer to a higher authority?" Well, they might not, but we do. We can't forget that there is a higher purpose in life than getting everything we want. As a nation that is kadosh, we have been given specific guidelines for how to live a life of kedusha. We are so lucky that most of us grow up aware we have meaning and a purpose in life. So many people in this world don't have that. We do. We should cherish that and try to live the way we are supposed to.

5. I don't think YU is a bad place. YU is a very good place trying to figure out how to deal with its wide array of students. Perhaps a lot of what they do is for money and image. But I really do think there's this understanding that YU students are a major part of the Orthodox future - certainly the Modern Orthodox future - and the institution tries to cater to the different kinds of students there are. Maybe that is part of the problem. Maybe YU as an institution ought to do some self-reflection and philosophizing, coming up with a real hashkafa that it stands by. If something does not abide by that hashkafa, then YU should not stand behind that thing. Then there will be no, or less, confusion, and YU will not find itself in quite as many situations as this. The argument against that is that YU wants to keep its diverse university face, as well. But I do think lines need to be drawn anyway, while still leaving room for productive intellectual discourse.

I'm just one Stern alum and these are my thoughts.

Stepping Forward

Today we moved Straight Man into YU. As we waited for Straight Man to sign in and get his room and student ID, someone came over and put a bright red bracelet on my wrist that said, "Welcome To YU." It was the weirdest thing. I was being welcomed to YU as though I was a guest, except I was just a student in Stern three months ago.

It's bizarre to me that YC and Stern's first day of school is this Wednesday, and I won't be there. Stern was my home for the past four years - it feels like I still belong there!

Every year of our lives, we grow and develop as people. But my time at Stern was where I probably had my biggest growth spurt as a person. So many people think that sort of thing is supposed to happen during your year in Israel. There's that pressure before you go - are you going to "change?" How much are you going to "grow?"

But what does it mean to grow, anyway? I don't think you can go anywhere specifically to grow. I know in all the Israel school interviews, they ask why you're going to Israel and everyone always says, "To grow in my Judaism, to grow as a person..." But you can't plan when and where you're going to develop as a person. My most meaningful growth experiences have been the most ordinary kinds of experiences, and not meant for growth at all. They weren't in any way inspiring. Some of them were quite difficult. I was not on a high. I struggled. I listened. I observed. I learned about others and about myself. And I grew.

I know there is still a lot of growing left for me to do, but I have a feeling it will be of a different kind. Everything about Stern was a kind of dream. Now I feel as though I'm waking up into an unfamiliar place, and I have to get my bearings all over again.Yet enough of that dream has remained with me upon waking, and I will keep it close to me. I don't know where I'm headed now. It's all very much an adventure, I suppose. I just have to learn to stop looking back and concentrate only on moving forward.

But I do miss Stern already, and I can never thank anyone who has been part of that experience enough for what they have given me.

Starting Out On A Journey

I am officially done with school.

Ever.

(Or maybe not ever, but for now.)

Last night was my last night as the Apple's roommate. In fact, it was my last night as part of TBA (what I nicknamed our apartment on my blog way back in the beginning of the year. I believe it stands for "The Best Apartment" - not very original, I know). But not even, because M.R. had already left.

Last night, the Apple and I talked a bit until we were nearly asleep (that didn't take very long, seeing as we were both exhausted from packing and transporting luggage). When I shut the lamp, I thought to myself, "These last few seconds before I fall asleep are my last few seconds as a member of this apartment. When I wake up in the morning, my time at Stern will really be over." While I was still the Apple's roommate, it was like school was still in session, even though there were no more classes. I was still a part of my Stern experience. Now I'm home for Shabbos and any return to the Stern premises will be as a graduate.

Truthfully, I do have one more night in my apartment at Stern. D2 and I are packing our stuff on motzei Shabbos and leaving Sunday morning. But it will be just us. We will be the last ones to say goodbye to The Apartment.

...And then we, and everyone else, will go on together to the next stage of our lives.

What's both nice and strange at the same time is that we're not saying goodbye to each other. We're going to be seeing each other next year. This is not like the end of the year in Israel when people go off to their respective colleges in various different states or countries or even continents. Those people you really need to say goodbye to. But not my friends now. We're still going to be together in some ways, but...differently. I don't know what it will be like but it doesn't feel lonely.

D2, Chana, SJ, M.R., and the Apple,

This year, there were struggles, triumphs, difficult moments, awesome moments...but you guys have been amazing apartment mates.

At the start of this year, I wrote a post on beginnings. Well, now we're all facing a new kind of beginning. It's the beginning of a path in a completely different walk of life. But I think we're not alone on that path. It's one we don't know well at all, yet we are not walking it in solitude, even as we are also all doing different things next year.

There's a song from the end of the movie Anastasia that I love. It's meant to be a love song really, but I think it can really apply to any sort of close relationship - especially a deep-rooted friendship that will help each of us face whatever journey we have up ahead.



As I step wistfully out of one stage and nervously, but not unhappily, into the next, I take with me everything my time at Stern College for Women has provided me with. In a way, I am the same person I always was, except I'm being that person in a different way. It's slightly confusing. But refreshing, in a way. It's exciting to feel like I can possibly do something important with my life outside of the comfortable school cocoon.

So thank you, Stern College.

This post feels somewhat awkward, but I guess some things are hard to say, let alone say with elegance.

This blog will no longer be the records of a girl in college. Now it will be something else. Perhaps it will be more important to me than ever to write about what happens to me. My life suddenly feels like it's one big surprise.

I suppose we shall see what happens come tomorrow.

Reflections Of An English Major

Some coast through college as though it is just a current tugging them along to graduation and then spitting them out into the "real world."

Others endure college because it is a practical guide for skills they can later use to make money, but they are not interested in wasting their time with studying anything impractical in that venue.

But there are also some who really use college as a time for personal growth. While this is not mutually exclusive from the first two categories, I do believe it deserves its own category anyway.

Someone who takes her English major seriously cannot possibly escape college without reaching a sort of self-knowledge she did not have before. Part of studying literature is studying yourself. A true English major gains an awareness of what she is doing. There is a certain kind of carefulness with which she learns to approach texts and, as an extension of that, the rest of the world.

Not all books are literature. The thing is, many people separate "popular fiction" with "high art literature." But literature is not synonymous with "high art." The way I like to understand it, though this is not my own idea, what makes something literature is its ability to be both good writing and exist on the same plane as its reader. There is not the book that is somehow on a pedestal higher than the reader, but rather the reader is able to take the book and see herself in its writing. That should not be confused with seeing herself in the characters. A real piece of literature is one that lasts through time and exists as its own entity, not dependent on a time period or a piece of background knowledge. You don't have to know anything about the author, about the time period, about the subject matter other than what is written in the book. It is writing that can speak to readers a hundred years ago, today, and a hundred years from now.

As my teacher put it: "It becomes literature the moment you enter the picture."

About a year and a half ago, I wrote a post about calling myself a writer. The crux of the post is that I find it somewhat absurd to go around calling myself a writer when I don't have any spectacular piece of writing to prove I deserve such an identity:

...by speaking the words I am a writer, I am effectively giving myself the title of, well, Writer, and I guess I just feel rather pretentious doing so. Because I'm not really a writer. I have nothing to show for being a writer. Its more like I fancy myself a writer.

But is the identity of "writer" really reserved for those who churn out bestsellers every year? Or is there some other way to be a writer? Is that kind of activity really writing?

I think that true writing requires a kind of consciousness of what you are doing, regardless of whether you get anything published or not. It's not like once you publish something, you are hereafter known as a writer. You can publish twenty books a year and not be truly writing. Or you can publish nothing but spend your energy really concentrating on what you are writing, how you write, and the fact that you are writing at all. Thinking about whether or not you are a true writer is indicative of a certain kind of attention that all true writers require.

After spending so much time and effort on doing this kind of work - four years of it, in fact - it's weird to feel like you are now walking away. Moving on. Enriched, perhaps, but somehow...leaving something behind. I don't even know what it is that I'm leaving behind, but it definitely feels like something.

It's weird to feel like I could have put so much more effort into my major, that I could have grown even more, that I could have achieved so much more. There's so much I was exposed to that I didn't properly soak in. And I know, you're not supposed to live in the past. You have to move forward. And I know you don't stop learning once you leave college.

But that doesn't mean it's hard to feel like I'm graduating a major that I did not take full advantage of.

The world may say that an English major is impractical. It may insist that English majors are wasting their time, ruining the economy, getting a BA in the Useless Members of Society club, and not gaining any real skills that matter outside of book clubs.

All that may be as true or not true as you decide.

But English majors also spend their time gaining an understanding of themselves and of other people. And the more they understand and work on themselves, the more they can understand and have an effect on the world.

I believe there's a R' Salanter quote about that. :)

That is the gift four years of studying literature and writing brings. So, no matter how useless my skills might be upon leaving college, I will never regret having been an English major. No other concentration could have given me a richer education.

It's just odd to think that the struggle in this environment is now over, yet I am not finished growing. I have a better understanding of what makes good writing, but can I do it? Can I take on the mantle of being my own teacher? Or will I slip into the routine of "real life" the way most people do and wake up thirty years from now wondering when I'll have time to start reading, thinking, and writing again the way I did back in my good ol' college days? How do I know I have the strength and determination to take control of my life instead of letting life's pressures and expectations take control of me?

Thoughts and Things I've Learned

More than any other schooling experience, my time at Stern has been a real journey. Through the teachers, the classes, and friends both in and out of school, I have been molded, and perhaps molded myself, into a richer, more mature, more self-assured person.

One of the first things I've had to learn was not to compare myself to anyone else. Someone else's success is not my failure. In fact, it has nothing at all to do with me, even if I did not "get" whatever the other person "got." Regardless of what any other person gets or how far any other person goes in any pursuit, I can only get as far and do as well as my efforts and talents allow.

The more you look at what other people are doing in comparison to what you are doing, the more negative feelings you will conjure up towards that other person. Trust me, it's not at all worth it. Feeling those things won't change anything. All it will do is make you frustrated and annoyed at both the other person and yourself. You'll resent the other person for doing well and you'll resent yourself for not performing to your potential and for feeling resentful towards your friend.

Yeah, it's frustrating not to get as good a grade as you want, especially if a friend does better than you in school. It's disappointing, and even somewhat depressing, to wish to get chosen for something and get passed over in favor of your friend. Such things bring competition into places where there should be none. But when such things happen, instead of looking at yourself and feeling resentful about all you're lacking, it's good to realize that you do have talents and that you have a lot more to go in order to reach your potential.

On that note, you always have the chance to grow more in your talents and stretch out your hand farther towards your potential. A grade is not a brand marking you forever as the limit of your abilities. There is always room and opportunity to strive for higher accomplishments. So you don't succeed today. That's okay. There's always tomorrow. Or next week. Or next year. Or even the next decade. Today might be someone else's moment, but one day it will be yours, too.

Something else I learned is to stand behind my own words. After all, if I don't stand by myself, who will? If I don't feel confident in what I'm saying, why should anyone take me seriously? Or believe in my ability to get anywhere or accomplish anything? If I write disclaimers before all my stories, it means I don't believe in my own writing! Am I going to be afraid of showing myself to the world forever? Or am I going to stand up and be confident that my opinions count, too, and that they're just as valid as anyone else's?

Sometimes people say things about you that aren't necessarily true or super accurate. Sometimes you even say things about yourself that aren't exactly accurate just to please or pacify someone else. But why should you? Why shouldn't you stand true to who you are?

I'm pretty intimidated about leaving the safety of school and stepping out into the "real" world. No matter what anyone says about the difference between the different stages of schooling (elementary, high school, college) or how on your own you are throughout school, there is always, always, always a difference between being in school and not being in school anymore. School is a place we all know by heart. We are all experts on The System. We can hold that system in our hands and mold it like clay to fit our needs. It's a system we've run around in, tripped over, and learned to balance just right. We know where all the lines are and just how far to push them. We know where we stand when we're in school - any school.

But I don't know the system outside of school. I don't know what is expected of me, where the lines are, or if I can even push them a centimeter. School is like a maze that we can feel our way through instinctively until, suddenly, it is not a maze any longer but a series of passages - some that are well known and some that are secret only to ourselves.

The outside world, to me, does not seem like a series of passages at all. From afar, it looks like a vast, seamless ocean of...a lot going on. There are new rules, new lines. It's a totally new game. I feel like I'm being pushed into the middle of a game of capture the flag and I haven't even been told who's on what team.

But the thing is, when you don't know the rules, if you know yourself then that's at least a start. If you don't know yourself or what you're getting into, that's tricky. Then you could be completely molded by whatever choices you make. Of course, you're always going to be somewhat colored by the environment you're in, but having a strong idea of who you are, what you like, what you believe in, what you approve of, what you wish to stay away from...that can help bring some direction, probably. At least - then you won't lose yourself in the vastness of possibilities that are out there. Or, it makes me feel better about it, anyway.

One last thing I'd like to write about here is facing the world with a positive attitude. I have so many friends who either always seem to be in a good mood or who don't let bad things bring them down. I admire them so much for this. Something I'm really working on is not letting things get to me, or get to me enough that it ruins my whole positive perspective on life. I really believe that if you face the world with a smile, the world will smile back. It's just something I have to learn how to do better.

Anyway, I don't mean for this post to hit anyone over the head with lessons. These are merely things that I have found valuable, but of course each person is different and each will find different kinds of inspiration and different ways to bring meaning and purpose into their lives.

And no, that was not a disclaimer. :P

Graduation

In a few minutes, SJ, the Apple, and I are going to be leaving for our graduation.

For the past few days, I've been thinking about what I would write on the day of graduation, and nothing too inspiring came to mind. I thought about writing a parody to the Les Miserables song, "One Day More" (as some of my friends and I used to do when there was one day left of something), but it seemed a bit silly. Then again, perhaps it's worth being silly about graduation?

Nah.

Then I thought about linking to some posts I wrote recently about growth and maturity. But that seemed overreaching, a bit. I don't want to write something too heavy or overly deep (or too cliche). I'm not valedictorian or anything. :P

So I figure I'll just write, simply, that today is graduation, and that after today I will be a ceremonial graduate of Yeshiva University - but not a real one quite yet because my finals don't start until Sunday (isn't that mean?).

Mazal tov, Class of 2009!

My Own Way

Tonight there was a pre-graduation ceremony at Stern which recognized certain individuals for their achievement and character. One of those people was a teacher who I am taking now for the fourth semester. In fact, I have taken every single one of the classes she teaches at Stern.

What I loved about the way she spoke was how natural it was. She was truly speaking from the heart. I was grinning the entire time she spoke and really felt proud to be her student. I was truly, truly happy for her and could not have felt more strongly that she is one of the best teachers in the school. Nothing was clearer when she spoke than that she genuinely deserves her awards.

Afterward, another professor who won an award spoke. This was a professor who actually teaches Speech, yet his own speech was not at all as striking as the first teacher's. He read off a paper and there wasn't very much meaning behind his words. It was almost like he considered such a thing to be routine. I didn't detect real feeling, or even any real thoughts. Anything he said that could have been meaningful came across as flat.

That was one thing I noticed. There is such a thing as being too prepared. This might sound cliche, or cheesy, and I've been told this more than once before, but seeing it in action made me realize how true it is: what comes from the heart, goes to the heart. You can write a speech and memorize it and know it perfectly, and there might even be some really important things in there, but if you don't really feel what you're saying - forget about smiling, forget about posture, forget about projecting or any other tips people give you about speaking - if you don't feel it, no one else will, either. The speech won't seem real. It'll just seem over-rehearsed, or like you don't care. And if you do put all your emotion behind what you're saying - if it really comes from within you - all the other stuff will come naturally. You'll speak up. You'll stand straight. You'll smile. You'll look the audience in the eye because you'll really want to be saying what you're saying. And you'll want them to know it.

The other thing I noticed was that when the second professor was speaking, he spoke about his subject. Speech. Drama. He spoke about his subject and then he applied it to life. God created the world with speech. Through speech, we can grow.

As he was speaking, I thought about how he sees the world through the lens of his subject. Meanwhile, my literature and philosophy teacher sees the world through the lens of her subject. She has been helping me with my thesis, been guiding my mind all year through complex philosophical ideas, and has helped shape the way I see writing and some of the way I approach life. But that doesn't mean her way is the only way. In fact, I don't always agree with her way of seeing things.

But when people are so invested in one idea, that seems to be the only idea they see as truly valid. Oh sure, they'll tell you other people have other ideas that work for them, but they don't really believe those ideas are as good, do they? Otherwise, why would they be so invested in a different idea?

So I thought about the point of being exposed to all these kinds of people. Why be pushed around in various directions? When taking this teacher, I'm told to see the world one way. When taking another, I have to adjust to see the world a different way. And for a third teacher, I have to reorient my ideas yet again. So which way is correct? What am I supposed to be learning? What have I gotten out of my time in college?

And I realized that what I got is the opportunity to do my own thinking. I don't think you realize you're doing your own thinking until after you've thought a lot. Suddenly, you find yourself rejecting certain ideas, latching onto others, and tweaking others to construct your own way of seeing the world.

Just because someone is older than you and knows more than you doesn't mean that person is wiser, or that that person has the only correct way of doing things. There are different kinds of wisdom, too. There is an intellectual sort of wisdom, where you can take ideas and understand their complexities. Teachers who really make you think can have that. But there's also another kind of wisdom. There's the wisdom of knowing yourself, knowing what works for you, knowing yourself in relation to others, knowing others in general, and having a feel for the world around you.

I think being open minded to ideas is a kind of wisdom. It's recognizing the worth in certain ideas, yet not getting pigeonholed into thinking only one way of life really works best.

Yet, even so, you can still have a favorite way of approaching things. And perhaps that's what these teachers have. Maybe it's not that they see their way as best, but just as the way they prefer best. So perhaps I've been wrong all along about that.

As might be apparent, graduating from college does not mean my education is finished. We've always got to be learning and growing or we would all stagnate as productive human beings. I mean that in the sense of both being productive in the world and also being productive for ourselves. We have to be interested in our own self-improvement and self-growth. If not, why be a part of the world?

As R' Yisroel Salanter says, in order for the world to change, you have to first change yourself. If you work on yourself, if you try to become a better person, then your relation to the world will change, too.

If you're not invested in your own self, then in what can you invest? Truly invest, I mean. It's you, not anyone else, who is going to ultimately make you a better person. And it's you who is going to most impact your own world. Everyone else provides guides, hindrances, support, waylays. Some give you great gifts. Some hurt you terribly. But each experience is for you to take from it what you will and use what you take productively towards your personal growth.

I believe that once you start growing and shaping yourself into who you really wish to be, only then can you truly stand up straight and face the world. And when I'm ready to face the world, I don't want to seem over-rehearsed. I want to do it with my whole heart.

Why I Will Not Make A Good Gofer

This morning, I was about to leave for the caf when D2 said to me, "Oh, Erachet, are you going to get breakfast?"

"Yep."

"Do you think you can get me a cup of coffee?"

I hesitated. Coffee was not the sort of thing I was much experienced in. In fact, I had never made a cup of coffee before in my life.

"Sure...but I don't really know how..."

"Oh, it's easy! Okay? I'm going to explain it to you."

"Okay."

"Okay," said D2, and began slowly. "You take a cup. Then you fill it up about this much with coffee. Then you place it under the milk thing and fill it up some more with milk. Then you put two sugars in."

"Okay," I said. "I can probably do that."

So I went to the caf and, before I knew it, there I was standing in front of the coffee counter. I had never paid much attention to it before. I stared at it for a moment, D2's instructions suddenly becoming incredibly complicated.

I couldn't find a place where you get coffee from. There was a big urn that said "Caution: Hot Water" on it. Then there was a machine with three different kinds of milk. Three! Next to that was another machine with spouts for either cappuccino, french vanilla, or hot chocolate.

Okay. First thing first. Take a cup. I can do that, right?

I started to reach for a cup and then hesitated. There were two different kinds. Did D2 want a large cup? Or a small one? I tried to remember if she had specified but, my mind blanking on me, I had to use my own judgment. I figured I'd get her a large.

Large cup in hand, I then tried to decide which of the three flavors on the machine could one possibly mean when asking for "coffee." Clearly, the answer was not hot chocolate. Was it cappuccino? French vanilla? I had absolutely no idea and, after two whole minutes of deliberation, I stuck the cup under the spout labeled "cappuccino" and tried my luck.

After the cup was about 3/4 full, I decided it was full enough and went over to the milk. Here was another complication. Did D2 want whole milk? Skim milk? 1%? At home we get 1% milk so I figured that was safe.

As I was adding the milk, another girl looked at me with keen interest. "Is that good, what you do? Cappuccino and milk?"

I felt a little startled. Was there something wrong?

"I-I have no idea," I stammered, trying to sound like I knew what I was doing. "This is for someone else."

But something about her question made me think I had made a mistake. When she then took a small cup, put it under the "Caution: Hot Water" urn, and brown liquid came out, I knew I had completely messed up.

I decided to skip the two packets of sugar and instead covered the cup and brought it back to my apartment.

After having gotten wrong the size of the cup, the milk, and the coffee, D2 later told me she'd give me coffee-making lessons.

Ahem

I have finished my senior thesis.

(!!!!!!!!!)

Freilichen Purim And Happy Birthday (Again)!

A few weeks ago, I wished a happy birthday to my little brother Mavis. The thing is...it's his birthday again!

Mavis, as I mentioned in the earlier post, was born on Purim. I already wrote about what it was like the day he was born. But I didn't go into much detail about his bar mitzvah, which we celebrated on his actual birthday - Purim.

He read megillah that morning in shul (and was amazing. I'm not just saying that because I'm his sister. People came up to us afterward and asked why my brother wasn't in the Yeshiva Boys Choir) and afterward he was having a party (costumes optional) about two minutes away. Various boys (Straight Man's friends mostly) were driving Mavis's friends from shul to the party. In fact, everyone was so concerned about getting all the guests there...we all sort of forgot that Mavis needed a ride, as well. I guess everyone assumed he'd be getting there somehow - that it wasn't up to them to figure out how. After all, he was the bar mitzvah boy, right?

Mavis ended up having to go over to another one of the guests who hadn't left shul yet and asking if he could please have a ride to his bar mitzvah.

The party itself was majorly fun, especially since my family was all dressed up in period costumess (colonial and stuff).

The chagiga tonight was also really fun. Highlights were:

• A girl wearing a sign that said, "Bernie Madoff stole my costume."
• A girl dressed up as a michlala girl - humongous poof and all.
• Zimri and Kozbi (that one was a little bit gross).

I sort of love it when people dress up as random things from Tanach. I think it's hilarious and so clever.

On the bus ride back, I discovered that I do have the abilitiy to sit next to a random person and talk. So I am not hopeless in social situations, after all! How relieving. (Joke.)

Also - I'm going to Israel tomorrow (what?!). For a wedding. I know, it's random and kinda weird and I'm missing two days of school and coming back to two midterms and a senior thesis, but what can you do? When a best friend from childhood gets married, everything else seems to get put on hold. Sort of. Not as much when it's in a different country across the ocean and you sort of aren't really sure that it's actually happening and won't be sure until after it's over when you say to yourself, "...Whoa. Was I just in Israel?" And even then, you're still not sure. Best to take pictures so you can prove it to yourself.

This post is random enough, I might as well end it with a Purim Torah joke. I used to know lots of these because the Rabbi of my fourth grade class gave us a whole sheet of them, but I only remember a few and only one of those that I remember is actually funny (in my opinion. Not laugh out loud funny. Just cute. They're all rather groan-worthy, really).

How do you know that Vashti was fat?*

In sixth grade, I remember we made fun of the Purim tape by going around saying in squeaky, whiny voices, "Vashtiiii...bring me a cup of caw-fee...!!!"

Anyway, I must go to sleep now, but happy birthday (again) to Mavis and a Purim Sameach to all my readers!!! That includes the lurkers, too! :)

*'Cause Vashti astah mishteh nashim! (Vashti was made of two women! [the real translation is Vashti made a feast for women])

Snow Day?

Dear Stern College for Women,

I would like to bring to your attention the icy white fluffy things falling from the sky outside. If you look out your window, you will see what I mean. Lots of it has also piled up on the ground. This icy white fluffy stuff is called snow. For your convenience, I have provided in this letter the dictionary.com definition:

snow

–noun

1.	Meteorology. a precipitation in the form of ice crystals, mainly of intricately branched, hexagonal form and often agglomerated into snowflakes, formed directly from the freezing of the water vapor in the air. Compare ice crystals, snow grains, snow pellets.

2.	these flakes as forming a layer on the ground or other surface.

3.	the fall of these flakes or a storm during which these flakes fall.

It is general practice, when such white fluffiness descends from the heavens, to cancel school so we may enjoy these crystal-lattice precipitations, and so you may, too. This is especially the case when the rest of New York State is on holiday. There are certain customs one must perform when this amount of snow has fallen, including the crafting of snow men, the building of snow forts, and the throwing of snow balls - usually culminating in a snow fight. I am giving you the benefit of the doubt that you were unaware of such procedures and I have seen it as my duty to inform you of them. I hope we have no such trouble in the future - the future being this moment and onward. So I trust we won't have school the rest of the day?

Sincerely,
A Snow Day Deprived Student

Reflections On A Visit To The YU Sefarim Sale

There is a strange phenomenon that spurts up after not having been around large amounts of guys since I was thirteen. The last time I was in a building filled with guys around my own age, I was in eighth grade and the boys were all still little. At the sefarim sale, I was suddenly hyper conscious of every single guy in the room. It was like having a sixth sense for all people of the male gender. I tried to focus on looking at books, but half the time I was glancing up to see what the boys were looking at.

No, stop, no, look at the sefarim. Look - there's one on hilchos muktzah.

I have to say that hilchos muktzah was the farthest thing from my mind at that moment and I only picked it up to give myself something to do. I glanced at the back without even reading it before returning the book to its pile. And here - a boy putting something on the table right next to me! I turned to look and it took me a moment - The Art Of The Date...? That's a book? (Alright, if it wasn't exactly that title, it was something very much like it). I glanced at the surrounding piles. They were all about dating. There was an entire table devoted to books about dating!

I hurried away from that section. Okay, okay, focus. Over there - The Rav! Those are good books to look at!

Eventually I managed to forget (mostly) that there were many males in the room. But it was hard. It was new. I wasn't used to it at all.

After the sefarim sale, D2, M.R., and I went to the C-Store on the guys' campus. That was even worse. It was filled with guys. And this was really actually on their territory - as opposed to the sefarim sale which isn't as much. I felt claustrophobic. They were guys scuffling and joking and - and - not much room for a shy Stern girl and her friends to look around and be awed by the fact that the guys have an actual store on their campus.

I'm not this nervous on dates. I'm really not. But it was rather interesting to notice the effect not being around guys has on a girl. I think when you primarily only see guys in the capacity of "is he someone I can marry?" then you don't know what to do with yourself, or them, when there are many of them at once, most of whom are not people you would conceivably marry. And it's not like I live in an all-girls cocoon either. I'm just not used to large quantities of eligible guys at once.

I suppose it was just strange to suddenly feel like I was in a co-ed school.

Ya know...after this post, I suddenly don't really feel so shtark anymore for having gone to the sefarim sale. It sounds like I was more aware of the guys than I was of the sefarim.

A Thirst Unquenched

Have you ever had it happen to you that you just wished you knew more? That you felt it was futile to express opinions about something because you were so acutely aware of how little you knew and you just weren't in the mood to be shot down by those who knew more than you?

I've always had this insurmountable desire to know everything. I would walk into a library and be overcome by all the books I still haven't read. How could I possibly read anything twice? How was there time when there were so many things I hadn't yet read once? And what about Torah? There is so much I never formally learned in school. There is so much more to know. How can I ever learn it all? How can I ever prioritize what I want to know? I can step inside the Beit Midrash at Stern and feel the weight of all that I don't yet know and ought to know pressing down - so much so that I just don't learn any of it. And Torah, more than literature, is something I feel I must know, and I am so self-conscious of all that I don't.

There was a point in time during my early semesters at Stern where I thought I was going to minor in History. I've always found History fascinating and I immensely enjoy listening to a professor teach it. The problem is that I also never did well in history. I was bad at memorizing all the names and dates, especially so many at once. I'm quite good at remembering history in the context of literature, when you get to really learn and understand a time period, its politics, and the people involved through the telling of a story.* I'm not good at memorizing lists of facts, or events, or people who I don't really get a sense of more than just their names and a resume of their accomplishments.

So after sitting through (and loving but not doing particularly well in) APUS History in 12th grade, and then Western Civ., French Revolution, and some others (I think) at Stern, I ended up smack against a brick wall. I was taking a class on the Middle East. Though I've never felt the same sort of romanticism in Arabic history that I've felt in American or European, I was drawn to the class because of its rather timely subject. I wanted to truly understand the issues in the Middle East. I wanted to be one of those people who could defend Israel properly and intelligently, being well-versed in everything going on in connection with the Arab-Israeli conflict. The same way that I always wanted to be able to participate in a discussion about American politics and actually sound like I know what I'm talking about. But that semester I was taking a bunch of English classes and another History and the work became too much. I couldn't handle two classed that I both loved but couldn't do well in at once, so on the day of our first test, when I'd had way too much other work to properly study, I dropped the class, and along with it, my History minor.

So I did not end up spending a semester studying the history behind the issues in the Middle East. And I do not know enough about American politics to speak in the presence of anyone who knows more than just a little about it. And I have not read some of the major classic works of literature that are out there. And I have not learned many practical halachos inside in order to really understand what I'm doing and why, or to even know what I really should be doing in certain circumstances. And I do not know many random obscure bekius in Tanach. And I do not know about a lot of major Rabbis that people talk about - even ones at YU.

And...there is so much that I don't know. How can I ever learn it all? And when? How can I consider myself an intelligent person when there is so much I feel I don't know? When I am ashamed of what I don't know? When I don't feel comfortable asking sometimes because that means admitting to someone that I just don't know? And, more overarchingly, how can I ever quench this thirst for knowledge? I want to know and understand so much. I just can't imagine how I'll ever be able to.

*I've read a little bit of Historical Fiction, but not a lot of it, but I'm pretty sure I'd love it, so if anyone would like to recommend anything good, please do!

An Innocent Question

Today, of all people, the professor of my King Arthur class opened up with, "so, what do you think of the Israeli elections?"

Immediately, a tumultuous uproar crescendoed as everyone began to speak at once.

"What a coherent, orderly discussion we're having," I remarked dryly.

A girl sitting near the front of the room tried to be more helpful. "If you want to know what it's like in Israel," she told our bewildered Professor. "It's kind of like this."

(And that is my contribution to such political matters.)

These Days And More

Sitting cross-legged on the floor of a narrow, square room reading Henry James out loud,
Occasionally shifting to my knees when I get too uncomfortable,
And then switching back to Indian style when I start to lose feeling in my feet.

Again sitting on the floor, this time of the Borders behind Penn Station,
Safe and snug in the set-back corner of the children's section.
Two of us there, each with a hot mint chocolate drink in one hand,
And an iced one in the other: a welcome mistake.

Sitting once more on a park bench,
Firecracker ices in hand--
The red dripping down the white until we get to the Patriotic bottom
Which gives us Smurf lips
And we stick out our blue tongues at each other like a secret handshake,
A family crescent, a clubhouse password.

Lost in the snow, the wheels of the car sliding slowly over transparent ice,
Then we sneak around the hoity-toity lodge
Pretending, for a few moments, we belong there, too.
Then chased by an overeager, over-hungry squirrel,
The iced wind biting at our faces and pinching our cheeks red.

Ice skating, ice skating, ice skating.
Alone, and then with you, and then alone, and then with you,
Around and around and around.
The rink a ring of people--
Pass by the same ones, yet each time you're different, they're different.
Change without change.
Watch out for the jocks who try to cut you off. They'll trip themselves one day, doing that.
They'll never trip me, though.
Here is one place I never fall.

Warm in there, on the couch, on the rocking chair, tired but don't want to sleep.
Awake, awake, stay awake.
Blink my eyes open - when did they close?
Open, yes, they're open.
And I'm wide awake now - but how?
Was I talking?
Whose line is it anyway?

Those glass elevators go up, up, up
I like to look down and see everything get smaller and smaller.
Dizzying -but a thrill because I can make myself look and still want to continue going up.
Let's ride again!
Up and back down, then back up--
Let's stay up, can't we?

Words on the screen tell us to sing.
Sing?
There are people. People!
They might hear us!
Do we even know the songs?
We laugh and sing and sing and laugh.
I am not me, you are not you, we are not we--
We just are.
Having the time of our lives.

These days and more. These days and more.
These days--
And more.

P.S. The Squeaker - the inspiring tale of a boy and his sneaker.

The Book Of Over-Think

Warning: This post is an inherent contradiction.


Calvin's brought the whole "caring too much about things" thing to an opposite extreme. See, it's not good to over-think a situation, but it's not good not to think at all.

The statement above might sound random to you. That's because I spent way too much time thinking about this post (it's been sitting in the drafts for about a week) and, seeing that there was no way to begin at any sort of beginning, I began in the middle. It's an age-old concept dating back to Homer (or is it Horace? Does it matter?) called in medias res, but if you walk around saying that, people might think you're an intellectual. Now, there's nothing wrong with being an intellectual, per se, but it all depends on how you'd like to come across, and I find that if one is too intellectual and goes around talking about people like Homer and Horace and not getting them all muddled up (not like anyone else'd know the difference) and speaking in Latin - asum thusum - what was I saying, again?

Oh yes. Caring too much. Over-thinking. Theorizing. Thesee-izing (that's coming up with a thesis plus a few to make it plural - or thesi - or thesii - or any neologism thou wishest).

I said something in my Literature and Philosophy class (yes, that is the name of one class, not two, despite the many confusions people have had when I've mentioned it before) which was considered "brilliant" or a "breakthrough" or, if you like, "seeing things our way now." It was this: "When the prejudices of the 'I' get in the way, you're not giving something itself proper attention, you're just giving attention to what you project onto the thing."

The reaction when these words slipped accidentally out of my mouth (although I had written them down on the side of an article beforehand) was that of a cult opening its arms wide and embracing me with an emphatic, "come join our side, soul-that-is-no-longer-wayward!"

And yet, despite my reluctance to join the dark side, I see that it is perhaps not as dark as I would have liked it to be. Because if it truly was that dark, then I'd stand with my hands on my hips in triumph, brandishing my brilliant arguments with pride and always coming out one step above (like on a staircase, which is certainly more prestigious an accomplishment than being one step ahead on a path, which takes much less energy and skill, unless 'twas a rocky path, in which case I shall consent to being one step ahead, although preferrably also above, on a rock, because the higher you are, the more you can see, and the more strategic your position, you know). But since it is not dark at all, but actually quite sensical, I find myself painfully admitting that perhaps I was ***** (for those not used to this game yet, I mean "wrong" but since I'd not like to say it, I won't). According to a philosopher we read in class, and according to the person who wrote about her, "'Something in our soul has a far more violent repugnance for true attention than the flesh has for bodily fatigue.' The repugnance Weil [pronounced 'vay,' not 'whale,' just so you won't sound as stupid saying her name out loud for the first time as I did] has in mind here is the ego's reluctance to engage in scrupulous self-criticism, since such criticism has a tendency to humiliate, to shatter the ego's pride and vanity." So, you know, we don't like to self-criticize because it makes us feel like we're being criticized (gee) and this hurts our ego. Blah blah.

Somehow I'd like to segue into this point:

That one should not approach a situation with a thesis. One should evaluate each situation as its own entity and not try to "figure things out" or "discover anything." People should not be treated as a mystery to be solved, nor should their actions be, nor should any situation one stumbles upon. As a wise person I sometimes come across says, "it is what it is 'cause it is," yeah?

Douglas Adams, in his book Mostly Harmless says, "Anything that happens, happens. Anything that, in happening, causes something else to happen, causes something else to happen. Anything that, in happening, causes itself to happen again, happens again. It doesn't necessarily do it in chronological order, though."

Now, that is odd, because how can all that not happen in chronological order? But perhaps this is not worth philosophizing over because that is not the point at all. The point is that anything that happens, happens, and it happens without being thesis-ized over.

And now, to throw on the cloak of an intellectual, I will say that there is something I cannot understand about Wiggenstien's The Blue Book. He says, "What is the meaning of a word?" Then he explains that to give a word definitions is not necessarily saying what the word means. His example is with a pencil. About a pencil one may say, "this is a pencil" or "this is round" or "this is wood" or "this is one" or "this is hard" and so on and so forth. These are all ways one might define or describe a pencil, but to know what a pencil is is to be able to differentiate it from, for instance, a pen. And to know what to do with it. Etc, etc, etc.

Yet aren't these all intuitive? Don't we understand this concept without having to put it into words and analyze it? What is the real point in this essay? To tell us what we already know?

But yes! Wiggenstien admits in his Philosophical Investigations, "the problems are solved, not by giving new information, but by arranging what we have always known."

My teacher, to quote: Philosophy is not in the business of discovering something new about the world.

HA!

But then why? Why learn philosophy? How is philosophy not synonymous with "over-thinking?"

This conversation with a friend, according to that friend, "was such a Calvin&Hobbes strip," and so we come full circle:

"Calvin": sometimes I wonder if people spend a lot of their lives wasting time mulling over things that are obvious
"Hobbes": you mean like that? :)
"Calvin": oh shut up

Important Things

A few important things happened this week or are about to happen:

1. My first ever real best friend got married this past Thursday. I couldn't be at her wedding because it was in Israel and I couldn't exactly skip my first week of school (sadly). The weird thing is - even though we don't speak a lot because of time difference and just the different directions our lives have taken, there is still a really strong bond there. Her family made aliyah the summer after first grade - so we were both only six years old. But my earliest memories include her and her family. We've been best friends since we were a year old. That's something special. Not everyone is still in touch with their friends from that long ago. We see each other nearly every time either I go to Israel or she comes to America and our families just have a very special relationship that doesn't require constant contact in order to stay strong. In a weird way, it's almost like a long lost sister of mine has just gotten married. I know that's kind of hard to explain, but when I was looking at her wedding pictures, that's what it felt like.

2. I have three friends making aliyah on the Nefesh b'Nefesh flight tomorrow. Each of them is from a different part of my life, although they sort of overlap, too. One is a boy (I know, I know, co-ed friendship, co-ed summer camp, blah blah) I went to Moshava with for a number of summers. We're part of a very tight group of seven friends and...it's just really hard to explain us. It's sort of like a clique but in a very noncliquey way. It's like a kind of family, in a way. We've all gone our separate routes (although two of the people in this group are marrying each other later this year...), but we're all focused on ending up in Israel (actually, everyone except one other girl and myself have accomplished this already - or have definite plans to do so). I miss all of them a lot - many of them I haven't seen in ages because, well, they're in Israel. Sigh.

The second friend is a girl I went to Harova with and the third is a girl I became friends with in Stern (in Ivrit class, actually - at least one good thing came out of Ivrit at Stern!). So basically, someone from my teenage years, someone from my year in Israel, and someone from my college days (which are still going on) is making aliyah on the same flight tomorrow. So if I go to the airport to see them off, it will be something like facing various parts of my life all joining to take a powerful journey together. Except I will not be with them, which is sad for me. But mazal tov to them and much hatzlacha!

3. Mavis (my brother) started high school. This means my family is officially old - we're all high school and up!

4. Last Sunday, we saw Straight Man (my other brother) off to Israel for shana bet.

5. Trademark not only started her senior year of high school this week, but she is DRIVING.

6. A week and a half ago, I started my last year in Stern. Which is scary.

Can't I Handle The Truth?

Y'know...I've always considered myself to be an English Literature major, but today, I received the insult of insults. I was told I was coming at things from a scientist point of view!

Apparently, I am too practical for the world of literature - or, at least, for literature as read through the eyes of a philosopher. Why? Simply because I believe that it is important to make the distinction between fiction and reality.

Of course, that begs the question - what is fiction? If we define fiction as something that is "untrue," then just because a story is fabricated does not necessarily make it entirely "fictional" in the context of distinguishing it from "reality." Yes, it is a story of fiction, but it may also contain many truths and those truths are definitely not part of the fictional aspect of the tale.

Therefore, I do not mean to suggest that there is no practical purpose to imagination or to stories, nor am I saying there is no value in them - even if we can't find them to be particularly practical in our every day lives - but I do feel it is imperative to recognize fiction for what it is.

I am a creative writer. I spend an awful lot of time conjuring up fictions. That does not mean I don't recognize them as fictional, even if they are based on me or on actual events or emotions. Even children who play imagination games and get so completely engrossed in them...even they recognize that what they are playing is something from their imagination. They know that when they go in for supper, they are stepping out of the game for a little while. They can see that there are two worlds - the world of adults and the world of the game. They do not think the adults are playing with them. They know fiction from reality. It could be that they create a new reality for themselves during the game, but they still can tell the difference between that reality and the tangible reality that exists outside their imaginations.

There is a difference between hoping, dreaming, imagining and actually believing that something exists when it does not. How can there not be infinitely more value in being true to one's self and one's reality than in living a shallow life of lies and illusions?

And there is a difference between those shallow lies and illusions vs. using your imagination to deal with reality. For instance, in A Little Princess, Sara uses her imagination to help her get through her Cinderella story. She knows that what she imagines is not real, she does not go around sincerely telling people that she is imprisoned in the Bastille (for instance), but she allows herself to go along with the game just enough that it helps her get through her troubles.

I guess what I'm trying to say is, there is creating a world of imagination, and then there is living a life of illusion and delusion and denying reality altogether. This latter thing is what I'm against. I find it unethical to allow such delusions to go on in someone else and I find it a shallow existence to deny reality in favor of illusion.

With Northanger Abbey, there would have been a big difference if Catherine had only hoped to find a Gothic story going on at the abbey, or even played a game that there was one, as opposed to actually believing one existed. If she was only playing, she would have allowed herself to slip into her imagination and deliciously pretend exciting things were happening. But the fact that she went so far as to intrude into Henry's dead mother's rooms, and the fact that she actually accused Mr. Tilney of murdering his wife to Henry's face - and in all seriousness, too! - shows the danger and preposterousness of allowing yourself to believe that it is perfectly okay for fiction - true fiction - to be substituted for reality.

But this does not mean I am against imagination - believe me, I am all for escaping into your imagination. I just don't believe in substituting fiction for reality. Yes, I see them as separate, though there are some blurring of the lines, and yes, I see value in both.

So, alright, perhaps I am too practical for philosophy. But I have a perfect imagination and yet I am still able to be true to myself. And that's what counts.

Learning To Breathe

I have come to the realization that all students love to complain. Well, all people, for that matter, but especially students. It's not that we want things to complain about, but if there is ever anything at all undesirable or unpleasant in our paths, we are ready, waiting, to pounce on it with every creative complaint ever invented. These complaints range from small grumblings to out-and-out melodrama (which is usually very amusing to watch).

Me, I like to not allow myself to get so stressed. After all, feeling stressed to the point of being unable to perform won't make the annoying work go away - it'll just make me unable to do it. This, perhaps, is why I am so far the only one I know about in my Lit. and Philosophy class who actually finished reading an overly complicated and obnoxious essay we're supposed to write about.

I have my share of stresses, but I guess schoolwork is the one thing I love to complain about but yet doesn't actually make me feel too stressed. Or, not usually, anyway. Sometimes it's good to just allow yourself to breathe a little, you know?

On the other hand, sometimes if you feel stressed or annoyed, the best thing to do is to vent it out and then start working. 'Cause you can't write a paper if you're all mad at it (if you know what I mean).

For instance, I'll vent something. Just what is the deal with philosophical essays being so snobby and obnoxious?! I mean, I understand that they're trying to explain difficult concepts, but that doesn't mean abusing the thesaurus while doing so!!!

Sheesh.

[Okay, that helps me breathe a little better :) ]

Top Ten Highlights Of The Week

1. Baking cookies with D2 (or, rather, eating D2's freshly baked cookies) and bringing them to the security guards downstairs

2. Beating SJ in Boggle :)

3. Writing bad poetry with SJ and the Apple

4. Our wild west poetry teacher looking for a board marker, not finding one, and muttering, "Heck!"

5. Our poetry teacher going around the room asking us our names and why we are taking the class. When my turn came around I said, "I'm Erachet, I'm an English Lit. major, and...I've done a lot of creative writing on my own."
"Really?" he asked, interested. "What sort of writing?"
"Well, mostly short stories but also some poetry. And, er, a lot of just...random blurbs."
"Well, that's poetry, too, you know!" my teacher exclaimed.
"Er, uh, well, they're more like beginnings or middles to random short stories," I explained hesitantly.
"Oh," he said, now looking at me as though I was a bit slow. "Those are called drafts."
Then a bunch of people laughed.
"Oh," I said. "Yeah. I write drafts."

6. Beginning a whole new year of adventurizing with SJ!

7. Beginning a new school year as the Apple's roommate :)

8. Getting five pages from my lit. and philosophy teacher about how to write a one page response (BRING IT!)

9. My 18th Century Satire class taught by my Gothic Novel teacher from last semester - and the funky book we're gonna read later called Tristram Shandy. It sounds sooooo....bizarrely cool.

10. School Books Buying: Survival Of The Fittest. It's a dog eats dog world out there in Barnes and Noble...