I felt so many emotions Wednesday night: anxiety, nausea, anticipation, pride, shock, anger, frustration, helplessness.
Many say it's dramatic that such emotions are channeled into a basketball game--a completely arbitrary competition on which nothing intrinsically valuable depends.
But a lot does depend on it. Many of the sad faces in the crowd at the end of the game were wearing shirts emblazoned with the basketball team's motto: "Together We Are Carolina." We hate Duke together; we win together; we lose together. Right now, a huge group of students just passed the library window, making quite the racket protesting tuition hikes. Together, we make a difference.
The UNC Duke rivalry is often set in stereotypical terms, but I think the underlying value systems of the universities are really at odds, giving the competition a personal, emotional edge. UNC, lovingly dubbed "public ivy," is about accessible, affordable, quality education. You can come from nothing and come to UNC: cost is never a deterrent. It's about inclusion, not exclusivity. People are easy-going. Carolina blue embodies a campus that values social change, progressive ideas (except when it comes to Gender Neutral Housing *grumble grumble*), and diversity.
Duke is an expensive, private school. It's for the privileged, people who like calling themselves the elite. As a result, they're whitewashed. The privileged portions of society don't have any interest in changing the status quo. Duke's in a different paradigm completely.
Then take these two clashing ideologies about education and privilege, stick them within eight miles of on another, then make them compete for some of the best and brightest minds and athletes and professors in the world, and you get one hell of a rivalry, all culminating in those basketball games.
So winning is not about comparing Austin Rivers and Tyler Zeller. Winning is not about free throw percentages or three point plays. It's about loving your school and believing in it so much that you want it to be the best at absolutely everything. It's about passion.
That five minutes of stunned silence permeating Chapel Hill at the end of the game? Even though it was one of the worst feelings in the world, I wouldn't trade it. I love being part of this place. All of that emotion makes me okay with shouting at the end of the fight song, every time we sing it:
GO TO HELL DUKE!
Showing posts with label college. Show all posts
Showing posts with label college. Show all posts
Feb 10, 2012
Aug 11, 2011
Ready
I've never felt more ready to go off to college than I do right now, sitting here in my bed, typing on my laptop at five in the morning. Five in the morning isn't usually when anything productive happens or people feel especially prepared, but somehow, in this moment, I finally think I'm absolutely ready.
It isn't about the piles of stuff heaped haphazardly in the guest bedroom, or the half-read summer reading book waiting to be finished, or the completed textbook order forms, or the move-in plans made, or anything you can check off on a to-do list.
You can prepare logistically to move out of your parents' house forever, but I don't think that's the most important part. It wasn't until this moment that I began moving, consciously at least, all the people in my life from actively affecting me to have affected me. That is not very clear, I realize, but it's a hard concept to force into the limitations of the English language.
I think most relationships reach a point where the people can simply no longer glean anything from each other, whether it's as important as life lessons or as insignificant as lunchtime company. Perhaps it's a bit callous to view people like tools that can outstrip their usefulness and call for replacing, but I can't help but feel that's what is happening to me right now.
Every conversation feels useless and strained, like everyone is just going through the motions because we've all grown accustomed to things going a certain way. There's no joy or relish, no excitement or fervor. All habit, tired routines. We've all been nailed into the caricatures formed by years of familiarity. We rely on the predictably we've created; while this once was comforting, so comforting the thought of leaving it was terrifying, it is now boring and limited. I feel stuffy and confined.
Most dangerously, I feel annoyed. The smallest things get to me. I want so badly to live a new life that things that belong distinctly in this old one are infuriating. All of this is coming from a self-professed hater of change. Nothing is more persuasive to me than the fact that I yearn for change, so often my mortal enemy.
Of course I love dearly all the people that have shaped my current life, and I always will. But I have to get away, or I will kill someone. I need newness, fresh faces that don't know anything about me. People that won't keep secrets from me because they fear judgment that doesn't exist. People that trust me because they haven't time to formulate prejudices. People that are willing to accept changes because they never knew the past. This is what I need now.
So finally, I think I'm ready. Things tend to be over-dramatic at five in the morning, but I'm grateful for these late night "epiphanies." Sometimes they give me the strength to face the oh-too-soon morning.
"I've lived in this place and I know all the faces/each one is different but they're always the same./They mean me no harm, but it's time that I faced it/They'll never allow me to change."
It isn't about the piles of stuff heaped haphazardly in the guest bedroom, or the half-read summer reading book waiting to be finished, or the completed textbook order forms, or the move-in plans made, or anything you can check off on a to-do list.
You can prepare logistically to move out of your parents' house forever, but I don't think that's the most important part. It wasn't until this moment that I began moving, consciously at least, all the people in my life from actively affecting me to have affected me. That is not very clear, I realize, but it's a hard concept to force into the limitations of the English language.
I think most relationships reach a point where the people can simply no longer glean anything from each other, whether it's as important as life lessons or as insignificant as lunchtime company. Perhaps it's a bit callous to view people like tools that can outstrip their usefulness and call for replacing, but I can't help but feel that's what is happening to me right now.
Every conversation feels useless and strained, like everyone is just going through the motions because we've all grown accustomed to things going a certain way. There's no joy or relish, no excitement or fervor. All habit, tired routines. We've all been nailed into the caricatures formed by years of familiarity. We rely on the predictably we've created; while this once was comforting, so comforting the thought of leaving it was terrifying, it is now boring and limited. I feel stuffy and confined.
Most dangerously, I feel annoyed. The smallest things get to me. I want so badly to live a new life that things that belong distinctly in this old one are infuriating. All of this is coming from a self-professed hater of change. Nothing is more persuasive to me than the fact that I yearn for change, so often my mortal enemy.
Of course I love dearly all the people that have shaped my current life, and I always will. But I have to get away, or I will kill someone. I need newness, fresh faces that don't know anything about me. People that won't keep secrets from me because they fear judgment that doesn't exist. People that trust me because they haven't time to formulate prejudices. People that are willing to accept changes because they never knew the past. This is what I need now.
So finally, I think I'm ready. Things tend to be over-dramatic at five in the morning, but I'm grateful for these late night "epiphanies." Sometimes they give me the strength to face the oh-too-soon morning.
"I've lived in this place and I know all the faces/each one is different but they're always the same./They mean me no harm, but it's time that I faced it/They'll never allow me to change."
Oct 18, 2010
I Just Want To Go To College
I really don't think I'm asking a whole lot.
Ever since middle school, I have been thinking about how wonderful college will be. I am made to be at a university; I know it is where I belong. As a result, everything I've done and accomplished these past six years have been with one goal in mind. I want to go to college.
When I was afforded the opportunity to go to college in high school, I jumped at it. And it was sometimes everything I hoped it would be--intellectually challenging, diverse (more so than high school at least), and productive. As cheesy as it sounds, I grew as a writer, a thinker, and a person. I feel a million times more educated than I think I would have if I'd never stepped foot in college classroom. That is something that is hard to give up.
That makes it all the more frustrating now that my desire for college is getting in the way of admission to a university.
I wish there was a way to measure aptitude and desire that didn't require jumping through forty hoops and five acres worth of paper. I know I'm a competent person and I will succeed in the university setting. I have teachers and peers who agree. I have a transcript that shows responsibility and dedication. I know what I want to do and where I want to be. But all of that might be lost through technicalities, muffled by a seven-page application. I don't want to be silenced by bureaucracy.
I'm horribly frustrated and desperate. This is why I haven't been blogging lately. When I get this frustrated, the words just gum up inside me. A big pile of congealed, stunted writing. Is this what university is going to do to me?
Do I really want all of this after all?
Ever since middle school, I have been thinking about how wonderful college will be. I am made to be at a university; I know it is where I belong. As a result, everything I've done and accomplished these past six years have been with one goal in mind. I want to go to college.
When I was afforded the opportunity to go to college in high school, I jumped at it. And it was sometimes everything I hoped it would be--intellectually challenging, diverse (more so than high school at least), and productive. As cheesy as it sounds, I grew as a writer, a thinker, and a person. I feel a million times more educated than I think I would have if I'd never stepped foot in college classroom. That is something that is hard to give up.
That makes it all the more frustrating now that my desire for college is getting in the way of admission to a university.
I wish there was a way to measure aptitude and desire that didn't require jumping through forty hoops and five acres worth of paper. I know I'm a competent person and I will succeed in the university setting. I have teachers and peers who agree. I have a transcript that shows responsibility and dedication. I know what I want to do and where I want to be. But all of that might be lost through technicalities, muffled by a seven-page application. I don't want to be silenced by bureaucracy.
I'm horribly frustrated and desperate. This is why I haven't been blogging lately. When I get this frustrated, the words just gum up inside me. A big pile of congealed, stunted writing. Is this what university is going to do to me?
Do I really want all of this after all?
Aug 25, 2010
A Breakfast Club Moment
Sometimes it would appear that microcosms only appear in the construed confines of literature, television, and movies, but if you look into any given room, you'll probably find a pretty good real life example. Though we can't all be the Breakfast Club, I've noticed a little bit of a college microcosm in my place of work, a tutor center.
Sitting idly at the well-worn but sturdy tables, waiting for the confused masses to seek our help, the tutors turn to discussing their life stories.
There's the middle-aged woman, proudly boasting of her kid's accomplishments and grumbling about her husband's inability to stick to a diet (as she shoveled chicken and gravy into her mouth), while grasping an anatomy book in her other hand. She tutors between singing in the college and church choirs, and has taken it upon herself to be the mother hen of the center. She councils one tutor about his less than perfect four year relationship for an hour after she's supposed to be off work, and even inquires into the nature of my relationship with another random tutor, who I actually only met three days ago. She's only known me a week but insists upon checking on my safety.
Then there's the college party movie walking stereotype. He failed out of a four year university and is now enthusiastically tutoring science and math. He walks around the school with music forever blaring from one headphone, which only parts from his ear during class and while tutoring. At all other times, he loops it up through his shirt for a constant stream of tunes. It often causes him to speak a little louder than necessary, but the volume matches his strange vibrancy in what seems to be a disappointing situation. But he's always all smiles, except for eight in the morning, when he slouches over his laptop, half-asleep. Ipod blaring.
Then there's the hesitant fatherly, criminal justice program types who usually just come in, do their jobs, and leave. But occasionally the social environment gets the best of them and they stay to chat about their latest parental woes, or gesticulate wildly about their hunting trips or NASCAR races.
And there's the guy who is always, always there, whether tutoring with extreme patience and skill or entertaining young (and, let's face it, dorky) students with his quick wit. He appears to tutor half the school as well as attending school himself, but is never frazzled. He's a regular staple of the place and everybody jokes with him because he takes it all so well. It's hard to tell how long he's been at the college (he randomly mentions so many different institutions of higher learning, including my beloved Chapel Hill) but he seems very content on his computer in the back corner of the room.
And of course, there are the fearless leaders. One always, always tutoring, and occasionally popping in to crack a joke at an understanding employee's expense. But the other one is full of surprises. Seemingly mild mannered, but in downtime conversation, he'll random through in a detail about being on probation in his younger years, a pop culture reference to Twilight, or mention how hyped up he gets on caffeine, with a maniacal glint in his eye.
And me. My friend and I are the youngest and most inexperienced, technically still being in high school, and we sit quietly off the side and watch the others interact, only joining ourselves at opportune moments.
The room to the tutor center is tucked away in the rarely trodden upstairs region of the library, unobtrusively going about its business. But inside, a whole separate social circle teems, representing the student body in the best ways possible.
Sitting idly at the well-worn but sturdy tables, waiting for the confused masses to seek our help, the tutors turn to discussing their life stories.
There's the middle-aged woman, proudly boasting of her kid's accomplishments and grumbling about her husband's inability to stick to a diet (as she shoveled chicken and gravy into her mouth), while grasping an anatomy book in her other hand. She tutors between singing in the college and church choirs, and has taken it upon herself to be the mother hen of the center. She councils one tutor about his less than perfect four year relationship for an hour after she's supposed to be off work, and even inquires into the nature of my relationship with another random tutor, who I actually only met three days ago. She's only known me a week but insists upon checking on my safety.
Then there's the college party movie walking stereotype. He failed out of a four year university and is now enthusiastically tutoring science and math. He walks around the school with music forever blaring from one headphone, which only parts from his ear during class and while tutoring. At all other times, he loops it up through his shirt for a constant stream of tunes. It often causes him to speak a little louder than necessary, but the volume matches his strange vibrancy in what seems to be a disappointing situation. But he's always all smiles, except for eight in the morning, when he slouches over his laptop, half-asleep. Ipod blaring.
Then there's the hesitant fatherly, criminal justice program types who usually just come in, do their jobs, and leave. But occasionally the social environment gets the best of them and they stay to chat about their latest parental woes, or gesticulate wildly about their hunting trips or NASCAR races.
And there's the guy who is always, always there, whether tutoring with extreme patience and skill or entertaining young (and, let's face it, dorky) students with his quick wit. He appears to tutor half the school as well as attending school himself, but is never frazzled. He's a regular staple of the place and everybody jokes with him because he takes it all so well. It's hard to tell how long he's been at the college (he randomly mentions so many different institutions of higher learning, including my beloved Chapel Hill) but he seems very content on his computer in the back corner of the room.
And of course, there are the fearless leaders. One always, always tutoring, and occasionally popping in to crack a joke at an understanding employee's expense. But the other one is full of surprises. Seemingly mild mannered, but in downtime conversation, he'll random through in a detail about being on probation in his younger years, a pop culture reference to Twilight, or mention how hyped up he gets on caffeine, with a maniacal glint in his eye.
And me. My friend and I are the youngest and most inexperienced, technically still being in high school, and we sit quietly off the side and watch the others interact, only joining ourselves at opportune moments.
The room to the tutor center is tucked away in the rarely trodden upstairs region of the library, unobtrusively going about its business. But inside, a whole separate social circle teems, representing the student body in the best ways possible.
Aug 2, 2010
Applying in Pajamas
Today was an ordinary day. It's kind of overcast outside, the kind of sky that leaves everything looking a little gloomy and a little sad. The kind of day that makes you want to curl up with a book all day, or watch that list of movies you've been putting off watching, and certainly the kind of day that never provides enough motivation to change out of your obnoxious pink-flowered pajama pants.
But today was not an ordinary day. It was the day I began my application to my dream school.
Everything I've done in my life for the past four years, possibly the last seven, was at least partially motivated by the promise improving my college application. A far away mysterious and hazy goal, it hovered in front of me like a carrot dangling by a string, begging me to chase it through my adolescence. I would get frustrated with all the club meetings, events to coordinate, class load to bear, but I just kept those blank application fields in mind and kept plunging through.
But now it's over and I've sealed my fate, good or bad, and I'm documenting it all in those indifferent, character-restricting boxes. There is something about it that hardly seems fair.
I need twelve word documents, 10,000 characters, more checkboxes, to explain. I need to explain why I need Carolina, why I'm worthy, what I've been doing with my life, what I want to do with my life. I can't sum up myself in these confines!
But I must. I haven't got a choice. I have to find a way to squish myself into the tiny boxes without losing any of the desire, personality, and competency I hope I have and wish to convey. Every word I type onto that application carries so much meaning. I feel the weight of each one in my typing-wearying fingers, in my blurring eyes, in the knot forming at the back of my neck.
The whole time, I felt this weird feeling that I should sit straighter. I should dress up. I should comb my hair. This apple juice wasn't fancy enough for the occasion. I was half-listening to "VH1's 100 Best Songs of the 90's." That isn't fitting. I should be sitting in complete, immaculate silence, dutifully focusing my attention on deciding my fate.
But alas, it was no production. Just a gloomy, overcast, pajamay day. The day I began the process that seals my fate.
But today was not an ordinary day. It was the day I began my application to my dream school.
Everything I've done in my life for the past four years, possibly the last seven, was at least partially motivated by the promise improving my college application. A far away mysterious and hazy goal, it hovered in front of me like a carrot dangling by a string, begging me to chase it through my adolescence. I would get frustrated with all the club meetings, events to coordinate, class load to bear, but I just kept those blank application fields in mind and kept plunging through.
But now it's over and I've sealed my fate, good or bad, and I'm documenting it all in those indifferent, character-restricting boxes. There is something about it that hardly seems fair.
I need twelve word documents, 10,000 characters, more checkboxes, to explain. I need to explain why I need Carolina, why I'm worthy, what I've been doing with my life, what I want to do with my life. I can't sum up myself in these confines!
But I must. I haven't got a choice. I have to find a way to squish myself into the tiny boxes without losing any of the desire, personality, and competency I hope I have and wish to convey. Every word I type onto that application carries so much meaning. I feel the weight of each one in my typing-wearying fingers, in my blurring eyes, in the knot forming at the back of my neck.
The whole time, I felt this weird feeling that I should sit straighter. I should dress up. I should comb my hair. This apple juice wasn't fancy enough for the occasion. I was half-listening to "VH1's 100 Best Songs of the 90's." That isn't fitting. I should be sitting in complete, immaculate silence, dutifully focusing my attention on deciding my fate.
But alas, it was no production. Just a gloomy, overcast, pajamay day. The day I began the process that seals my fate.
Aug 24, 2009
Stupid College...
The applying to college is unnecessarily complicated. Why do we make it so hard? It's just this constant cloud of stress hovering over me, no matter what I do.
Everything feels too inadequate. Somebody's always preparing better than I am, sending me into a fury of panic. "There goes one more spot in my dream school!"
It seems so silly. Almost everyone that wants to go to college gets in somewhere. Why do we make it such a big deal when if we all relaxed, it wouldn't have to be? The right people can get the right education without facing almost unbearable stress in the preceding years. For some reason, we've decided to create this intimidating aurora around college that probably does more scaring off than anything else.
I know where I want to go; I know what I want to study; I know I could succeed. But that's not enough. I have to prove this by jumping through six thousand unnecessary hoops. My needs get lost in a sea of test scores, statistics, and transfer credits. Somewhere along the way, my voice gets drowned out by the paper trail that consumes me. Every breathing second, I'm supposed to be doing something so I can make a mark on those blasted applications.
I just want to get in, get my degree, and get out. Is that too much to ask?
Everything feels too inadequate. Somebody's always preparing better than I am, sending me into a fury of panic. "There goes one more spot in my dream school!"
It seems so silly. Almost everyone that wants to go to college gets in somewhere. Why do we make it such a big deal when if we all relaxed, it wouldn't have to be? The right people can get the right education without facing almost unbearable stress in the preceding years. For some reason, we've decided to create this intimidating aurora around college that probably does more scaring off than anything else.
I know where I want to go; I know what I want to study; I know I could succeed. But that's not enough. I have to prove this by jumping through six thousand unnecessary hoops. My needs get lost in a sea of test scores, statistics, and transfer credits. Somewhere along the way, my voice gets drowned out by the paper trail that consumes me. Every breathing second, I'm supposed to be doing something so I can make a mark on those blasted applications.
I just want to get in, get my degree, and get out. Is that too much to ask?
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