A Few of My Favorite Things...

Here is a list, in no particular order, of a few of my favorite things about Wellesley. The list is by no means exhaustive!

1) Traditions
Especially during orientation and the first couple weeks of the semester, traditions abound. It is fun to do something that you would feel ridiculous doing, except for the fact that you know every other class that has been here for the last 100 years has done the exact same thing. Take Stepsinging, for example. This is when all of the classes dress in their class colors and gather together to sing songs either written by Wellesley alums (like America the Beautiful) or about Wellesley (one of my personal favorites is entitled "The Ballad of a Bold Bad Man", detailing the story of a Harvard man who pretended to be a Wellesley senior on graduation day) and shout class cheers and try to out-cheer everybody else. We also have Flower Sunday (where each first year is paired with a "big sister"), Lake Day (they used to announce late the night before that classes for the next day were cancelled. However, professors didn't like that much so now we still have to go to class, but there are celebrations that day), Marathon Monday (our campus is the half-way point for the Boston Marathon, so classes are cancelled for the day and everybody goes out to cheer on runners and form the "scream tunnel"), and hoop rolling (where all of the seniors race down a hill rolling a hoop and the winner gets thrown into the lake). There are LOTS of others, but these are a few of the main ones.

2) Galen Tower

If you know anything about Wellesley (or have been following my blog), you have seen a picture of this tower. It is one of the stereotypically famous things about this campus. And for good reason. I love how majestic it looks, and how you can see it from pretty much anywhere you go on campus, and just how awesome it is that we have a bell tower! However, I also love it because I am an apprentice in the Guild of Carillonneurs, so once a week I get to climb the ridiculously large amount of stairs through the creepy tower to have my lesson on playing the carillon (and if you don't know what that is, you should look it up!) It's pretty great, and its just one of those opportunities I wouldn't get anywhere else.

3) Ice Cream
Enough said.

4) Random Harry Potter Jokes
I'm pretty new to the world of Harry Potter, the first time I ever read the books was this summer (and I still haven't read the last book. I'm working on it!) However, I am still able to appreciate the abundance of Harry Potter jokes on this campus. From Platform 9 and 3/4 to The Leaky Beaker (the cafe in our science center) it is very evident that Wellesley students have somewhat of an obsession.

5) My Professors
I am now convinced that learning about pretty much anything can be interesting and enjoyable as long as you have a good professor that cares about the topic. For example, my Hamlet class this semester. We spent an entire semester doing nothing but reading and watching movies and discussing Hamlet, and I genuinely enjoy going to that class. Good professors make all the difference.

6) The view out my window
I live on one of the most beautiful college campuses that I have ever seen. I love waking up in the morning and looking out my dorm room window to see a path lined with trees and flowers (well, there were flowers earlier this year) and Lake Waban in the background. This autumn was one of the most beautiful I have ever experienced, because I was able to see the flaming bright trees every morning as I woke up right outside my window. It was incredible! (And the view still is, I'm looking forward to more snow!)

7) Sports
I mean this in a couple of ways. Those of you who know me well know that I have never been very into sports (maybe with the exception of baseball, due to my family) so I enjoy that there isn't a huge culture on campus of sports and huge football games and all that. We have good sports teams, but it isn't the most important thing here. However, I have gotten involved in a couple of unique sports this semester that I have really enjoyed. The PE class that I am taking is all about rock climbing. It is so different from anything I have done before, and its a lot of fun (even though I do occasionally leave class with bloody scraped up knees...) I am also in archery club this semester, which is awesome! It is something I have always wanted to do, and now I get to spend 4 hours a week in archery practice learning how. I also like archery because it is a sport, but it is very laid back and if I am busy, I don't have to go to every practice. (Seriously, all of you Wellesley students should come at least once, it is such a great way to get out your frustrations! And every practice is open to anybody, even if you have never come before.)

Okay, I could think of so many more things, but I just don't have the time to write everything I like about this place!

Waxing Philosophical about the Weather

In these past couple weeks I have had the odd experience of having the weather make me feel both like a stranger here in Massachusetts, and also more at home than I have felt in a long time. Let me explain.

Last week was hurricane Sandy (as I'm sure most of you know.) While the main storm missed us, we still got bad enough weather that Wellesley deemed it necessary to cancel classes (for the first time in 27 years!) For me, being from the state of Minnesota (which is pretty much as far away from any ocean as you can get) the prospect of being hit by a hurricane was completely foreign. The only time I've ever heard about hurricanes I was safely in the middle of the continent with no fear of being affected whatsoever.

Hurricane Sandy made me feel really far away from home. While I like storms, a part of me wished I was hearing about it on the news instead of looking out my dorm room window seeing the trees bending improbably far towards the ground. It was a bizarre experience, and it still seems strange to me that it actually happened.

On the other hand, this Wednesday was one of the best days I have had in a long time, in large part because of the weather. What weather makes a Minnesotan feel at home, you ask?

Snow!

I didn't realize how much I missed it. There was something comforting and familiar about having the snowflakes land on my eyelashes, about sticking out my tongue to catch them. As I sat inside and watched the ground and all of the trees slowly become carpeted in white, it felt like the world was transforming into home. It reminded me of wonderful white Christmases spent with my family, of watching snow fall past my window, of that first blissful feeling of warmth when you come inside after spending time out in the snow and cold.

I don't know if I can fully explain it, but I had the most pleasant two hours on Wednesday afternoon. Nothing spectacular happened (In fact, I was in my professor's office hours doing calculus. Pretty much the opposite of spectacular.) but I was filled with a feeling of quiet contentment and happiness. Something about snow outside makes me appreciate the warmth and fellowship I have inside so much more.

The snow also made me realize how everybody comes from a different place and has a different background. I was talking to a girl in one of my classes and she said that she had always wanted to make a snowman (she's from Texas). I asked if she knew how, and she said no. I started to explain how you make a snowball and then roll it along the ground to make it bigger. She interrupted and asked, "How do you make a snowball?" I was struck dumb. Isn't that something everybody should know how to do? I never thought about it being something a person had to learn. Anyway, it made me realize just how Minnesotan I am, if that makes any sense.

So, that's pretty much all of the thoughts I have at the moment... In the meantime, I hope you all have a great weekend and find lots of small things that bring you joy. Sometimes all it takes is the weather.  :)

One Thing Remains

Luke 8:41-56

These people in this story have tried everything. One woman spent the entire last 12 years of her life looking for a doctor who could help her. The other was a synagogue leader, I'm sure he was pretty well off and tried everything he could to save his little girl and make her better again.

Nothing worked.

But look at how easily Jesus healed them both, almost without effort.

Why do we try so many things to solve our small problems every day? Why do we think that anything besides Jesus will make us happy or successful or satisfied? Why is it so hard to read the Bible and pray and spend time with God?

Maybe its because we forget His love.

After all, God is love, and if we forget His love we forget Him. When we forget that each and every breath comes from the overwhelming abundance of God's love, we become lost.

Indifferent.

Complacent.

Unsatisfied.


We forget that His love is all we need.

Its All in the Attitude (And My New Hampshire Adventure!)

First, let me say that I am sorry it has been so long! I love writing posts for you all to read, but I just have not had the time these past couple weeks. (Midterms. Enough said...)

I've had more trouble with time management than I thought I would. I've always considered myself to be pretty organized. However, there is something very different about being completely in charge of every moment of my time. I was able to schedule my classes at any time that I wanted, and there is nobody now to actually make me go to them. I can eat anytime I want (well, when the dining halls are open), I can go to whatever activities I want, and I can sleep whenever I want. I've never had to make so many decisions about how to spend my time!

Now, I'm not saying I've done a bad job managing my time. However, one thing that I have had a problem with is trying to find a balance between having fun and getting work done. Wellesley is a very challenging and sometimes stressful (okay, often stressful) academic environment. When I'm not doing work, sometimes I feel really guilty for not getting anything productive done, and sometimes academics eclipses my life and I have no time for enjoyment (or little things like sleeping or doing my laundry or taking the time to eat good meals.) Often when I spend time doing fun things I end up feeling guilty later when I realize how much I have to do.

As you can imagine, this is incredibly frustrating! Will I never be able to do anything fun without a paper or a problem set or a midterm looming over me? There is always something that I could be studying or reviewing or catching up on.

Last week was one of the most academically intense weeks that I've had all semester. On Monday I had a five page paper due, Wednesday I had a test, and Thursday I had both a midterm and a calculus problem set due (which usually take me at least 7-8 hours to finish.) Not to mention the other smaller assignments I was supposed to do, including watch 2 different film versions of Hamlet, write a poem in Spanish, and several other readings and worksheets. Pretty horrible, right?

Well, I sure thought it was going to be, but I was pleasantly surprised in the end. Sure, I had to stay up until 3 in the morning working on my problem set and I still didn't finish it all the way. Sure, I spent my entire weekend writing an essay about Hamlet. Sure, I had two important tests that I spent hours studying for. Sure, I had to skip archery practice because I had too much homework to do.

But I had an awesome week.

You see, I've begun to realize that the tests and papers and problem sets will always be there. I can't stake my happiness on having all of my work finished, because that will never happen. It's all about my attitude. If I determine to have a good day, more often than not I will, no matter what I do that day. So that's why last week was a good week. I took a few moments every day to be outside and enjoy the beautiful weather. I did my best on all of my work and then stopped stressing out about it.

I know that this is something that I will keep struggling with. I guess I just wanted to remind all of you that you can't always let your circumstances dictate your emotions. It's much more about your attitude and how you react to what happens around you. All of you out there should take a break from work and do something you enjoy! There is way more to life than productivity.


Also, on a completely different note, I had an amazing weekend! I had the opportunity to go on a retreat with Intervarsity Christian Fellowship to a retreat center in New Hampshire. It was absolutely beautiful! One of the best weekends I've had in a long time. I got to go canoeing, make lots of new friends, and just get away from campus and my worries for a weekend.

Oh, and did I mention that it was beautiful there?

How God Shows His Love....

Today was a somewhat stressful day. First I had to wake up early this morning because I had an 8:15 shift at work. After work I had a class, and then my first midterm of the year (multivariable calculus, yikes...) After the midterm I went back to my room and turned off my over-taxed and over-tired brain. And as a result I missed the first half of a mandatory training for my job. Oops... After the part of the training that I did make it to I had 15 minutes in which to run back to my dorm for a snack before working another 2 hour shift. And that is how I found myself finally free for the day at 4:00 in the afternoon, tired from staying up too late studying for my midterm and hungry because I never had time to eat lunch.

I was very tempted to go back to my room and sulk about my day. I did that for a while, in fact. Pretty soon, however, I decided that the weather was far too nice for sulking and decided that a walk around the lake was just what I needed. The sun went behind the trees pretty soon after I went outside, so I wasn't able to get many good pictures. But seriously, my frustrations and disappointments had no choice but to melt away surrounded by all of this.

It almost felt like God decided He needed to tell me that he loved me and that He was going to make everything okay again.

And now I am going to go watch a movie and drink hot cocoa and eat snacks and enjoy my 4 days of freedom (fall break!)

And that was how my day went today :)

(Don't forget that you can click on the pictures if you want to see them bigger.)

Just a normal day...

*I started writing this on Tuesday and ran out of time to finish it, just so you know that this is not actually describing today.


The last few days I have had a great desire to blog. However,  I have not had much time or inspiration. So, I hope you will bear with me as I simply relate what my day was like today. I actually think it was a pretty good example of what life is like here at Wellesley...

This morning I had to get up earlier than normal, which I generally don't enjoy. But the reason I had to get up early was because today was my first day of work! I got a job at the campus library. Although it was somewhat stressful because I didn't know what I was doing, I can tell that I will enjoy this job. However, after my shift I  only had 5 minutes to get to my first class of the day, Spanish. Yeah, I didn't quite make it on time... I hate getting to class really out of breath because I just had to hurry up 4 flights of stairs! It's quite a common occurrence here. Evidently whoever designed this campus really likes stairs and building things on top of hills. (Often during my 10 minute passing periods when I still barely get to class on time, I miss our little hallway at Hope Academy...)

After Spanish I had another class, Multivariable Calculus. (Just bear with me for a moment, I know this was the boring part of my day.) I really enjoy that class, as crazy as most people think I am. We always have to take a ridiculous amount of notes (almost 7 pages today) , but my professor is really good at explaining difficult things. And of course he takes the occasional break from math to explain the Latin conjugation of a certain word, or to play hangman when we can't come up with the word he's trying to describe. I find that class very amusing.

After class was over I hurriedly ate lunch, and then I had to work another shift at a different library (we actually have 4 libraries altogether, although I only work at 2 of them). Once again I had no idea what I was doing, but I learned how to find the page counts for various printers, tricks for extending the use of a toner cartridge, and where (and what) the minifocus is. While I was on shift I also happened to see that I had gotten an email saying I had a package in at the mail center. Hurray! (Seriously you guys, mail is one of the highlights of my day.)

Of course, when I was done with my shift I immediately went to check my mail and get my package. And you know what else was in my mail box? A letter from Alyssa! (For those of you who don't know, she is one of my best friends in the whole world who is currently in boot camp for the Air Force). I was about to walk back  across campus to my dorm, but then I thought better of it and decided to find somewhere comfortable to sit in the campus center and read my letter first. Our campus center has a beautiful view of the lake, so I found a window seat overlooking Lake Waban and sat to read my letter.

Unfortunately, pretty soon after I sat down it started to thunderstorm, so the few minutes I was going to spend there turned into 2 hours instead. I decided to write back to Alyssa, so at least the time wasn't completely wasted. It ended up being a very pleasant place to sit and watch the wind and rain without actually being outside in it. Finally, after it stopped raining, I went back to my dorm for a while. It's always nice to be in my own space for a while (even if it is a rather small room I share with two other people).

Soon after I got back to my room I went to eat supper. Food is one of the highlights of my day too, they always have something good. While I have eaten plenty of things at our dining halls that I did not enjoy, usually I am pretty impressed. And the ice cream... I eat way too much ice cream here. (Have I told you guys about our ice cream endowment? Basically an alumnus donated a bunch of money and made it a requirement that every dining hall always has at least 3 types of ice cream. We also have a smores endowment, but that's another story...)

At 6:45, I headed out for class again. What class do I have at 7 in the evening, you ask? Rock climbing! That class is so much fun. (I use the term 'class' loosely. We are required to take two PE classes, but we don't get grades, they don't show up on our transcripts, and we never have any kind of homework.) That class is just so unlike anything I have ever taken before, I really enjoy it. In our first couple classes we talked about safety, learned how to put on the harnesses, and learned how to tie the knots that attach us to the rope so we don't die. Pretty important stuff... Today, however, we actually learned how to belay and climbed the wall for the first time. I successfully made it all the way to the top, and the person I belayed didn't fall and get injured, so I would call that a successful class! We also spend half of class exercising, which is fun because all of our ellipticals and treadmills have cable tv. That is pretty much the only time I get to watch tv anymore, so I always enjoy it.

Finally, my day complete, I walked back to my dorm. (Well, I may have taken a small detour to our dining hall for some more ice cream...) Overall, today was a pretty great day. And I hope you weren't too bored reading about it :)

Wellesley - College or Summer Camp?

Two weeks ago was orientation, which was pretty great for the most part. You meet tons of new people and  can reasonably go up to a complete stranger and start a conversation with them (because its not likely that they know anybody either). You spend lots of time outside walking around to different buildings (we have a very spread out and picturesque campus), doing activities, and exploring your unfamiliar environment. The school organizes tons of events, like a scavenger hunt, a circus themed party in the sports center, an arts and crafts night, and a James Bond/casino themed dance party.

Sound like summer camp to anybody? Yeah, me too.

Orientation week was fun, but I felt like I was always being herded to various mandatory meetings, academic advising sessions, and random (mostly fun) activities. This week, however, I felt like I was really in college. I actually like it much better. While it means that now I have responsibility, and homework, and classes I have to go to, it also means that I have more control over what I do with my time, and that I can start making friends that I will actually see on a regular basis (instead of people that I just sit next to once and then never see again).

Another thing that makes me like my second week of college better than  my first? I got a real job! This was a huge answer to prayer, because I have heard that it can be very hard for first years to get on-campus jobs. I am very excited :) I get to work for the library and technology services, so I think I will actually get some practical and helpful knowledge. I am very excited to start training and find out when I will be working, because it will be very nice to finalize my schedule pretty soon.

One more thing that I am very excited about, and then I should probably go start on my homework. (Yay, homework... :P ) Tomorrow, I get to start my PE class. And why is that so exciting, you ask? Because I get to take rock climbing! I cannot wait to start, it sounds like so much fun! I suppose, even though classes have started, there is still some small feeling of being at summer camp here. But I'm okay with that :)