At the end of winter term, I had my last official Undergraduate Advisor group meeting before I left for France. It was a late-night gathering during finals, and we clustered in my room around pizza boxes for a study break. Some of us were finished with exams, some of us were not, but for the most part, we avoided the topic of tests. The conversation was rowdy and diverse, as it always was when I managed to gather them all.
Before they had all arrived, the topic turned to Dartmouth men and women.
My male freshmen, for some time now, have taken considerable pride in citing a survey -- USA Today or The National Inquirer, I cannot remember who conducted it -- which ranked the "looks" of males and females at colleges and universities across the country. According to my guys, Dartmouth men ranked 3rd, while Dartmouth women ranked 269th.
The first time they (gloatingly) quoted this to me, I feigned horror at their shallowness. When the topic came up again, my reaction was "So everyone is not a Miss America-type. Big deal." What are these statistics, anyway, and who are the statisticians, these gurus? Would I let them define my criteria for friendship, select my reading material? Would I trust them with the key to my closet? Would I allow them to be the arbiters of my musical taste? I think not.
It is always an interesting thing to talk about Dartmouth with freshmen. As much as they do not like to be told it, and as much as I did not know it when I was a freshman, there is a difference between most freshmen and upperclassmen. There is a modicum of truth in the adage "older & wiser." But if freshmen lack years, they make up for it with a fresh outlook. They notice things that many have ceased to see and comment on.
The discussion focused on the Big Green women (creating the fleeting image of a campus of obese, life-size, female Kermits -- no wonder I could not take the topic to heart). One of my male freshmen observed, "The women here clean up nice ... but they don't clean up often!" He then added, "The guys always look nice -- nice button-down shirts, khakis," and the room exploded into chatter.
"Yeah, they always look nice," one of my female freshmen managed to respond through the cacophony. "But they wear the same $#%&*@ thing every day, and they don't wash in between!"
Six weeks later, 3,000 miles away from the Dartmouth campus and remembering my freshmen with fondness, I look at my closet here in Lyon and think to myself, how wonderful to see the world in hyperbole. Their words give the impression that Dartmouth students are vile, with dirt between their toes and pizza grease under their nails, for days.
Here in Lyon there are no all-nighters. There is very little stress here. I live 45 minutes from the University, on foot (yes, that is further than Grand Union), so there is no waking up and racing to my first class in a state of disarray. I have yet to pull myself from bed and to class running a fever caused by a virus I never would have caught if I had been getting enough sleep and eating healthy food. In Lyon, I always look peachy-keen, streamlined, dressed for the day when I emerge from my doorway, bright-eyed and bushy-tailed, ready to take on the world, showered, suitably dressed, my coiffure silken and subdued.
Lacking all of the normal occurrences of Dartmouth life (and lacking a Berry Sports Center), my sweatpants sit in the bottom of my closet here, neatly folded, never worn, just as they were when I removed them from my suitcase. At Dartmouth a warm pair of sweats or green, water-wicking pants are sometimes a necessity. Here, I would never dream of wearing them. (I stand out enough in my American Gortex.)
In a choice between being dressed exquisitely for an exam and doing well on it, most people I know will choose the latter. Dartmouth is a relaxed academic environment in a small town. Whatever fashion we have is a statement collegial rather than worldly. An anti-statement even. We dress how we dress because we are comfortable. At the very least it gives us all, men and women alike, a good lesson on not judging books by their grungy plaid covers.
