So I'm sitting in class and the professor is talking about time geological time versus cultural time versus political time. And I admit I'm mainly thinking that it feels like it's time to eat. Apparently though, our perception of whether change has occurred depends on the lens of time we're using to view history, which is a completely logical statement that I had never considered before. I realize that all of the self-reflective moping I've been doing the last few weeks boils down to a series of questions about time and its mutations.
What time is it now? It's 2:48 Eastern Standard Time. Doesn't even matter if that's a.m. or p.m. I'm still in college and any behavior is acceptable at any time of day. It's Friday, May 27 and there are 16 days until graduation. It's the end of an era or the beginning of a new one. It's about time I stopped speaking in clichs. Is the clock moving slowly as I try to comprehend the imminent transformation that feels so distant right now? The Green certainly looks just as it always has at this time of day. Sixteen days. I think I can physically feel time passing. Is it time to be grabbing hold of every moment left to spend with close friends before we all move to different cities, to different continents, to different lives? Should I be meeting all those people I never got a chance to meet? Is it time to retrace the grooves of my well-worn paths around Hanover, or ought I check off the final things on my to-do list? (Sunset hike to the Fire Tower, anyone? Seriously.)
Okay, so I don't have any kind of advice or answers. I'm not going to pretend I do. All I can do is pose more rhetorical questions than you thought possible.
What time of our lives are we in? (Don't tell me it's THE time. I'm trying to stay optimistic here.) I've had the thought "Am I young or old?" on repeat in my brain the last few weeks. I feel so old when I look at prospies walking around campus and considering their options for college. God I'm glad I don't have to look at the Common App again. Then the alums over returned over Green Key, strategically timed to make us 'feel like babies.
(Number of times I've written the word time so far: 20. I'm not sorry.)
What stage of our lives will we enter after graduation? While the patterns of our Dartmouth existence have been fairly similar, that will completely change after graduation. The schedule of a full-time grad student just doesn't match up with the life of someone entering the workforce. On the bright side, it seems like all kinds of alums are always on g-chat.
My perception of the past just feels so warped at the moment. I can sit around my kitchen with an old friend reminiscing about freshmen year and the memories seem like recent events. Simultaneously, we're simply different people now. And looking around the kitchen it's clear how much our version of Dartmouth has changed as well.
So has it been a long time or a little since our Orientation? Why did sophomore and junior years fly by so fast, so very fast, while the memories of those terms both off and abroad feel like they could fill up years instead of just 10 weeks each?
All I know is that it's late. It's late. It's late.
