It's been fun. By 'it' I mean blogging this year. And this year in general, I suppose. Definitely one of my better years, all-around. And if I'm not very much mistaken, next year is going to be quite a bit better, which is a very tall order. So now I guess I'm going to reflect on the year.
Reflection, eh? How're you gonna do that?
Well, maybe I'll, um, well, I dunno. How about lists? Lists of things? That will have to do.
Places I’ve Been For Meets
UVM and St. Michael’s, Burlington, VT
Dartmouth, NH
Williams, MA
Amherst, MA
Boston, MA
Bates, Lewiston, ME
Bowdoin, Brunswick, ME
New York City, NY
San Diego, CA
Airports I’ve Been To
John Wayne
Los Angeles
Burlington
Boston
Cleveland
Denver
Washington-Dulles
Washington-Reagan
Houston
Salt Lake City
Detroit
San Francisco
San Diego
Phoenix
Important Things I’ve Read
Iliad
Odyssey
Aeneid
Suetonius’ Life of Augustus
Beowulf
Song of Roland
Magna Carta
95 Theses
The Wizard of the Crow, Ngugi
Boswell’s London Journal
Hebrew Bible
The Apocrypha
New Testament
Gilgamesh
Waiting for the Barbarians, Coetzee
Endgame, Beckett
The Imaginary Invalid, Moliere
Way to Rainy Mountain, Momaday
Song of Solomon, Morrison
Ficciones, Borges
Poetry by many, notably Dickinson, Bishop, Segalen
Lists I’ve Written So Far
Places I’ve Been For Meets
Airports I’ve Been To
Important Things I’ve Read
Things of Mine That Have Been Intentionally Misplaced by My Roommate And Later Found Without His Help in Finding Them or Even His Acknowledgement of Having Touched Them
Book
Flashlight
Reading light
Coins
States (and things that I could convince Max are states) I Know People From
New England
New York
New Jersey
Pennsylvania
Maryland
DC
North Carolina
Tennessee
Georgia
Alabama
Michigan
Illinois
Minnesota
Colorado
Montana
Idaho
Nevada
Washington
Oregon
California
Quebec
Mexico
St. Lucia
Spain
Malaysia
Places I’ve Slept
Sleeping Bag in Goshen house
Bed in Stew 107
Bed in Newport
Bed in our motorhome in the desert
Bed in our Utah place
Martin Sweeney’s bed in Chateau 204
Several planes
Several buses
The back right seat of Addison’s car
Hotel beds in Amherst, Boston, Auburn, New York, and San Diego
A chair near the back of Warner Hemicycle
Papers I’ve Written That Spice My Salsa
Iliad
Aeneid
The Role of Cultural Adoption in Religious Evolution
Travel in the Poetry of Bishop and Segalen
The English Civil Wars
Papers I’ve Written That Water My Orange Juice
Perpetua
Charter of Lorris
Both Papers on Wizard of the Crow
England in the Early 1600s
The Passion in Mark and Luke
NHL Teams With Fans With Whom I Have Talked Hockey
Bruins
Flyers
Red Wings
Blackhawks
Sharks
People I’ve Co-Blogged With
Jason
Nicole
Rich
Rachael
Things That Grate On My Ears
That One Overplayed Dubstep Song
The Word “Hashtag”
Snoring
Spongebob Episode Names That Approximate My Present State
Home Sweet Pineapple
That's not really a great way to tell you how my year was, but I think it's a step in the right direction, isn't it? How about we try a video log thing whatever that some of you have been doing? That sounds great, eh?
Okay, maybe not. I think I'll just make it really, really, simple.
I had a fantastic year at Middlebury. True, I was hampered by some inconvenient inconveniences, notably a late night-inducing three-hour time delay for west coast hockey games; an infuriating inability to find food that was any two of the following three, much less all three: Mexican, good, and spicy; and a roommate with all the friendliness of a Nazi's tombstone. But at the same time, I managed to find some truly amazing people. The college cross country team has already become as much of a family for me as the high school one, and as long as that remains true I know I'm going to enjoy my time in the middle of Nowhere, Vermont more than I ever would have thought. And that's the most important thing, right? I think it is.
I was hoping that I'd have a lot to say at this point in the year. My last post should be a powerful evocation of the events of the last nine months, shouldn't it? I should be telling you all of this with a little more words and a lot more emotion. I want to answer the question, "What did you do at and learn from your first year at Middlebury?" But maybe it's more general than that. Something like, "How can you sum up your first year?" or perhaps just a simple, "What is college?" I think one Pat Rothfuss answers that last question pretty well with Chapter 59 of his first book. Specifically the last paragraph of that chapter. Perhaps he is right.
Now I look forward to the summer. I look forward to the Devils lifting their fourth Stanley Cup, but only because of the identity of their opponent. I look forward to relaxing a little. I look forward to getting some recreational reading done. I look forward to exploring this corner of the world a bit. I look forward to the puppy my family is going to adopt next month. I look forward to logging some serious mileage. I look forward eating a real fucking burrito. Actually, I've already done that, but I intend to do a lot more of it. I look forward to playing some roller hockey. I look forward to getting up at 6:00 five days a week.
Most reassuring is that I look forward to the flight back to Vermont in the last week of August.
Most powerful is that I look forward to spending a great deal of time with each of you.
1) I love Suetonius
ReplyDelete2) I love you
3) That video was beautiful
4) We should get burritos together (yes, that's a sex thing)
5) When are we gonna hang out?
List of things you are missing from the list "Things of Mine That Have Been Intentionally Misplaced by My Roommate And Later Found Without His Help in Finding Them or Even His Acknowledgement of Having Touched Them"
ReplyDelete- iphone charger
- butterbeer mug
- a weird history book thrown behind your dresser or something
I like the list of states bit. That's really funny. Idaho, yeah right. No one would give a state that stupid of a name.
ReplyDeleteAnd yay! Let's hang out all the time.
"HA! New York isn't a state, its a province, given to the Duke of York by the governor of New England as a dowry for marrying his sister. However, William Penn, another major suitor for the governor's sister's hand, was outraged that he didn't get his way, so he seceded from New England and founded the province of Pennsylvania, also known as Pencilveinia, because young children are often forced into the workforce very early to make pencils at discount prices for the rest of the world, and in the process often become so depressed an disillusioned with life that they end up commiting suicide by opening their veins with the very pencils they make. Penn later met Carl Marx, who convinced him that communism would get him laid much more than capitalism, and so Penn decided to change his province's name to China, and his own name to Mao. He the wrote a little red book which became a bestseller worldwide, and with that money, he hired a team of leviathans to detach China from Pangaea and move it some distance away, so he could party all day without fear of the police. Unfortunately, these leviathans were sloppy and accidentally dragged the Middle East, Europe, and both Africas (one of which was later renamed Australia and moved away from China to be a continental prison) with them while they were moving China; indeed, this is how the shape of the world came to be."
ReplyDelete-A More Interesting History of the World Accordin to Max, Vol VI.