Entry 28: Envies of a Third Year

Often the most profound thoughts come from the most mundane circumstances. I was sat in the Bragg Cluster, slogging through some weighty jurisprudence extracts. Bragg, if you didn’t already know, is the Alan Davies of the cluster selection; unassuming, tatty, but ultimately reliable. It was about 11 O’clock at night, mid-November, and it was a dark and windy night. I looked up briefly from the papers, and caught sight of a building directly across from me. It took me a second to realise it was Charles Morris halls, which is funny since I probably should have realised that a long time ago. It took me back in an instant, to my own time in halls. And in the midst of that dull work slog a strange sensation began to tug at me, and it was a peculiar feeling, one that was difficult to properly describe. But it felt like loss.

It seems like decades ago now, but 2010 wasn’t really that long ago. I was at Lupton, practically a country bumpkin way out in Headingley.  I remember there was such a great energy around at the time, a real tangible buzz of hundreds of anxious young people slowly feeling their way around life away from home. The first semester was one of the most exciting and uncertain times I’ve ever known. Some very important friendships were born, and scores of others petered out within weeks, as you come to realise that guy who lives in the flat on the top floor who seemed alright was actually sort of weird and threw up in the kitchen sink anyways. For the first semester there was a real togetherness in the block, which housed around forty people. Whenever a birthday came up, a small party from the appropriate flat would come round knocking, looking for a little donation and a signature on a card; they were always met with generosity and enthusiasm.  The ensuing soirees were always riotous, with a couple of dozen people squeezed into the tiny kitchens, that soon became stifling even in the middle of winter; the block always had a sort of musty, hazy warmth to it, which made staying indoors in the summer months akin to life in the reptile cage. All the flat doors were left on the sneck, and people were always pinging between the floors, fetching drinks or bottle-openers, or seeking out free bathrooms. 

Then, Christmas came, with a flat-spanning round of secret Santa, which must have been an administrative nightmare for the poor girls arranging it. Still, when the time of exchange came, it was quite a sight seeing twenty or so people come to congregate in a single hallway, with little bundled up packages tucked under their arms and a certain look of sheepishness. Of course the gift limit wasn’t high; about a fiver I think, but the student imagination had come up trumps, with one poor veggie lad receiving a bacon sandwich, lovingly wrapped in festive wrap, and another boy, who received a large horn, of the sort used by invading Scandinavian tribesmen.  And of course, when the snow came (and that winter, come it did) there was a huge and deeply embittered inter-block snow fight that raged on with the veracity of the Hundred Years War, just with far more poorly constructed snow phalluses, tastefully lavished among the grounds so that one or two of them were always visible from the kitchen window.

Of course this feeling of community soon petered away, regretfully, but somewhat inevitably. Lines were drawn, friends fell out, scandals exposed, and inexorably the block ceased to be the collective it had once been. Everyone seemed to mourn the loss of that feeling of togetherness, but likewise, they were powerless to stop it; changes like that are deeply rooted in human nature. But I look back on that time now with real affection. At that point I stirred, feeling a bit like a dog woken from his own flatulence. I properly took in the building in front of me; each window lit and with a little character shuffling about inside. I looked on at the first years as they seemed to aimlessly potter about; in a purely whimsical manner I should probably add, not in the rape-y, mouth-breathing sort of way you are probably imagining. As I looked on I saw a lad tacking a poster up on his corkboard; another girl poured a brew in the kitchen, yawning in a Hello Kitty nightgown. Two boys sat staring at a screen, tapping frenziedly at a couple of game pads.  I took in all of this and smiled. Because it was strange, realising what they were going through, what an exciting and unclear times they were experiencing.  I found myself quietly wishing them luck. Because I realised what that feeling was, that feeling that irked me in the middle of my work, on that could November evening.

 It was sadness, tinged with regret. I thought of how hard I had found it, unable to fit in the groove I had taken for granted at home. I could hardly cook, didn’t know anything about the city, and, most troublingly, my hair (as anyone who knew me then will testify; it was bad).  But I did not learn what every first year should learn; that you have to take that first step at university and shake it for dear life. I don’t believe it is a pointless year, academically speaking, especially if you want a year abroad, and besides if you’ve picked a tough course you will need those first year study skills when you make second year, cause boy, do things get lairy. But it’s true what literally everybody tells you; you really need to just go for it. Join societies, grab at your discounted Edge membership, make a real effort with everyone you know, because when it’s all said and done, you won’t find it easy to have a go later on.  It isn’t easy, your first year. You meet some total heroes; I personally met some friends who are some of the greatest and loveliest people I’ve ever known. But you meet some villains too; liars, cheats, and the deeply disingenuous. They can make life every difficult in that most volatile of times. But, I reiterate what I thought, as I begrudgingly returned to work at 11:31 in Bragg Cluster. Good luck, to all those first years, happy or dissatisfied, comfortable or uncertain, capable or lagging behind. It’s just the first step in one of the most important times of your young life. And wring every drop from it that you can. Because just blink, just for a moment, and you’ll find yourself in your final year, in Bragg Cluster, at around midnight, making notes on 18^th century jurist thought. Imagine that.