Janus

Today officially marks six months since I graduated college. I wish I could offer some pearls of wisdom about how grand the trajectory has been from where I began (unemployed, Austen-peddling leper) to where I am (...Jersey...), but let's face facts -- you don't want me as your life template. I didn't set this day up on my calendar or anything. I've been panicking about getting cut off from Columbia's email server, and it broke in upon me that not only does November 18th mark the day I told computer services to kiss my ass, it marks the half-year anniversary of one of the most stressful days of my college career.

I never once looked forward to graduation. I didn't have that great, progressive, "screw all this reading! I'm off to wall street to make sure that the rich get richer" mentality that characterized so many classmates. I preferred moping and reading for 4 years and then whining extensively about how unfair it was that I couldn't continue to mope and read in peace. How I remember the details of May 18th! The stress-induced rash on my face, the weird crease in my blue gown where I had set the iron too high the night before, the sudden nausea and hysteria. Our commencement speaker's less-than-praiseworthy speech ("think big, guys" -- thanks dude, I tried), tawdry comments from the guy in the row behind me, the last visit to Philosophy Hall, holding Chris' hand very very tightly. I was conscious of missing my friends already, though they sat clustered around me en force. Most of all, I was mourning myself -- the passing of my own life which suddenly bloomed into all the loveliness of the past four years.

I want to say something meaningful about how everyone (from Jackie & Vanni to Ben & Ling) and everything (Carmen 7 and the hacky-sack to River 2B and thesis angst) changed me into a better person. But I can't. For now it strikes me that six months isn't long enough to have stopped missing any of it, to stop needing the reassurance that post-college, it's all going to be OK. Because the "all" just keeps looming larger, and I'm still definitely poised here, Janus-like, looking forward -- and looking back.