I'm almost done with my first year here atDartmouth. As I look back on a year that went by unbelievably quickly, I can say one thing with relative certainty: so far, I've had a pretty good time here despite all the administration's proposed "improvements." Maybe this year wasn't really the Dartmouth experience I had hoped for or expected, but it was a worthwhile one nonetheless.
And with the future of Dartmouth's social options in question, I'd like to say I envy the graduating seniors because they get to leave before the boom is lowered and Dartmouth is transformed into a failed social-planning experiment; a Harvard-North without the prestige or nearby city.
But I don't really envy the graduating students. As grim as things might get around here in the next few years (and believe me, if the Trustees are to be believed, we're in for nasty weather), I can't imagine them being any harder to swallow than the real world.
If, over the next three years, I sit and watch in horror as the Greek system I've come to know and love (for all the right and wrong reasons) erodes and crumbles into ruins, I will no doubt feel cheated out of part of what I hoped would be my Dartmouth experience. But whatever, these things happen and while I seriously doubt it now, maybe things will work out for the better.
But no matter how cheated I feel, no matter how saddened I become when I look out and see juice-bars, pool-halls, and Superclusters standing where fine Greek institutions once stood, things could still be worse. And if the future Dartmouth experience means sitting around a Starbucks table sipping Amaretto Coffee while discussing Praust with my fellow bespectacled students instead of polishing off kegs while wading through mung-filled basements, so be it. I'll openly admit that I am honestly frightened for our future here at Dartmouth. Whenever you have a handful of distant, graying old men and women deciding how college kids will have fun for their four expensive years here, things can get downright scary. And while I wouldn't be the least bit surprised at this point if the Trustees proposed mandatory afternoon naps, shuffleboard games, and a dress code of white pants and white shoes, there is still something more fear-inspiring than the handful of old folks trying to run our social lives.
And that thing is the real world. The job-place. The wife and kids. The nine-to-five, the mortgage, the plumbing, changing diapers, all of it. If it scares the hell out of me, I can only imagine and sympathize with all my heart what it must be like for the graduating class. I was talking the other night to a few fellow freshman who supports the Greek system. We discussed the rumors we had heard about the future of the Greeks on campus and what might happen to Dartmouth in the next few years, and we pretty much came to the consensus that pretty soon things are going to start to suck. But I wouldn't trade even an altered Dartmouth for the harsh reality of life out there in the real world.
So while I've complained quite a bit in these pages about the things here that I don't like - and don't get me wrong, there's plenty of stuff here that I really don't like - I would be misleading you if I said there's some place that I'd rather be. Dartmouth may have its flaws now and, if certain proposals are enacted, it certainly will have more flaws in the near future. But no matter how much you dilute or detract from the Dartmouth experience, it's still, through some form of tautology, the Dartmouth experience. It's still a shelter, a safe-haven, a world of books and kids and friendly professors and all that stuff that disappears far too quickly from our lives. So, for those of us who are going to be here for a while longer, I say let's fight to keep our little safe-haven the best it possibly can be. And to those of you who are moving on, taking the leap headlong out into the world, I wish you the best of luck. The world can be cold and hard and uninviting at times but, from the little I know of it and Dartmouth, you are as prepared as anyone to tackle and overcome its many obstacles. Hopefully Dartmouth has acted both as your temporary respite from the world, sheltering you with libraries and professors and lifelong friends and experiences; and as your mentor, giving you the talents and skills (and business connections) to become a success out there. To some degree or another, every Dartmouth student is at a crossroads in his life. Very soon, we will all be faced with decisions that will change the way we view the world. Before I start sounding any more like a bad Chinese fortune cookie, I'll stop now and just wish us all the best of luck.
