The tours are bigger. The NorthFaces are disappearing. The sun is occasionally visible. There's no mistaking it: springtime at Dartmouth has arrived. Finally, the '09s get to experience a college campus as it was presented in Furstenberg's intoxicating propaganda: green trees, warmth and girls in short-but-classy skirts grabbing a smoothie and some casual conversation with a strapping young lad with a lacrosse stick in one hand and Foucault in the other (just kidding, obviously -- between daily practice and making an obnoxious show of dropping out of student elections, there's precious little time in the day for philosophy; what's your secret, Sweeta Delt?). Look out! Don't let that Frisbee knock you unconscious -- passing out on the Green isn't fashionable until Green Key.
As much fun as we're having, my dictatorial editor has requested content -- perhaps a point. To that end, our subject: springtime romance at Dartmouth. You've heard this before: "Spring term is the best! Everyone comes out of their winter shell and love is in the air!" In the words of Andrew Berry '08, "People love to be in love in the spring."
Popular culture would agree with him. Is there any truth to this at Dartmouth? Come Spring term, do relationships blossom in Hanover?
Given that our college statistician made like the psych department and quit, we lack much hard data on this subject. One thing, though, is certain: everyone looks better. We've all had that moment in the last few weeks -- the jaunt across the Green when you noticed just how many attractive people surround you. The tank tops are skimpier, the athletes are huger and the general populace has gloriously shifted from utterly un-tan to a kind of off-tan that only passes for impressive here at Dartmouth. Nevertheless, some students are less than smitten.To quote Caleb Powers '08: "Springtime is a great time to finally see the beautiful butterflies emerge that have been hiding in winter clothing cocoons since October. The problem is, unless you were hitting Kresge pretty hard before break to show off the bod in South Beach, two term's worth of EBAs shut-in nights has probably left you more butter and less fly."
Even if we do look better, what of this "romance" business? What does it mean to talk about springtime love at a school that perceives itself as bereft of a dating scene? We all know students who have bemoaned Dartmouth's hook-up culture, but as long as freshman girls keep running to Heorot dance parties like so many made-up sheep, our social gravity is not likely to shift towards dinner dates -- even if it is sunny outside.
What of Spring term itself? The agreeable weather makes it a perennially unpopular off-term -- thus, the crowded and flirtation-friendly Green. Moreover, Spring term may be the beginning of flowers and prettiness, but it is the end of something else: the Reign of the Freshman Girl. '09s, don't take this too hard, but you won't be the most coveted item on campus forever. Spring term also brings another painful but inevitable transition, from "I'm not joining a sorority, it's not for me" to the harrowing dance of who's-rushing-where.
What were we talking about? Spring? If so, let's not forget another Spring term ritual: the prospie flood. As you read this, you are no doubt beating back waves of high-school kids awash in nervous energy and the newness of a real campus. Kyle Finnegan '09 has some special words for our new friends: "I call it Project Threesome. These girls are only here to hook up with a college guy for two reasons: to confirm their own attractiveness, and to run and tell their best friends at home about it." I fear plagiarism. I believe it was the Office of Admissions who said that first.
As long as this article has lost all sense of direction, some advice. Wes Clark '08, philosopher of Spring term fashion for the Dartmouth female, has this to say: "Less is more. I think that is a good rule of thumb. However, you still have to maintain some sort of class about you." Words to live by.
Leon Chang '08, take us out: "I think Jack Handey said it best about springtime: 'You can go skipping and prancing through life, skipping through a field of dandelions. But what you don't see is that on each dandelion is a bee, and on each bee is an ant, and the ant is biting the bee and the bee is biting the flower, and if that shocks you then I'm sorry.'"
A quote within a quote -- what would Foucault say? Probably he would ask why you were still reading this. Get outside. Prospies, come to Dartmouth.
