I’m sitting at my desk in my messy room the morning I leave for sophomore summer. Soon, I won’t have to explain to my friends at home why I’ll be gone until August — and that no, poor academics aren’t the reason I’ll be in school this summer. I am required to be on campus! But I am excited about it!
Lately, I’ve been thinking a lot about what these next 10 weeks could be — the infamous “X” that marks the halfway point of the Dartmouth experience. People say sophomore summer is their favorite term here. I want to know why. Why, when I’m with a group of upperclassmen, they turn to me and say, “Wow, I can’t believe you haven’t done sophomore summer yet.” How does one 10-week period become a defining moment?
Beyond the sun stretching out past dinnertime and the fact that I will only be in two classes, sophomore summer is when you finally do all the things you don’t have time for during the year: audition for a dance group, hike the Fifty, drive to diners out of town, experience the cool waters of the river beyond the three warm weeks in spring.
Dartmouth runs on traditions, on checklists. Volunteer for First-Year Trips. Live in an off-campus house. Take the iconic classes — ENGS 12, ECON 1, a creative writing class. Oh, you haven’t done a cabin night yet? A meal at Moosilauke Ravine Lodge? The Lou’s Challenge? A “sunrike” up Gile Mountain? The Seven?
If you don’t know what at least three of those are, congrats. You are either an incoming freshman or you go to a school with Uber.
These bucket list items exist for a reason; Dartmouth, by age and rural location, is a place where student culture is strongly defined by what goes on right here on campus. But the list is endless. You could spend four years trying to cross off every Dartmouth tradition and still feel like you fell short because you never quite managed to hit the 50-yard line. Wink wink.
Before I came to Dartmouth, I liked to imagine myself as a student here. When I was applying, all I saw were the infinite possibilities advertised to me: clubs, classes, activities, sports. Throughout my time here, the possibilities have narrowed; Some performance groups only take first-years and if I double-major, then I can’t take that theater class I’ve always wanted to take.
Instead, I do a few of the hundreds of things I could have done here. It’s like a line graph that starts at zero and fans out in every direction. Each line is a different version of my Dartmouth life: in one, I made it into an a cappella group; in another, I focused on athletics; in another, I never took a class where I met one of my best friends.
There’s only one ghost timeline where I do everything I ever dreamed of here — but that version isn’t real. My freshman fall was full of rejections. Sophomore year, I lived in a one-room double in the Lodge instead of New Hamp, like I’d pictured. This September, I sat in my room at home, wondering why I wasn’t given a chance to participate in one of my own favorite Dartmouth traditions.
I’ve had to accept that I won’t be able to do everything I imagined here. Instead, I have to remember what I have done, the things that can get overshadowed by what I haven’t. Even my rejections are framed by fond memories of trying.
I still let myself dream. A sunrise hike, a jump off the Ledyard docks, lazy afternoons on the Green reading novels I didn’t have time for during the year. Beyond those general hopes and wishes, I want to make room for the unplanned. Maybe I’ll stay up too late sitting on a porch somewhere. Maybe I’ll find my favorite days in the smallest moments — a Collis acai bowl, my apartment living room, a bike ride back from the river with my wet hair sticking to my neck.
I’ve learned that trying to maximize every minute can make you miss what’s right in front of you. This summer, I want to be here … in the moment, and not chasing the idea of a perfect sophomore summer. Out of all the possible lines on that graph, I only get to follow one. I’d rather take note of where it leads than wish I was on another one.
I still need to pack. I should probably find my flashlight, too. Just in case there’s a cabin night. Or something else that I haven’t even considered yet.
