moving through and on

My first summer in Cambridge is nearing its end. Trying to decide whether I had a good time is impossible, and I’ve concluded that such an experience can’t be narrowed down that way. I had a lot of good times. Summer here is incredibly beautiful. I was able to do many of the summer-in-Boston things I’ve always wanted to do. Sailing didn’t happen, nor did outdoor exercise, nor did Swan Boats, but I won’t give up on those for the future. Staying here was also difficult, and intense, for reasons that have more to do with my interaction with the environment, my relationship with this place, and my general state of mind as far as where I am in my life and how being here reminds me of it, doesn’t let me escape from it. It was hard. I can’t describe it in less vague terms because it’s all hazy to me too. I just know that I was often happy, often unhappy. I guess I’m still coming to terms with the fact that the proportion of my different emotions has changed, that the things that drive me and fulfill me are changing, becoming bigger and requiring more of me, which almost ironically makes it harder for me to make myself happy.

A lot of the superficial unsettledness stemmed from the fact that I was immersed in physics. I’m sorry to those of you who appreciate physics, but oh my God, I hate it. I know that it’s not arbitrary, I know that it explains many things, and I’ve always valued that about science, but honestly I can’t remember the last time I cared so little about a subject. Chemistry and biology have always offered so many analogies to concepts that mattered to me, but I couldn’t find anything in physics. I’m sure they’re there; I’m just not built to see them. It was a good course, well-taught and well-organized, but I’m glad it’s over. Also because I think being in a class I hated put me in a mode of thinking about other things that I didn’t like. Annoyances heightened, anxieties increased. I told Sarah recently that I write so much about things that I like; I should really mention that there are many things that I don’t like. Like when people are selectively nice, or don’t clean up after themselves, and especially when they’re inconsiderate. I know no one likes these things, but I think I get abnormally irritated by them. My biggest pet peeve has always been people kicking the back of my chair, on airplanes and in movie theaters for example. It’s that complete lack of awareness of another person’s presence other than your own that really gets me. Anyway, I think being in a general state of negativity made me have unnecessarily mean thoughts and made me forget that I like to believe in mean moments rather than mean people.

But like I mentioned, I had a lot of fun too. Dinner with the blockmates happened awhile ago, which was so much fun. Melkis, Courtney, Yonina and I met up with Jackie at Star Market to buy ingredients, and I was amazed by the wide array of bellpeppers. I love bellpeppers, the way they smell and look and taste and feel. They had orange, yellow, red and green…so bright and immediately appealing. They’re also so odd-looking, and have these various quirks and nooks and crannies about them, so that I can’t quite pinpoint exactly why they amuse me so much. They’re so shiny and smooth, and make such a crispy sound when you cut into them, and I really enjoy how the little seeds that had been neatly arranged spill out and stick to your fingers. I like how they look sliced, or diced, or in chunks. Whatever it is, I just like them, a lot. Back at Jackie’s we prepared everything, salad and chicken and tofu stir fry and rice (I mostly cut things, a process that I like in the same way that I like bellpeppers, and put things into pans when Jackie told me it was okay to). It’s very satisfying to eat a meal that you’ve prepared, and even more so to have it supplemented by wonderful people and funny conversation. It was very homey, and comfortable.

We also went to Shakespeare in the Park…specifically, Hamlet in Boston Common. Lara and I staked out spots really early so we had the best possible seats. Then she brought Vietnamese sandwiches and bubble tea from Chinatown, and by the time Rajan and Tim and Maciej and friends arrived there were about twenty of us piled and squished on two sheets and a blanket. The show was good. I’d forgotten how much I love Hamlet, how much I think I’m like Hamlet sometimes—indecisive, contradictory, moody, disconnected, overanalytical and overly emotional at once. The set was more elaborate than I’d expected, and the actors used the space really well—using the high stage, having people up and down the stairs, in the little pool of water in the front. For some reason Lara and I found the line “I find thee apt” really amusing and every few moments she would turn around and tell me that she found me apt. I discovered that that girl gets crazier as the night goes on, without any assistance from external agents…she burns some kind of inner fuel and makes you laugh harder and harder with every minute.

During the dramatic final scenes lightning occurred every few moments, and you could hear the distant rumble of thunder grumbling louder and louder, until it started pouring after Hamlet kills Polonius. A little at first, then a flood all of the sudden. It was cooling, and refreshing after soaking in the humidity. We walked-ran to the T station, and it was so fun to be out in the summer rain. I don’t care what anyone says about East Coast weather, I love it. Maybe it’s just because I haven’t experienced it long enough to become jaded, but I’ll take the illusion. The weather personifies the world, reveals its moods, and makes me feel connected to it and makes me feel a little less silly for being emotionally capricious. The thunder that’s so loud it sounds hungry and the sharp lightning that’s so quick it’s elusive at the same time that it’s so commanding, make it seem like something out there is demanding something from me and from us, and all of that is so crucial to not becoming stale and indifferent, which I suppose I fear sometimes.

Melkis and I went to see Charlie and the Chocolate Factory. I really loved the first half hour, which probably sounds strange because it’s all removed from the factory itself, but I think that’s what I really liked about it. I liked how they took the actual legends of Willy Wonka from the book and set up this fantastical image of him before they actually showed the factory, and how they contrasted it with Charlie’s bleak but cozy life. I liked how content Charlie was with concepts, dreams and ideas, with his models of the real thing. I found the rest of the movie—the real thing, I suppose—entertaining but in that during-the-moment kind of way, rather than an enduring kind of way. I always envision the book coming to life as such an exciting prospect, but maybe it takes away a bit from the self-guided imagination that’s such a part of Dahl books.

Afterwards we went to the Cambridge city dance party. They basically cut off a couple blocks in Central, in front of City Hall, so that people could dance outside. It was the first dance I’d been to with fellow college students as well as little kids, high schoolers, famillies and senior couples. We found Rachel and Connie, and other Harvard people, and had a good time. It was a warm night, but not stifling and I’d never danced in the streets like that before.

I got to see Andrew relatively often this summer, which was nice. We tried catching the Swan Boats, but apparently it was too humid and the man-powered boats weren’t running. So we walked around the public gardens a bit; I wanted to show him the duckling statues from Make Way for Ducklings. While we were doing that we saw the cutest fuzziest littlest yellow duckling in the water, surrounded by other brownish ducks. Maybe it was because the day was becoming gray, and rain was nearing, but the image of that bright duck in the murky water is so distinct in my mind. It’s so easy to conjure, it doesn’t even seem like a memory. Before we could find the statues it started raining, and we were without umbrellas or any extra layers of clothing. For some reason we thought it would be all right to find cover under a tree and wait for the storm to pass, and this worked for all of two minutes before it began insanely pouring. After the initial shock it was pretty liberating to just get bombarded by the elements. We have so many little associations with the rain that it seemed fitting to get drenched like that together. We eventually made a run for the subway station, where much smarter people had already found cover. But they probably didn’t have as much fun in there.

I suppose that’s the most significant thing I did get from this summer—that sometimes it’s better for me to brave the outside instead of seeking shelter. It makes me feel good that I got through whatever it was that made this experience tough, that though I had to work harder, mentally and physically and emotionally, to achieve what I wanted to, it is probably meant to be that way. Keeping sight of my original goals in the midst of expected and unexpected worries and down moments became a new thing to work for, and to prove to myself that I could do. When I spoke to Stephen during anxious times, he’d say things like, “Of course you’ll get through it but it comes down to the fact that if you had to do it all over again, you wouldn’t stay there. You would’ve gone home.” And without even thinking about it, I said, “No, I wouldn’t have.” Seeing a lot of people close to me go through difficult things this summer again made me think again about how I’ve always romanticized struggles and pains because I see them as part of the full experience I want to have and think that I’ve either downplayed in my own life or really haven’t had. I know that I won’t feel that way when I actually go through them, but I have faith that I’ll see their value in retrospect as people always do. Completeness is just that, and I wouldn’t want to settle for the partial.