I innately like Thanksgiving because of the Over the River and Through the Woods mentality in the long drives when everyone is together. I put a dent in my APES homework by flashlight, read one of my brother's short stories, and listened to my grandma's reminiscences -- and then the immediate merges with the extended family. In the first few hours ( Read more... )

After all these bitter weeks, my poem (possibly inspired by a former history teacher) made the front page of our prestigious literary broadsheet, which was released this morning while the Journalism teacher was out of the building.

Shaken Villanelle ( Read more... )

The closer I come to mastering the challenges that life throws me, the more I realize that the rules are changing in such complicated ways that my effort seems irrelevant. After my years of bitter cold, revealing clothing, and inconvenient practices, my final varsity cross country race involved a small amount of straightforward running. The rest ( Read more... )

I may have written my own theme song, with some kind of central C - A - B- C - D - E - C. For the first time, I now have a digital recording device, so yesterday afternoon, I hummed my song into the recorder and went upstairs to play it on the keyboard. On my second attempt, I made something that sounded vaguely sea shanty and organ grinder - ish ( Read more... )

I was about to go to bed on Sunday. All the lights were off. I was shaken up to look out the octagonal window and see the sky glowing a pale green-white. Since I am fairly new to my room, I took this as a normal event ( Read more... )

I almost woke up this morning. In the dream, I was in the garage, doing call and response with my echo, "Stephan - Stephan - Stephan," until I stopped completely and my echo worked alone. Then I realized that it was someone yelling to get me out of bed ( Read more... )

At colleges across New England and upstate New York, a band of naked students from Hamilton College, who call themselves the school's varsity streaking team (and consider themselves undefeated and ranked No. 1 in the nation, though it is not clear - or even probable - that there is any competition), has been spotted tiptoeing through college ( Read more... )

Every fourth year reinforces my bad feelings toward Kentucky. They wane, but always flare back up.

"I'm so glad that it's over," someone said.

"It's only beginning," I wanted to say ominously. All I can see is that we have four more years of raging against the dying of the light.

Which would be more surprising, Osama bin Laden staging an attack on America, or simply not appearing at all before the election? Of course, in the nature of the surprise, he did neither. Surmise no more, his video message to American voters, even more oddly, does not contain vitriolic platitudes. For being a mass murderer, he is pretty lucid. Some ( Read more... )

I completely revised what was supposed to be my first completed college essay last night. What used to be "Spreading the Word", which connected my experience working for the local Democratic Party has become "The Hard Sell", which subliminally connects my plea to a mysterious voter with my unstated final plea to be accepted. I never say it, but I ( Read more... )