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‘Opinion’ Category
Getting Graphic: Season Finale!
Hi everyone, welcome to the last Getting Graphic of the year. Thank you to Spec for giving me this space and to you for reading!
Now allow me to indulge: this is how I’m feeling.
‘Tis the season for senior wisdom! More »
You in a few [weeks/hours/minutes]
I’ve never had a near-death experience, but Monday night was the closest I’ve ever been. I was headed back uptown after hanging out with an old high school friend in Midtown. I took the No. 3 train at Times Square, you know, to be efficient. The train moved slowly and suspiciously stopped at 50th Street. It lingered for a few minutes, and while I actually got off at one point, the doors started to close and I quickly jumped back inside.
Between 59th and 66th Street, the train stopped again. Five minutes pass. The conductor tells us, “We apologize for the inconvenience. A customer was seen on the subway tracks between 42nd and 72nd Street. Police are looking for this customer.”
Nobody reacts much, other than the Crazy Lady at the end of the car who mumbles something that everyone brushes off. We wait another 15 or 20 minutes. Crazy Lady mumbles something about not wanting to get shot. People brush her off again, but not completely. We see police out on the subway tracks. One woman is claustrophobic. We’re all getting antsy and wondering what’s going on. More »
Six lessons online trolls taught me
As all three of my regular Spec columns come to an end, so does my relationship with Spec comment sections.
Yes, I know, you’re not supposed to read them—but I did. And, particularly for my sex column (plug: check out the last installment this Sunday), some of the comments were, shall we say, a little…vicious? Mean-spirited? Made me feel like absolute shit?
But seriously—every Sunday night, I’d barely get work done because I obsessed over every awful jab, every downvote or upvote on each single comment. I eventually got into a pattern of gripping my chair and trying to mentally steel myself before clicking “comments” on every post I wrote.
It almost never ended well.
Lonely, lovely
For the first time in my life yesterday morning, I got stood up. And boy, did it feel good.
In the interest of transparency, I will divulge that the situation did not unfold as you would probably imagine. My forlorn little self was not left on my doorstep to wait for a certain someone to arrive. There were no long-standing reveries of a flawless union shattered and not a single salty teardrop was shed. No worried and wearied eyes darted around the room, no sorrowful exhalations of profound and immutable disappointment filled the air. No moans or groans, no huffs or puffs. It was remarkably boring, really, now that I consider it closely. But then again, so was “The Histories.” And you still “read” that.
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Scramble with friends
Illustration by Lian Plass
Three-fourths into my mango-passionfruit Heights margarita, I am suddenly hit by a remarkably sober surge of appreciation for the girl sitting across from me. Later that night, hours into a study session, the very standard sight of my study-buddy hunched over his Macbook, brow furrowed from concentration, has me similarly overwhelmed. The next morning, an unexceptional text message from a friend, casually asking me to coffee, nearly moves me to tears. That afternoon, in a seminar class, while a classmate rambles on about the merits and demerits of writing in the second person and I listen to him, I am caught off guard by feelings that feel uncannily like love. More »
Getting Graphic
Hey everyone, it is the beginning of the end! You have reading to do, so I’ll skip the introduction.
Spring semester is difficult: as the weather gets nicer, we have to spend more and more time indoors.
International love
Illustration by Lian Plass
“You’re not an international student.”
If I had a Euro cent for every time I heard this sentence, I might have enough to finance my entire Columbia education. Alright, maybe not quite that much. But I would certainly have plenty. More »
Shouting her name forever
Illustration by Lian Plass
It’s been keeping me up all odd hours. Everything else has been shoved, unceremoniously, onto the backburner. I try to tear myself away but can’t. When I do manage to make it to class, I’m either late, distracted, or exhausted (if not all three). It’s making me irrational and it’s making me emotional. It’s making me incredibly, intolerably homesick. There are only a small handful of people on campus who understand how I feel so, when I find them, I embrace them. I slip away with them, onto roofs and in the dead of night, just to feel less alone. More »
Do the right thing
If you’re feeling good about exams, if reading week is generally free time for you, or if you’re a second-semester senior, there’s really no reason to read this post—carry on with your dollar beer nights and basking on the steps. But for those of you who may need a reminder, keep in mind the following fact:
Monday, May 6 = Last Day Of Classes
We’re in the home stretch, people. It’s the second to last week of classes, and pretty soon it’ll be the last week of classes, and then before you know it you’ll be done with exams and on a plane back home to Kansas City. But before you get to gorge yourself on homemade cooking, collapse in your unlofted bed, and hibernate until the next season of Bad Girls’ Club begins, you’ve still got… finals.
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Getting Graphic
Hey everyone,
Twas a really hard week. I hope everyone is okay. I think we all can use some pie (charts).
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