Rockford College - Recensio / Cupola Yearbook (Rockford, IL)

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she had felt forlorn but not forsaken, for she had known that twenty-three others were in the same plight. Company certainly is an antidote for misery. But she had lacked even this poor conso- lation when four years later she had left behind her not only home, but her dear Alma Mater as Well, and had stood for the first time facing her classes The ordeal of being the 'fnew teacher came vividly back to her. She saw herself on that first Monday morning, standing at the head of the long flight of stairs as that endless stream of nameless humanity filed curiously past her. She could still feel their searching gaze noting the details of her white shirtwaist and black tie. She could almost hear their comments as to the length of her skirt and the way she Wore her hair. She wondered if they knew immediately that she had never taught before. Does the college Freshman suffer such pangs? But that first month had at last dragged itself out, and gradually those giggling girls and awk- ward boys had become her appreciative friends and trusted comrades. It was they who had in some measure filled the place of those other friends back in old Rockford. But blue Mondays and restless Fridays no longer troubled the Old Girl. She was back in her former haunts. To be sure, the Freshmen had regarded her with cool indifference and had won- dered how long ago she had been there. But that mattered very little, for many of her old friends were back, and, although she knew she was no longer a part of the college life, yet she felt athome. The room she had was not hers, it was a long, narrow room on the second floor which looked bare enough in the white light of the June moon. Not a poster, not a photograph, relieved the monotony of bunch after bunch of staring red carnations: the closet had no curtains: the bureau was without a cover, yet all this made her feel that she belonged here, for, like the college family proper, she was allowed to make the best of inconveniences so that the older old girls might occupy the more habitable guest rooms. , l-low dear it all was to her! Yet there was a change. The question which had so agitated the girls in Middle Hall that morning was not so vital to her as it had been a year ago: or, at least, now she could see both sides so plainly that she wondered how she could ever have cared so much either one way or the other. So this is my first anniversary, she mused: in two more years I shall be even less closely bound to the girls personally, but perhaps all the more closely to the Alma Mater herself, whose personality is the sum total of all those who have been sheltered within her warm walls. l-lere the subdued tuning of banjos interrupted her meditation, and from the front steps floated the familiar strains of that old serenade, She Sleeps, My Lady Sleeps. As the melody of those fresh young voices sounded in the quiet campus, now proclaiming that they'd been workin' on the railroad, and now that they were loyal to their own Alma Mater, the girl in her bare room felt for the first time alone, for this was not for her. She knew that up in the library was gathered a group of whispering girls who could distinguish whose was the rich baritone voice, and whose the l2

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The Old Girl 4 TWO VIEWS OLLEGE opened yesterday- Friday. lt is now Saturday morning, nearly time for luncheon. Apparently Middle Hall has been left to the tender mercies of the small groups of lonely, painfully verdant Freshmen who stand or sit here and there, as if not knowing what better to do, vaguely waiting for something to happen. A carriage stops outside and a tall girl steps out of the door as it is flung open. As she comes up into the hall, looking neither to her right nor to her left, her authoritative manner, her air of familiarity with the place, and her supreme indifference to the looks of curiosity which are her only greeting, all prove that she is something apart from the common mortals that surround her. Surely she is the President of the College, or anyway one of the Trustees, whispers one Freshman to another, who, merely shaking her head in reply, stands gazing at the dark stairway up which her I-lighness has vanished. While the Freshman is still looking up into the darkness, she sees coming down the stairs another girl whom she recognizes as a Sophomore, but whom she has not yet met. Almost overcome by fright, she yet ventures to ask, Will you please tell me if the lady who just went up stairs is the President? The Sophomore gives one gasp, shrieks, Noll and as she rushes up stairs again to spread abroad the latest Freshman break, she stops just long enough to say, Better luck to you the next time you see an Old Girl! 4 h c One year old! She wondered if all first anniversaries were as reflective as this one. It did not seem twelve months since she had put on her cap and gown for the last time and had stood in line waiting for her sheepskin. I-lers had not been what is known as a weepy class, yet only by counting the roses in a great jar at her side, had she been able to keep back the tears as she listened to those tender words beginning, Dear Children. All this was a year ago. To-day she had come back for her first alumnae reunion. Was she changed? Was the Alma Mater grown cold? No and yes. 'She had had a year of experience, as the teacher's agencies would say, and one must change with thatg but the Alma Mater, was she not the same kind, though sometimes unresponsive, personality who had welcomed her five years before? l-low well she remembered that first week in number thirteen, as she looked back at it now, and the fight she had made against homesickness. She smiled into the duskiness of the bare room. What is Freshman homesickness compared to that of the baby alumna? As a Freshman ll

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high tenor. She did not know, yet she was glad she had heard the serenade. Then, when Goodnight, Ladies, was followed by a last cheer for Rockford and a final tribute to that neigh- boring college, she turned sleepily toward the hall to dream that she was a Junior throwing a Senior's commencement roses from the Gym. window to a football eleven in shining yellow suits, singing in the road below. So, in her dream, she had her wish and was once more a part of that eventful and joyful College world. She was no longer the despised or respected Old Girl. -M. P. 1. -.O O .'o ' 9: O P hfqaigg z s 1 944.531 n A . iv S1 il ffff fill 1. 212 i pl 1 wg gg :fr fi 7 ' tif , I 331' f,?.g,,.:gg 3 J' 'A ffl? Ngo . sigh' If 5 l , 1 gl 've f I 5, 3315? t- Slg . 0 2. 1:1 o q-Figs: . JI' s.b.' ,lv t V. Q :Ash ' L. v HR. ' ' '51 5331-1 ' 13A