Stern College for Women - Kochaviah Yearbook (New York, NY)

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believably close to Ronnie ' s. She held her breath, while the world stopped and she waited, conscious only of the tense- ness in her ears. But it was Ronnie who stuck out his hand firmly to ward them off, and then promptly bent his head again, as the girls ' boat drew up along-side the boys ' . Their unconcealed flirtation was directed to win Ronnie now. None of it, however evoked any response from him. They were acting disgracefully to Amy ' s mind, under these conditions. For the boys utterly ignored their pointed comments, acting as if they weren ' t there at all. Amy would hive immediately rowed away at such a re- ception if she could have. But these girls weren ' t to be outdone so easily. Such tactlessness! Their coy remarks clearly begged Ronnie for an answer. Not a stir from Ronie ' s stolid face, though. He remained unruffled. Amy ' s heart was playing leap frog within her all the while. She urgently yearned to say something clever. But what? Tell the girls to go off? She fidgeted uneasily, suddenly self-conscious and ashamed of the girls. How could she show Ronnie somerhing of herself? By now Ronnie evinced impatience. He looked menacingly, first to the right, then to the left, picked up his oars, and started to row toward the girls. That was enough. The girls fled like tats from a chasing hound, not because they were afraid, but because they realized it wasn ' t worth the trouble. No use to flirt with a stone wall. But Amy was burning red inside of her. She warched like a spectator, as if this were a play in which she had no part. Never had anything seemed so un- real to her. This meeting was everything really. She ought to have said something to impress him here. This was her chance and she had bungled horribly. This was more than a quick smile, or a passing conversation in the halls of school . . . A deep feeling of loneliness slowly crept through her. Her life was so dull: school, homework, house chores, sleep, girlfriends, gossip, school again, and so on in an endless round. No time for all the things she dreamed of. Where was that excitement she read about in books, saw in the movies? Where the thrills.- ' Would they ever come to her? And the fast widening expanse of water between the boats reflected its own an- swer in the gentle lilt of a thousand little waves dancing in the sunlight. on bodies of water by RENAH MESCHELOFF Bodies of water, even like people, are subject to moods, and each mood is de- pendent on the surroundings, colors, size. In my home, Miami Beach, the artificial, superficial, hypocritical city of the South, the ocean is real, genuine and it speaks to me of gayness, relaxation, calm. The golden sands reflect the sun whose beams dance on the shore, now blind-bold and now, as a cloudlet passes before the mother light, shy-soft. The ocean roars at the shore and finding it unfrightened, comes to caress its whiteness, bubbling and frothing in joy; soothing, musical to the ear and mind. People walk together and talk together, laughing in the heat; dipping their toes in the cooling water; pushing, splashing, swimming, diving like a school of porpoises; bouncing, bobbing among the rollicking waves. One summer the family unanimously decided to spend our summer in the Northern countryside. We rented a bungalow in a popular section of Upstate New York and moved in. Being infected with a spirit of adventure, 1 set our to explore my new surroundings. A green forest stretched otit behind our cabin and several entrances to its depths teased me until I could no longer resist entering this green mansion . My path was carpeted with soft, damp leaves whose continuity was de-

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almost a romance by EVA DIER The boat tilted tantalizingly as Amy struggled at the oars. With each stroke her breath came in shorter puffs, but she flung her head back defiantly and fought on. She must not let the girls suspect that their glances at each other and affected giggles, accompanied by delib- erate rocking of the boat, disturbed her. She gazed across the dark green ripples of the lake to the rich, brown, muddy bank and freshly smelling woods beyond, and tried to forget the girls. Other boats glided past filled with couples and trios of her lighthearted classmates. A group of colorful mallards caught Amy ' s eye, the ducklings swimming noiselessly and obediently in a V shape behind their well-rounded mother. She drank in the invigorating air, and lelt like pulling rhythmically, healthfully at the oars, when she remembered. Anger welled up within her with the girls. Well she compre- hended their motives. She knew they were dying for the attention of the male members of the class. Of course, she also would have loved to. But it was not in her to behave as they did, and she could not forgive them. Why couldn ' t they be satisfied as she could be, languid- ly rowing on the calm, mirror lake? No! they must have romance. At least they could have concealed their motive a little better! But they were displaying tiieir most conspicuous behaviour, while- Amy sat silent. She wouldn ' t stoop to such open flirtation. If the boys wanted to come to them, well they would come themselves! But just the same she was embarrassed sitting among them. The girls sensed her mood and just to tease her, swung the boai dangerously to the side. Suddenly Amy was not going to be made a fool of anymore. Here, you want to row.- ' ' She handed the oars to one of the girls .t n immed- iately the boat rode evenly again in a determined search for some object ot interest. Amy lay back absently. For her there was only one such object hidden in the bottom of her heart. The splash tit watei playing against the boat ' s sides, the oc- casional caw-caw ot a now rending the air, the swish t a weeping willow slow- |y swaying in the breeze fell upon her ear like faraway music, There he rose before her eyes and filled her thoughts: tall, straight, athletic; a bright, fresh, young face; black eyes that could turn soft and velvety brown when she looked into them — eyes that laughed back into hers; and smooth black hair to match. Whenever Ronnie spoke to her, Amy ' s temperature rose a couple of de- grees. When he smiled to her all over his face, he seemed to be smiling just for her. Amy loved to be with him. They always found something to talk about. The fact that she was different from othet girls had interested him in her. He thought her a fine person, but — any- thing else? Amy wondered. She knew he liked her, but that knowledge alone wasn ' t enough. Amy longed for a real friendship with him. You couldn ' t just go up to a boy you liked, however, and ask him to be friends with you. For that reason, the school dance that had just passed turn into a failure for Amy. All the girls in the class had invited outside boys, but she was so taken up with Ronnie that she had asked no one. And he hadn ' t gone either. Why? Certainly not because he didn ' t want to. But she could not bring herself to ask hh)i. It seemed to her that she ' d known him for a lifetime. Her whole life revolved around him. And he didn ' t know it. Not a bit of it. Amy woke from her reverie with a start. Now was her chance to let him know, to get out of this dreaming and to translate it into reality. This will be a dream come true, on this lovely lake . . . but now she was interrupted from her resolutions by the outside world. They were heading straight for a collision. Didn ' t they know how to steer? Amy asked herself, annoyed once more. Or were they doing it purposely.- ' Well, she wouldn ' t warn them. They could see as well as she could. Amy helplessly scanned the occupants of the boat as they shot toward it. All that was visible was a broad white back, yet untouched by the mild June sun. Two heals were bending over something in- tently in the boat. Amy ' s pulse quickened. One of the heads was unmistakably black and sleek. RONNIE! Met heart spelled it otit in loud thumps. Somehow she didn ' t wish to Stop anymore. She wanted passionately to bump into them. Nearer and nearer the boat sped, and Amy. seated in the nose, would be the one to DUSh them tt Hei hand would be mi-

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stroyed from time to time by stones, tiny white mushrooms, or the dead branches of trees long since rotted through. I wondered as I spied brightness ahead and was pleased to see a small lake coming into view. It was wild, exotic looking with vines hanging across the clearing, here and there even dropping into the water. Spiders wove delicate blankets of lace, or devoured gnats that were caught in them. Water ougs skated across the dark, stagnant water or admired their reflections in its sur- face. Bees kissed the virgin water lillies or flirted with brilliant red buds on the bank. Leaves floated along, were slowly saturated, and sank. I watched this graceful play from my vantage point on the bank many times after that day, charmed by the exotic atmosphere, unconscious of the biting insects, usually alone and relishing my aloneness. The summer ended, and I said good-bye to my quiet cove. Summers came and summers went until one year my parents felt that my brothers and I were ready to attend a summer camp. There I met a counselor who had a car that he would let me borrow from time to time; I took advantage of the opportunity. One wet, foggy day I was riding up to the top of Big Mount Pocono on a seldom used road when I saw a sight unforgettable. I stopped and left the car, for the dark, moist air blocked my vision. As I stood there, the waves of fog engulfing me, I felt an eerie sensation overcome me. Before me stretched a lake whose limits were shrouded. The water looked like a sheet of steel whose edges had been cut in an irregular, odd pattern and from out of it lazily drifted a mysterious mist. I gazed at the mist dissolving into the heavy air around it and the full beauty of the scene struck me. There was about it the air of sullen fantasie which engulfs Dozmary Pool, in which dwells the Lady of the Lake and her lake maidens. I felt the scene creep into my veins and I knew in my heart that I would return to see it again. My second visit to the lake revealed a vision of unalloyed magnificence. The day had in it a golden warmth which seemed to enter into everything it touched. The surface of the water was smooth, as if nature had frozen it that it might better serve to mirror the vernal calm which engulfed it. Only the jumping of a frog or the paddling of several ducks disturbed the surface. Surrounding the lake was a swath of lush, velvet green. Much of the lake ' s warmth and friendliness exuded from that verdant border and without it the lake would have resembled many others in the region. Beyond the grass was a low stone wall intended to keep the waters in their bed when spring floods came. Past the wall was a rustic forest path surrounded, on one side heavily, and on the other side sparsely, by the wild vegetation of our northern country. An atmosphere of inviting friendliness pervaded. How different the same body of water seemed these two times. Oh, how I wanted to return and learn of its other moods. But all too soon the summer was over and I returned home again. 1 have grown older — mentally, physically, emotionally. The time arrived for me to leave home to obtain greater maturity and knowledge. I departed and now 1 am here once again in my beloved North. Even now, when 1 think of home, one of my firsts thoughts is of the ocean, turbulent or peaceful in turns, and 1 try to compensate by going to the Hudson River to watch the sky. the water, the boats on it. The river is wide and a great expanse surrounds it. Whether gray, blue, or green, it is a com- mercial river and makes no effort to hide the fact. No puny delicacy for it. Everything is big, powerful. The big sightseeing boats carrying gaping tourists: the bigger cargo boars carrying cotton to far off countries; the grand yachts Willi their rowdy, card- playing, horse-betting owners and their dignified stifi captains; the gigantic ocean liners, their rails lined with travelers waving adieu to relatives on the piers; the great bridges that span it, all doing homage to the George Washington Bridge. And the sky, like a roof of blue, SO very far and high. I feel small and insignificant next to the grandeur that surrounds me; u is a good feeling. 1 watch the water running, swirling in eddies, but going — going, and I realize thai here before me is a symbol ..I lit. 1 1- i lift develops quickly m there it runs in circles, confused, dizzy. Over there, see. ii rights itself again and continues along us normal paths. And so on through etemitj