Vassar College - Vassarion Yearbook (Poughkeepsie, NY)

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dchclem Grand old Seniors? We were not sure. It was like having a birthday--you expected to feel older, and you didn't. We had football games in the corridor with the pillows off the daybed, and the freshmen down the hall looked surprised at our levity. We were surprised that they were surprised, and it worried us. On our twenty-first birthday We went out and climbed trees to prove to ourselves that we were still young. Of course, we had caps and gowns, and marching up to the chapel while the bells played a medieval student's song, We felt academic and part of a long line of tradition, until We became conscious of all the blue jeans around us. Most of the time we were too busy to worry about it. Why did We do extra-curricular work? Why couldn't We just sit and do the things We wanted to do? We finally decided that we were doing the things we wanted to do. We just wanted to do too many things. The fall passed peacefully enough. We had to write a thesis sometime, but it wasn't due for months. We could not under- stand why the professor kept harping on it, and we did a little work in self-defense. We finished the term without undue strain -it seemed a little silly to worry about exams with comprehen- sives just around the corner, and we wondered what compre- hensives were like. We asked our professors. One smiled kindly and said not to worry. The other chuckled a low, demonic laugh. We were not reassured, but we didn't think about them much. '1-.. X 4 ' in I , R 1' '31 3, U .F I Q 115' I Y V, T ': 2-. -. y ,. V -Atv 'rpg- H:- e e j iw, E on QQ Q Q - ... - tirri s K - a.j I 1 A Ai x. I A V K 4, ' in I N '- 18 r,..., ! W if l l,-

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We were terribly busy. Five courses-hard ones, and we had stayed on the paper, and were wasting our youth in the cause of better journalism. We took trips to the Tabard as spring came along. Dramatics was an unexplored fieldg we made scenery and put on shorts and waved our lovely limbs in the kicking chorus in Soph Party. The man from Yale was in the audience, and he seemed impressed. We acquired a large and beautiful pic- ture of him to put on the bureau, and our roommates admired him noisily. He was going overseas in a week. A pity. Despite all the activity, we were doing better Work than last year. We looked over our freshman papers and quietly shud- dered, and then wrote our first really good term paper. We thought it was our life work and we stayed up all night typing it. Of course, we were practically flunking psych, but we can't be geniuses at everything. Besides, Miss Jones said We organized our material well. What do you want? C term we let up a little-after all, we deserved a rest some- times. It was really a wonderful tan. We perfected a foolproof scheme for cleaning a john in thirteen minutes flat, and we prowled up and down Arlington gazing at the new lavender and cerise suits. We became terribly witty and went to Founder's Day brandishing a twig, disguised as Birnam Wood. We were taking a couple of three hundred courses. They weren't much harder, and they were much more interesting. We thought per- haps our real bent was for scholarship. gi-jf' ' V . 2 , fx jl 4 , 1 A la! lu! S ! p J UWM ,N-N , 63 y ' f , l x J -l -- Ll I ir... 5 O ,. s -'uf ' ' 1 ,4rf,.,. ' f f' len rj- '7 V-I I., . - - ., 1- , V 1 Q UDE, Q: Wgtph L 1 . Q93 I qs l 1 T 7 M f'l ,, Q - ,, X ,1 ,g, .I .Q i , ,I 3 .' ix, y A A i ' ,',.'k.,! X Y - ' xr , 1, ..- . ' 1 '1 X. QXIHI p A J-' :Ill 5 ' ' 1 f 1 ' ' I . : , 1 fi' Y Y J hill l, jp, ' Ai A ii ' 'Xu 5 ' t l lil. 6 'A X t ll' 1' H l ' M- la kh!-my 1 ll l 4 li l - li llllli I I I n ,ft L pill I 'lldli' l xl . ff' f . ' t l f--sa lv ,l f .shy un f L WLUE1 7 4 l ' M 4 K H, g 17

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Christmas was very gay. We felt sentimental, we didn't know what we would be doing next year at this time, and we thought lovingly of hearth and home. Back at college we didn't even think. The thesis was raising its ugly head and snickering at us, and we got down to work. We went to Prom in a fluffy creation of tulle and ostrich plumes, and, since it rained, rubber boots. We became obsessed with thoughts of Next Year and haunted the Vocational Bureau. We asked everyone we met if anyone needed a girl with not much training but a great deal of natural intelligence. Our extra- curricular activities were one by one given over to younger and abler hands, and we retired into our cells. But there were always distractions. We thought that perhaps we were not meant for scholarship after all. It was the beginning of the end. We had a strange uneasy feeling when freshmen came into our beloved room and callously sized up its good and bad points. We watched the orchard in bloom for the last time and occasionally looked fondly at the hideous exterior of Avery. The library was still beautiful from the outside, but we saw a great deal more of the interior. And when it was all over, and we were through with the exams and papers, labs, libe, waiting on breakfast, acting, sing- ing, reading and all the rest, they gave us a little piece of paper saying that we had done all this. And we packed our bags and left, and that was the end of the beginning. ,- .nil N tax F- ' f- V21 , gf? r t. i '- . . O if '4 E :N l.f' ,hi llf N v , I 1 .li ,' gl . is IJ if I l e ' 3 , E N ' y. ll M: ll .l5'l1 .lla ll f ll 4 llllyil lllif' llul ll l . ' i l J li MK l 'i f i A-. , 5. , X. ga. , ff gif! Q im , E X I lyf, 3 , f , T3 53 LD 'ff cf, a ' 19 1 ,'pl fi!