Wellesley College - Legenda Yearbook (Wellesley, MA)

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' f Climb toivards e ' erlastuig truth . . . Hetcv R. Green Hall ' [23]

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upon the village green , We are the students of Wellesley fJe Begin to Be SOME of us came in the family car, grinning nervously over the lamp shades to reas- sure our mothers. We stared at cars with col- lege stickers on the windows and felt friendly towards the inmates w ho, like ourselves, might have been troops of gypsies with their household goods on their laps. Others of us came by tram, occupying ourse lves by leafing surreptitiously through the blue handbook. Not Wellesley Farms; not Wellesley Hills; but Wellesley, where a chattering swarm of girls struggled to the platform. Feeling un- social because we couldn ' t think of any small talk, we took a taxi and marvelled for the first but not the last time at the number of people the car could carry. It was funny to find the Vil houses mixed in with the town. We thought a college was all in one piece. Washington was beautiful. Noanett looked like a reform school. It was hard to open the front door and it shut on our heels with a snap. The halls were hot! The early arrivals, comfortable in cotton dresses, had made friends and were walking familiarly around the halls. We met our Vil Juniors . . . Lee Wilson . . . Nancy Jane Miller . . . Our names were on the lists they held. We belonged! They took us to our rooms. How dark! How bare! Did we have to live there for a year? Would we be homesick? We put the thought aside. Our guidance books told us to see Miss V iggin . . . Mrs. Alexander . . . Miss Lind- sey. Then we had to register. So we found a girl who had asked us our names and together we headed for campus. And suddenly we were excited. We didn ' t know the names of the buildings or what went on in them but this was Wellesley! The pink tower rose before us. It was not plain gray as in the picture. The whole campus was done in colors. The prim- rose bushes; the chapel steps beneath the oaks; the huge evergreen trees; the vivid lawns, the hollow full of rhododendrons; the quaint [22]

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turreted red building . . . there was too much to comprehend. We found the Information Bureau (noting how we got in so we could get out again). They gave us blanks and scratchy pens. Nibbling the tips thoughtfully, we decided to say we read the Tribune because we took it Sundays. We asked the girl next to us if we hadn ' t seen her in Noanett, but her registration card said she was 1938. Atrocious error! How our new friends would laugh at our first anecdote as a class. Lau h at htm whose weary . . . WE bought bicycles at the exchange and on them wobbled up to the Gym . . . so far! We went down to the room where Wright and Ditson were. We ' ve never found it since, becaus e it looked so different. They gave us shirts and serge bloomers . . . we had been warned. They put flat shower sandals on our feet, and we chose them too large rather than too small. Afterwards we almost forgot to take our bicycles out of the rack to go home; they weren ' t yet an integral part of us. We brazenly asked the girl next to us if she were going to the Vil, and together reached It by a circuitous route, admitting frankly that neither of us knew the way. Once home we hung our curtains, and began to put pic- tures on the walls. That was better! The room now looked as though someone lived in it. We put the five books we had brought with us in the case and wondered if we could ever fill the shelves. We didn ' t guess that in four years they would overflow onto tables and desks. We took the wrappings from our little glass pitchers and from our collections of dogs, elephants, horses, and cats. Our china menageries were certainly extensive — and varied. We got the janitor to uncrate the big easy chair that had been shipped from the store at home. Now to hang up the last dresses. At last we were finished! Suddenly the house shuddered with the sound of a bell. We seized our purses for fear of fire and plunged downstairs. Then, noticing our neighbors ' serenity, we looked sheepish. Lunch was a quiet thing at home! We found a place at a table. Everybody was talking, say- ing Do you know — Yes, she ' s one of my best friends. We wracked our brains to find someone we knew in Pittsburgh or Shaker Heights. Heavens! What would we talk about all year? We had nothing in common. One of the girls was very funny. In fact, at every meal that week, there was someone who held everybody ' s attention. We wished we were brilliant conversationalists. And the dialects sounded strange. Some girls drawled, some twanged, some dropped their r ' s . We began to think Wellesley a cosmopolitan place. We hoped the baked apples weren ' t symbolic of meals to come. That afternoon we had tea in the living room. We told each other our names, room- numbers, home-towns, and the courses we were taking. Someone played Cheek to Cheek, and we discovered an interest in common. One or two girls danced. We decided we ' d have to lead in spite of our past objec- tions. We unpacked incessantly. Taddie wore her wool dress three days because her trunk didn ' t come. We started cheerful letters home but the pictures they called up were too much to bear. We were excited when the girls in the double across the hall invited us all in for food. Grapes, chocolates, pictures of their friends at home, matching bedspreads, a radio, brownies, Princeton banners, conversa- tion. Dizzying and wonderful. This was the life we had read about! We were in college. Best of all we were in Wellesley! [24]