The view from WestCo Down One consists of Weshop patrons, the courtyard and its European beech tree. This view has accompanied years of underclassmen as they pull all-nighters or observe the weather before dressing. As a freshman, it’s easy to get caught up in my own drama, and I often neglect to see that I’m just pedestrian to this experience, a visitor to the University, a trial subscriber to the 177 years of community.
Perhaps you think Wes is changing too rapidly, at risk of losing her identity, and that the Office of Admission scams prefrosh with ideas of a Wesleyan ideal. You say, “Dear Wes, surely you cannot be serious when you censor Zonker Harris Day and ban chalking.” I tell you, my brother, to relax“because even the Wes you think you know and love is the product of change to something similarly dear to another alumnus.
WestCo has been facing issues that constantly baffle me and piss me off. Former WestCo presidents and archives tell me, however, that there’s nothing new to these problems. Every year, Residential Life threatens to cut us down and wishes that Zonker Harris Day would go away. Challenges revisit WestCo in cycles and, similarly, identity crises come to Wes in ebbs and flows.
Who remembers, for instance, the administration’s outrageous decision to admit women to Wes? Thankfully, the decision was reversed. But, wait, why am I now sharing my toilet with girls? Let us assume a sense of humor here and acknowledge that Wes has always struggled with decision and indecision and that, if we treat changes too seriously, then truly the joke’s on us.
Who, for example, is the chalk ban supposed to deter? If you’re passionate enough about anything that you imagine deserves chalking, you’ll steal out at night to rampage the pavement with chalk. And while we’re on this, who thinks for a second that students are going to stop calling Zonker Harris Day just that?
I came to Wes, half-serious, smitten with the idea of being the rebel. To its credit, the administration has given me something to rebel against. Back in the hippie days, students did not opt for marijuana, naked dorms, protests and firebombs entirely for its own entertainment value. It’s poetic, exciting, and legendary precisely because it was disallowed and fingers were being wagged.
Hence, if you consider yourself an activist and are discouraged because Wes is now so mainstream and apathetic, take a step back and appreciate the fact that YOU are living the dream. You are the Wes student that you read about as a high school senior, trying to change something and make a difference, whatever the cause.
Nothing really changes and, in spite of what you perceive, the essence of Wes (all 177 years of it) will remain the same because you came here, fought for something, and got into a whole lot of drama. Perhaps, then, this is also how we can look at the way Wes is being represented.
It really doesn’t matter if we try to change our reputation so that people imagine we’re amazing at molecular biology. Nobody will take us too seriously when we try to act stiffer than Williams. What really matters is that we fight for Old Wesleyan”we fight among ourselves and with the administration about how we think Wes should be“and that we let people know that we fight.
As long as we fight with sincerity and act with humility and an open mind, it’s all good, isn’t it? And didn’t most of us come here for a slight sense of schizophrenia anyway? Now, excuse me while I go commune with the beech tree barefoot.
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