the freshmen are still trying to find themselves. earnestly trying, but some becoming caricatures. lost, trying to fit in, finding the square doesn't match the circle. i wonder if this is the true mark of the freshman, if you can smell them from a mile off. i wonder when you outgrow that, if i even have. were we that annoying? probably. but there were fewer of us. yes, we chose cult over community.

(no, cheryl, i did not entirely enjoy my coffeehouse experience tonight.)

what makes us who we are and what makes us want to change it? why do they bill college as a blank slate, a place where you can reinvent yourself, as if that's a good thing? why not a chance for greater comfort with and understanding of who you are? we keep running away from ourselves. we try to be that person who seems to have it all figured out; they're as messed up as the rest of us. when you try to be another person you cease to be a person at all. don't you?

so i'm not the piercing, tattooing kind. not just because of the pain, not even because of the bank balance: i'm not. i'm simple, i'm unadorned. for a day i thought something new could help me somehow, make me stand out - but if i need that... no. lani is a piercer. it's her. and i am not her. i am not the "gender studies crowd" or the "crazy liberals." i am lauren, fascinated by gender, a liberal, a friend. but remain always, essentially, me.