Tuesday, October 16, 2007

Peering Over the Walls at Oxford

Now that I am at UT, I think of my high school years in relation to college. Freshman year at HSPVA was all “random feelings of nervousness” (Logan France) and disbelief: “Is this really high school? I can’t believe I’m going to be driving next year.” I was “enthralled with the freedom” (Logan France) but not really sure what to do with it. College was still rather distant. During sophomore year, I began to feel like I actually belonged in high school. Sixteen is the quintessential high school age. College begins to peek around the corner, but nothing’s urgent yet. Junior year is when the focus begins to shift from high school to college. You’re an upperclassman, which means you get to be full of yourself and flaunt your jadedness. Test results are sent to universities and university solicitations fill your mailbox. Everybody wants you at his school! Harvard and Yale are practically begging your presence. Senior year is almost a misfit in the high school plan. Senioritis rolls around; you are so done with this petty education. The last year of high school is completely structured around preparation for the next four. The progression should really be: freshman, sophomore, junior, pre-freshman, repeat. I built so many dreams about my four years at “a citadel of enlightenment” (639) during my last two years of high school. Oh, what wonders the future always seems to hold.

At the High School for the Performing and Visual Arts, academics are not so much a focus. The teachers understand that arts are the priority – for the students individually as well as the school overall.

(This is actually one of my sister's best friends at HSPVA.) Being more academically inclined than many of my friends, I became frustrated with the intellectual limitations my school placed on me. I had visions of breaking free from the intellectual malaise and joining “the more thoughtful and mentally shining” (Hardy 651) students at a great university. As I proclaimed in August, “I cannot wait to be with many more academically inclined peers” (Wiley Jennings). As I read over the pre-college expectations of fellow Bumpers, I feel a little backwards. In high school I had so much freedom. I had a three-hour art block everyday dedicated to the pursuit of my own artistic vision. The idea was to create a structure within this big empty block. It is very difficult to build this for yourself. I envied the academic rigor of other schools in which there was a prescribed path to intellectual enlightenment. I could not wait for the demands of college classes.



College is romanticized. High school kids can’t wait to get there, and adults long to relive those four greatest years of their life. Standing on the edge of high school, peering into college, I felt as though I was looking down into Hardy’s ancient well. The glory of tradition lay before me, and I, at last, was going to travel down that “original Roman road” (650). I was nostalgic about college before I even arrived, as though my memory were flipped in some bizarre looking-glass trick. As Andrew pointed out in class today, we cannot fully understand this collegiate drive as an individual phenomenon. Without societal expectations, who knows which of us would have aspired to higher education. By junior year of high school I was helplessly ensnared by the collective unconscious’ collegiate archetypes, in part responsible for determining “how we both perceive and behave” (171).

Now that I am experiencing the full thrust of university demands, my needs have inverted. I am miniscule in comparison to the academic structure that stands tall around me, and it is all I can do to push against it slightly. It is wonderful though, trying to reach back into the arts instead of being suffocated by them. Last week I attended a Taiko drumming rehearsal, a Czech folk music concert, Bulgarian wedding music, the Museum of Fine Arts in Houston and the Blanton art museum for the first time.

The experiences were vivified by my desire for them. It was wonderful to realize how enriching the arts are to my life. I am learning that the intellectual world, which I so desired before, is only a part of a whole life. 

The emphasis of my goals has shifted since August. As Avni so wisely proclaimed, “I really hope to grow into a well-rounded person” (Avni Mody). I would have hoped for the same thing, but it is only now that I am truly beginning to understand the necessity of well-roundedness. “I am trying [with all my energy] to integrate my own contemplative inclinations into other aspects of my life” (Wiley Jennings). “And what about balancing work and play?” (Margaret Clemons) If my academic schedule is not overwhelming, then great! I have time to work out, goof off, and contemplate. If I have more work than I could ever possibly finish, stop! Recognize this, and try to maintain balance. Devoting time to other integral aspects of life does not impede any of the individual endeavors. Rather, each is strengthened when it is part of well-coordinated whole because the Gestalt whole is greater than the sum of its parts. College is not a place that should make you bitter about life, but it should introduce to the realities of living independently in a life you must create for yourself. What I currently want from college is a combination of the idyllic experience I imagined while in high school and the ability to forge a strong, happy, unique life based in self-awareness.