Someone once told me that the hardest part of starting out on your own is losing the community support that college provides you. Filling that gap with cyber-support may not be quite as nice as being able to physically be around each other, but we hope it will help.
Who are we? A bunch of Oberlin graduates, class of 2008, starting out in the big world outside the Oberlin Bubble. We are all across the country, focusing on all kinds of career paths. Keep in touch with us, explore our stories, we hope it'll be a fun ride!
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3 comments:
Hello to all!
I absolutely agree that losing the safety networks previously afforded by the Oberlin bubble makes it rough to strike on one's own, however exciting the adventures may be. And to check in with each other and share trials and glories and funny tidbits along the way eases my mind at least a lot.
I walked through that Arch elated, but also wary because I had yet to be walking to something. At times I felt more that I was walking away from something -Oberlin, Tappan square, my good friends, awesome profs, delicious Decafe sandwiches- rather than to something.
But after much vexation, I finally got an internship. Not a full out job, but a pretty amazing internship -Arts Administration at the Juilliard School! I'm currently working to secure a roof over my head before beginning work.
So there will shortly be stories about phone interviews, airline travel, the housing hunt -and I may slip something in there about food, just because I love food.
So here's to us in wide world world. Whoot whoot '08 Obies!!
I'm so glad that this has started up. My summer has been unbelievably hectic, and I've had no time to really communicate with any of my friends. (Teaching is very demanding, and being part of Teach for America on top of teaching doesn't really help much).
I know many of you are moving to New York, so I'll have to make sure and visit - hopefully we'll find a way to recreate a mini O-bubble :)
For those of you who don't already know, I'm teaching 7th grade math at Neal Middle School in Durham, NC. I went and visited my school for the first time this week. There is mold in the room and they've been using it as a storage space so there are books and materials (all VERY unorganized, i might add) taller than I am. The counters are drowning in the profanities of former students, the air conditioner knocks, and the paint is peeling off the walls. And this is supposed to be the place where great learning, creativity, and invention happens.
I'm just about to tackle this Grendel of a room when a fellow teacher walks in. Ecstatic for ANYONE to take my hand and tell me it will be OK, we begin our exchange:
New Teacher: Hello! Would you mind coming in to my storage closet with me?
Me: ...Sure! (We walk across the hall to her room and approach her storage closet) Any reason in particular this is a two person job?
NT: Well, I figure when the rats hear two pairs of feet coming they'll be more likely to run away. (My face must of indicated shock worthy of her next comment:) Oh, you're new, aren't you? So have you been in your storage closet yet?
We enter her storage closet, jumping all around until she got to the light switch on the other side of the storage - no rats today.
As we pop our O-bubbles across the nation, it's important that we share these stories with each other so we can stay together, comfort each other in times of rats, and support each other during the times we're not sure we can do the "adult" thing any more. It has become more obvious to me than ever over this summer just how important the listening ear of a friend is - so here's to being great ears! Hope you have all had fantastic summers. I miss you all and think of you more often than i have opportunity to tell you.
Rats reminds me: I was setting up my new room in NYC. I was fitting the fan into the window and casting an eye about what view the window had to offer. Which is the rear gardens and back walls of the buildings around. Pretty green for the city, nice.
Then I turned around and wtith great solemnity my mom said to me, "Now I'm saying this because I'm your mother-" which was a very weird beginning. First of all, I think she'd ever uttered such a phrase before. And second, it smacks of the sort of 'talk' one might get in high school: Don't drink, or something like that.
So, startled, I was mentally steeling myself for something very serious. And Mom said, "Now construction (the building next door has some renovation underway) in New York means rodentia. So you have to keep the window closed!"
It's perfectly sound advice, and believe I don't want rats, but I really wanted to laugh at the time. Of course, I haven't had a an encounter with a true New York Rat, and I'm sure when I do I won't find any humor in the situation; but at the time it was amusing.
So rats all up and down the eastern seaboard it would seem.
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