By now, all you darling wide-eyed freshmen have probably started to get your sea legs. You've claimed your bathroom cubby, you've been to a few classes, you've participated in your first hookup with a member of your fellow group even though you promised your long-distance still-in-high-school girlfriend that you'd love her for all eternity. You might even be varsity enough to self-consciously refer to the dining hall as "the Deece."* But even with days and days of experience under your collective freshmen belt, there's still oodles to learn about Vassar College.
I'm not necessarily the best person to dispense said information. Even though I'm a slick, streetwise junior who knows all the ins and outs of this fine institution, this year I forgot to pack my toothbrush, my sunglasses, my razor, three books required for my seminar, and Milk Duds. Not exactly the picture of responsibility up in here. Still, I'd hate to leave you hanging without any of my sage Vassar wisdom, so here are some gems condensed into convenient, fortune-cookie-sized tidbits (and while we're on the subject of fortune cookies, be warned that sometimes the VCash machine breaks at Chan's Peking Kitchen III** and while their sesame chicken is okay, it's not worth spending actual real money on):
- Intro to Art History is the best thing that will ever happen to your Text Twist high score.
- Jokes about losing your VCard stay hilarious until way after you graduate. (Get it? Do you get it? It's like sex!)
- False.
- You may think you know exactly what you want to study/ do with the rest of your whole entire life, but you could be wrong. The appeal of a triple major in Econ, Biochem and Victorian Studies tends to dim slightly when you actually have to take the required classes.
- TAs are houses, not teaching assistants. SoCos are also houses, not Southern Comfort, plus they look kind of like those creepy pastel pre-fabs in Edward Scissorhands.
- Everyone knows everything about everyone else. Like, when you admitted that you used to fantasize about your middle school lunch monitor during a drunken round of Never Have I Ever last weekend? We all know about that.
- Nobody in the history of vaginas has ever used one of those minty-smelling female condoms they put in the Student Fellow anti-teen-pregnancy envelopes, except as a slingshot.
- You know that printer that came free when you bought your fancy new Mac laptop? You'll use it to print out one single reading for a class and then turn it into the world's most high-tech drink holder for the rest of the year.
- Bacio's is never the wrong choice.
- Except when you have half a dozen ounces of some vodka that came from a plastic bottle sloshing around in your empty stomach and there's a line for the bathroom and you vom everywhere and nobody speaks to you ever again because you're such a social leper.
If you feel overwhelmed, don't worry. Objectively speaking, Vassar is the best place in the world. Your tender little baby-fingers will soon get used to typing the nonsensical stream of letters and numbers that is your web authentication password.*** You'll quickly discover that the only way to truly enjoy shower nookie is in the handicap stall (the only problem there is that you go straight to Hell if any actual paraplegics happen to be waiting to use it). And you'll learn about the gastronomic miracle that is Eggs All Day. So, freshmen, freshwomen and fresh-defiers-of-the-gender-binary, I leave you with the best of tidings, and the promise that if any of you continue to wear those ridiculous lanyards after October Break, I will personally wrap them several times around your throats. Welcome to Vassar!
* Although I bet you haven't yet figured out a comfortable way to refer to it in a text message (just type "dc")(spelling out "deece" is longer than the actual name and makes you look like a douche)(you're welcome).
** Nobody has ever been able to confirm the existence of Chan's Peking Kitchen I or II. I suspect foul play.
*** Changing your password is for quitters.
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