Full issue can be found here: http://www.tcs.cam.ac.uk/assets/downloads/TCS_Volume14_Michaelmas_Issue1.pdf
One never thinks that a gown will
make one cry, but that’s exactly
what mine did this week when I
heard from the president of my
new governing body, the MCR,
that I needed a new gown, forcing
me to bid farewell to my navy lined
formal companion.
Goodbye dear friend of 2008 to
2011. May your wax stains and
slightly wine-smelling fabric rest
peacefully in the big wardrobe in
the sky.
The fact of the matter is that I’m
still eighteen, you see, and therefore
have no need of the postgraduate
student’s friend the BA gown.
No,
don’t laugh.
Whilst my birth certificate and
the behaviour of my peers might
encourage you to believe that I
am really twenty two, a graduate
of two degree programmes and
survivor of more bad dates than
you’ve had hot dinners, my lad,
the truth will out: I’m stuck in the
mindset in several crucial ways of
an eighteen year old fresher.
I am
ridiculously excited at the prospect
of coming (back) to Cambridge,
but the problem mainly lies in that
I’m not quite sure what to expect
when I get here.
I mean, the last time I thought I
was coming back to Cambridge I
had a captaincy, a sort-of boyfriend,
and a whole host of friends waiting
for me until one mark in one exam
redistributed my papers and my
final grade and I ended up jetting
off to Edinburgh for a year.
This
time, not so much.
My captaincy has been taken by a
more qualified candidate; the now
ex has a new girlfriend; the friends
have jobs, have postgrad places
elsewhere, have lives no longer
situated in one small university
town.
No biggie, though, right?
My mum keeps dropping hints
that I should be thinking about
‘reinventing myself ’ but unless I
were to chemically straighten my
hair, laser my eyes and physically
beat my need to geek out from my
impulses with a giant hammer I
can’t see it happening.
Instead I’m being a very much
Fresher-type person in my very
much un-Fresher town, joining
new clubs and talking to new people
and trying very, very hard not to
remember that I have been here
once before, and it was amazing.
