First Semester Experiences

Who Are You - The Who

(lyrics here)

The typical scene at Town Lake: Joggers, baby strollers, and half-naked men.

I had forgotten just how beautiful Town Lake looks in the morning. I had forgotten the sting of cold air in my lungs at the inhale, the feeling of rocks in my running shoes, and the way that the sun rippled itself across the water, floating like an oily orb. Crew teams rowed past, their coaches’ orders amplified by microphones, and dogs passed by with belabored pants, tongues flopping as their owners urged them to run faster. It was a great feeling to be back on the familiar turf of the place that had known me so well before I had gone to college.

During the break, I somehow managed to drag myself to Town Lake everyday, often alone, because I found that I had a nasty habit of waking up at two o’clock in the afternoon, which was the time during which all of my friends were busy. Previously, I could not even stand on the trail without a friend by my side, petrified at the prospect of being alone. After being completely surrounded by people all the time at UT and in the presence of my roommate even when it was least expected and largely despised, I discovered that being alone was the most wonderful feeling. Over the break, I relished my time at Town Lake, alone, triumphant, having two to three hours to myself, doing naught but walking and running towards blinding sunlight.

One of my favorite haunts: Mozart’s Coffee. I spend more time here than is healthy, and I don’t even like coffee.

I do not think that this “alone time” made me into a recluse, instead, it brought out independence. After Town Lake, what else was I willing to try by myself? To avoid hurt friends and slighted engagements, I ventured forth during the daytime, settling into coffeehouses with a book in tow, hiking through Wild Basin and secluding myself between the rocks, and even volunteering to do menial errands for my mother, glad at the opportunity to hone my growing independence more.

In a way, I am grateful to my first semester at UT, thankful for the ceaseless noise and the ever so torrential crowds that flooded me, for it brought out a side of me that I had previously thought to be a depressing thing. I have come to realize that being alone is not necessarily a negative thing, for it forces me to be more independent, something that I lack significantly.

This eager child was the exact opposite of me in grade school.

With independence also comes leadership, something that we hammered on profusely in class first semester (and I assume second semester as well). Previously, I was only vaguely aware that I was often hesitant to voice my opinions, and in front of my friends, I often swallowed rebuttals and forced myself to agree with them to avoid altercations. In high school, I always waited for someone else to say what I wanted to say, hoping that they would ask the questions I wanted answered. In retrospect, these memories make me squirm, but I still find myself guilty of these actions from time to time. This is what I had hoped the University would dissolve, for it is “’the tree of knowledge’ and ‘the paradise of the learned’.” (X638) The idea of a university that I had before I started my semester was that of a place that taught me things that would make me a cultured and well rounded. My current conception of a university, now standing on the other side of the year, is that it is integral to teaching attributes and whetting characteristics that can carry on through life.

The most important things I learned from my first semester at UT were not the lessons taught in classes, but things about myself that I wanted to change or improve. Newman’s idea of a University, that “it is more correct, as well as more usual, to speak of a University as a place of education, than of instruction…” (X310) applies wholly to my experience thus far, for I believe that education calls for learning through experience, while instruction entails information being doled out. Just as Jude thought of a university as a “city of light” (Hardy 23), I am faithful that my future experiences at UT will reveal more and more the type of person I wish to be.