Subtle Reminder

I recently posed the following question to a very close friend of mine: "Do students at any other school work as much as we do?" The answer was a clear and resounding "No."

Upon further consideration, he mentioned that students at MIT and Caltech probably work as much as we do, and we should probably give due credit to students at similar liberal arts schools who probably have comparable work loads. But on the whole, Reedies spend more of their lives studying than any other students in the country. Or at least that's the claim that I'm going to make...

I mention this as a preface only because it is easy to get caught up in the work that you have to do at Reed. On Monday I went down to the library at 11 am and continued the work that I had spent three hours on the night before--looking up answers to the 52 study questions that my Metaphysics professor had given us for the upcoming midterm. By 7:30pm, I had answers to 40 of them after working all day with a 1 hour lunch break and a 2 hour study session with other students sandwiched in between.

At 4:30 I went over to the computer lab to print out my reading for the next day's Reasons course (another philosophy class). I found that I had two 40-page articles to read on top of the studying I was set to do, not to mention reading for Virtue Ethics, International Trade and, of course, Metaphysics. And I still had two hours of 24 to watch from 8-10 pm. Clearly, I have poor time management skills. After all, the whole weekend was available for me to get to work on this. But that's just not how I operate, is it?

There is a point here. Amidst all the bitching and moaning that Reed students do (and I'm near the top of that list), it's far too easy to fall into the routine of the reading, the problem sets, and the papers. Today, my senses gave me a subtle reminder why I am here.

I think it was a conversation that I had with a close friend who told me to brighten my disposition and smile more (which I took to heart all day today) that triggered this realization. I had class at 9am this morning but I was ecstatic to be with a group of students who really and truly cared about learning. Reedies, especially philosophy students, never cease to amaze me. We studied together, discussed metaphysics, argued points--it was nearly impossible to go through the study questions concisely because we kept getting side-tracked by philosophical discussions.

And then my class tonight. A grueling session from 7:10 to 10:00 on the nature of reasons, justification for action, true belief, epistemic propositions. Instead of suffocating from the density of the subject, I found myself awakened by the aroma of coffee and a memory from my childhood.

As a kid, my parents held discussion groups at our house every Wednesday night in which students would read papers and then argue and consider their main points. This is exactly the atmosphere I felt tonight. Nobody was there because she had to be. Everyone was there because he wanted to be. This is Reed. Everyone is here to learn and the work is just a biproduct of that learning. Sometimes you have to take a step back to really understand why you reed 200 pages of philosophy a week.

I'm learning how to learn, how to think, how to argue, and how to evaluate. It is wonderful.

Emptiness

It's hard to get past the emptiness I have felt for the past few days. The biggest event of the semester, the Stanford Ultimate tournament has come and gone and now I feel as though I have nothing more to look forward to. I've spent the last three months, minimum, thinking about and preparing for this tournament. I was psyching myself up mentally, physically, and emotionally. I thought of the video footage we'd get, how I would edit it over spring break and the prospect of winning the whole fuckin' thing (in the words of Jake Taylor from Major League).

The greatest disappointment isn't that we lost the tournament or that the footage didn't come out as well as I would have liked. I don't mind Sunday's wind and rain or the pain I feel in both my feet, my right thigh, my ribs and my shoulder.

I'm really disappointed in how I personally prepared myself for the tournament mentally and physically. I'm a damn good ultimate player, but I put myself way ahead of where I actually am. I took my game for granted, felt like I would be able to run all over everyone there and that just plain didn't happen. My throws were off, my flicks were bladey, my backhands too floaty and my cutting was lukewarm at best. I realize that I just got lazy with ultimate. I set myself in a particular position on this team and was contented with beating up on the younger guys and being able to basically score at will in practice.

When other teams showed up with stronger marks and more aggressive styles of play, I crumbled. Looking back, I should have thought more about my release points and throws. It would have benefitted me to complete the Air Alert program and add 8 inches to my vertical leap. I should have been stronger, faster, and in better shape. I tapered off feeling like I was where I should be. I was nowhere near there.

I've never been affected by an athletic event like this before. In high school, I gave up 8 runs to Chandler High in 3 innings (included a 3-run homer to an eventual 1st round pick by the New York Yankees), but I left the game smiling and cheerful. There would be other days and other games. It wasn't the end of the world.

I turned the disc over 16 times in two games on Saturday and was point blocked 5 times. Four point blocks were in the crucial UCLA game in which we blew a 12-8 lead (game to 13) in the second half in which I had 6 turnovers. Why am I so upset? Because I should be the guy on this team that is dependable with the disc. I shouldn't turn it over and for all I talk about myself with ultimate and all I expect of my future with the game, this was a major setback. I feel like I jumped back to the rest of the field and most importantly, that I cost my team invaluable momentum and frankly, a chance at winning the tournament.

For the last two days I've been nearly sick over the UCLA game, my single worst performance in my sporting career. I've been playing sports since tee-ball at 7 years old and nothing compares to this. Oh well, it's fresh in my mind and now I have something to shoot for and something to improve on. I don't feel like this sickening feeling in my stomach will go away until our next tournament in two weeks.

Maybe then I can feel better about helping this team.