The Miscellany News miscellanynews.org
Vassar College’s student newspaper of record since 1866 Volume 154 | Issue 12
November 19, 2020
SNUG tackles gun violence in Poughkeepsie with community outreach Alex Wilson
Assistant News Editor
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SNUG team members and Poughkeepsie residents. Courtesy of Debra Long
n recent months, headlines reporting skyrocketing gun violence in New York City have dominated major news outlets and drawn public concern. But across the state, other cities, including the City of Poughkeepsie, are reckoning with similar upward trends. By the end of last week, Poughkeepsie had already seen three shootings since the beginning of November. On the night of Nov. 1, a 20-year-old Poughkeepsie resident was found with several gunshot wounds inside of a vehicle. Just three days later, a 27-year-old was shot in an attack that police believe was carried out by multiple shooters. Last Monday, Nov. 9, a 17-year-old with multiple gunshot wounds was rushed to Vassar Brothers Med-
ical Center where he underwent surgery. As the city battles this uptick in gun violence, Debra Long, Program Coordinator for Family Services SNUG, hopes to be a part of the solution. SNUG is one of many programs operated by Family Services, an organization that served 19,000 people last year within their program areas of Behavioral Health, Victim Services, Family Programs, Youth Services, Community Safety and Prevention. Long explained that SNUG (“guns” spelled backwards) is an organisation that focuses on reducing gun violence. “[SNUG] is an evidence based, street outreach program based on the Cure Violence model that was initiated in Chicago. This model treats gun violence like a disease by identifying its causes and interrupting
its transmission” she said. The Cure Violence model teaches that individuals can stop the cycle of violence by curbing their own violent practices and using their influence to change how their community views aggression. The model seeks to heal the damage caused by violence, change negative behaviors and empower them to help others leave aggressive patterns behind. The Cure Violence model has a track record of success—in the United States, cities that have implemented the model have seen up to a 73 percent reduction in shootings and killings. In Baltimore, it had a larger effect in reducing non-fatal shootings than any law enforcement activity. SNUG focuses primarily on youth between the ages of 14 and 24. “We work together as a team See SNUG on page 3
Joss murals Vassar reflects on unprecedented semester comfort, charm W Lucille Brewster News Editor
Yael Gelman
Guest Reporter
“W
ell, it’s kinda gross down there,” said Riley Kelly ’24. I had asked her about the basement in her house, Josselyn. As a first year living in Davison House, I had never ventured into the unknown realms of the other dorm basements. Was it really as bad as my friends had told me? Sneeze-inducing dust, unbearable heat and creepy hidden passageways—was it all true? James Nicholas ’23 recalled that the first time he went down there he was “scared as heck.” So when I was asked to write a piece on the beautiful murals in the Josselyn basement, I was thoroughly surprised. Much of the Joss basement was exactly what I expected. But after winding down a narrow staircase and shedding my jacket, I found myself staring down a dark hallway covered in colorful paint from the dusty cement floor all the way up to the low-hanging ceiling. The first thing I noticed? None of the artwork was signed. Although there were names and class years painted in some places (it was as if a group of friends wanted to leave their mark on See MURALS page 3
hen President Bradley shared in early summer that all students would be welcome back to campus in the fall, the news elicited a range of emotions. While many students were excited to return to campus after months of isolation, critics were dubious that Vassar could pull off a safe return to Poughkeepsie. Peer institutions, such as Bowdoin College and Kenyon College, opted to only allow first-years on campus to lower population density. Pomona College and Smith College did not welcome any students back to campus. While this semester was challenging and unprecedented, the Vassar community was able to avoid large COVID-19 outbreaks on campus. With a few days left before the majority of students
NEWS
While 41 students tested positive for COVID-19 this semester, there was no community spread and Vassar never had to go into any form of lockdown. “That we have been fortunate to keep our COVID-19 cases relatively low is a tribute to everyone on campus students, faculty and employees - who followed the College’s protocols, and moreover took to heart that ‘We precedes me’,” commented President Elizabeth Bradley in a written statement for this article. She also emphasized the important role of the VassarTogether team. Dean of the College Carlos Alamo-Pastrana concurred, explaining, “When we began this semester, we had no idea how successful any of the measures we put in place might be, but we are quite thankful that we have been able to keep the on-campus incidence of COVID-19 as low as we have.”
According to students and administrators, Vassar’s student culture played a part in preventing COVID-19 spikes. Lucy Kuhn ’22 explained that since much of Vassar’s social life and extracurricular activities are on campus, shifting to an island model in itself was not a huge change in students’ day to day lives. Inside campus boundaries, many students felt a responsibility to their peers to follow social distancing guidelines. “As a small school, I think accountability is a lot more real when you know the majority of the community on a personal level,” explained Kuhn. Safety measures such as mask wearing, social distancing and following testing schedules became part of everyday life this semester. For Alamo-Pastrana and other college administrators, it was important to design a system of accountSee REFLECT on page 4
New org revitalizes VC poetry community Leila Raines
Guest Reporter
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ndy Kasper ’23 and Sam Kass ’23 were hanging out in the Old Bookstore last year when the idea of forming a poetry-writing group blossomed from their latenight conversation. Almost one year later, Kasper and Kass are now the co-presidents and founders of Vassar Verse, a pre-organization that meets every Friday and provides a supportive space for
Inside this issue
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leave campus, the percentage of positive test results is .11 percent, which is noticeably lower than both the national rate of infection and the rate of infection in Dutchess County, which is 2.4 percent. Success in limiting the spread of COVID-19 on college campuses has not been universal. According to a New York Times survey, there have been over 252,000 cases and at least 80 deaths at 1,700 American colleges and universities. Marist College, also in Poughkeepsie, had to shift into a soft lockdown twice this semester as a result of large COVID-19 outbreaks. The first pause in October was the result of an off-campus party that led to 26 cases on campus. The college went on a second pause in early November after their COVID-19 dashboard showed 33 cases involving Marist students.
Senior Editor Olivia Watson breaks down how local hospitals are preparing for the second wave of COVID-19.
student poets to come together to discuss and write poetry with one another. The idea evolved from the two friends’ shared passion for poetry, as well as the realization that, although it seemed like there were a lot of writers in the Vassar community, there was no official poetry organization on campus They themselves longed for a community of writers, so they decided to start Vassar Verse.
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Allison Deutsch ’23 also noticed the lack of community for campus poets. Like Kasper and Kass, Deutsch had written a lot of poetry in high school, so when she first arrived at Vassar last year, she expected poetry to have a robust presence on campus. However, Deutsch soon realized that it was a lot harder to get involved with poetry in a communal sense than she had originally thought; there weren’t any official student
Columnist Helen Johnson explains how the 2020 election clouded her view of her Iowa hometown.
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poetry clubs for her to join, so she found herself longing for a sense of . “Poetry was so much of what got me through high school emotionally,” Deutsch shared in a Zoom interview. “I felt kind of lost not having that outlet. And so, when Sam Kass and Andy [Kasper] decided to start Vassar Verse, I was like, ‘Holy crap. That is what I need. That is what I need See VERSE on page 15
Features Editor Janet Song breaks down the best (and worst) bathrooms on campus.
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November 19, 2020
COVID19 AT VASSAR 15,325 Total Tests Administered
42
Total Student Cases to Date
NOVEMBER 18 DATA VIA VASSAR TOGETHER
03
Total Employee Cases to Date
01
Total Active Cases on Campus
For daily updates on Vassar's testing and cases, visit https://www.vassar.ed u/together/dashboard
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November 19, 2020
NEWS
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Local doctors respond to surge of COVID-19 cases Olivia Watson Senior Editor
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ccording to Vice President of Medical Affairs at Vassar Brothers Medical Center Dr. William Begg, Dutchess County is already facing the second surge of the COVID-19 pandemic. As reflected by the Dutchess County COVID-19 Community Impact Dashboard, COVID-19 cases have doubled in Dutchess County since the beginning of November. As of Wednesday Nov. 18, there were 576 active cases, and a 3.7 percent rate of COVID-19 tests in the Mid-Hudson Region having positive results. Begg explained that because the country is experiencing a second surge of COVID-19, a second wave was expected in Dutchess county. He also said that hospitals, including Vassar Brothers Medical Center, are now more prepared to handle a potential outbreak than at the onset of the pandemic. Vassar Brothers has a surge plan, which is a document detailing how to handle a possible flood of cases. “We’re preparing for a very large surge, whether it comes or not. We all understand, things will probably get worse before they get better because the number of patients in the hospital lags two weeks behind the number of new COVID cases. Also, with the holidays and people moving indoors with colder weather, there is an increased chance of people transmitting COVID because they’re in closer quarters” said Begg. He continued, “During the first surge, the number of patients increased daily very, very quickly. This time it’s a slow rise in the number of patients which gives us more time to prepare everything, whether it’s particular beds, units, or personal protec-
tive equipment, medication and even just staffing. The rise [in cases] is a lot less steep than the first time around.” Medical Director and Chair of Emergency Medicine at Vassar Brothers Medical Center Dr. Livia Santiago-Rosado shared in a Facebook Live hosted by center officials and Dutchess County that Vassar Brothers is taking many precautions to prevent the spread of COVID-19 inside the hospital. Santiago-Rosado described that every person who enters the hospital must wear a mask, and that COVID-19 screening occurs at every entrance of the building. Every patient admitted is tested. They also separate anyone who is positive, or exhibiting symptoms that could be COVID-19, away from other patients. Beyond precautions within hospitals, doctors are pleading that people observe and maintain social distancing practices in their everyday lives. Cases across the country are rising; according to the CDC, COVID-19 cases in the United States have been increasing since September. Commissioner of the Dutchess County Department of Behavioral & Community Health Dr. Anil Vaidian shared in an online briefing on Nov. 13 that this rise in cases is due to people relaxing their social distancing practices. “People are becoming lax with some of the mitigation strategies that they have held to for a long time,” he explained. In response to climbing cases, Governor Cuomo and the New York State Department have released new regulations that state bars, gyms and restaurants must close at 10 p.m., and at-home gatherings cannot exceed 10 people. Cuomo explained that these new restrictions are in response to contact tracing, which has revealed that
Vassar Brothers Medical Center has prepared a “surge plan” detailing how it will handle a second surge of the COVID-19 pandemic. Courtesy of the Poughkeepsie Journal. most COVID-19 transmissions occur at bars, restaurants, gyms and gatherings in homes. Begg also emphasized that private gatherings have driven recent COVID spikes. He warned that people’s choices oftentime determine whether or not they will be exposed to COVID-19. “The local community, to a significant degree, they control their own destiny as to whether they will get COVID or not. We all know about the best practices which are wearing masks, washing your hands, social distancing and not having big group gath-
erings. The reason why someone may or may not get COVID is whether or not they decide to follow these recommendations,” he explained. He continued, “It seems like a silly thing to say, but everyone knows the recommendations, and the people who are most likely to get COVID are the ones that don’t follow these recommendations. The number one recommendation is to avoid having big gatherings over the holiday season because the people most likely to get bad COVID are older family members who get COVID inadvertently from the younger generation.”
Local organization combats gun violence with education Continued from SNUG on page 1 to develop risk-reduction strategies to reduce involvement...with the goal of saving lives and helping individuals turn their lives around,” Long said. The program will work with the Empowerment Center, which develops programming for Poughkeepsie youth, to expand outreach efforts. Organizers with SNUG are training educators to look for the seeds of future gun violence and build positive relationships with high-risk
individuals. Eventually, they hope to implement the initiative in Poughkeepsie High School (PHS) to identify those who may engage in violence, especially gun violence, in order to address the systemic issues that lead them to turn to these activities. “We’re going to let that school community know about violence, what it is, how it spreads,” she said, adding that SNUG is hoping to change attitudes about gun violence in everyday life.
Members of SNUG gather outside the Newburg Activity Center. SNUG is using community outreach to combat rising rates of gun violence in Poughkeepsie. Courtesy of Debra Long
Gun violence hits close to home at PHS. Just this past summer, a 16-year-old student, Frederick Wells, was shot and killed in an attack that also injured his friend. There are currently 12 similar programs throughout New York State, from Long Island to Buffalo. While these programs operate with relative independence, Poughkeepsie’s SNUG still meets frequently with other leaders to discuss broader trends and issues. Gun violence has increased throughout the state, where the rate of firearm homicides is 11 percent higher than the national average. Just in New York City, there was a 33 percent jump in murders and a 102 percent spike in shooting victims since last year. In the City of Poughkeepsie, Long said that there is now roughly one shooting every week. Despite these worrying trends, Long is still hopeful for the future. “I am hopeful because we’ve been able to really work on establishing positive relationships with those at risk,” she remarked. SNUG’s targeted approach emphasizes close contact with small pockets of the community that cause the majority of violent crime in the City of Poughkeepsie. While Long’s team is still working to better identify these pockets, they are already identifying and building relationships with many of the high-risk youth in the community. Once these relationships are established, they can offer individuals many of the resources that Family Services, as a whole, can provide. Long credits her team at SNUG and is confident that, especially given their dedication to interacting closely with the community, they are seeing real results. Just over two weeks ago, SNUG responded to a call from a community member that alerted them to
MISCELLANY NEWS | VASSAR COLLEGE
possible violence. They could hear gunshots as they arrived, but thanks to her team’s commitment, Long asserts that “I can honestly say that they interrupted possibly two homicides.” Hoping to act as an “interruptor,” SNUG does not work directly with the police and is not a law enforcement agency. Long sees this independence as an integral characteristic of the program. After all, one of the greatest aspects of this work is building positive relationships. She believes that “You’ll never be able to build a positive relationship with someone if you’re really connected with the police.” Instead of SNUG itself working with the police or engaging directly in governmental policy matters, members of the community, not program staff, mobilize to advocate for additional funding and resources. SNUG is always looking for community partners and individuals to come out and canvas. While COVID-19 concerns and the cold weather have made it more difficult to hold community canvassing days, Long is working to ensure the safety of community volunteers—she reiterated that safety comes first in every single aspect of their programming. Still, she insisted that “We open our doors to individuals to help us for an event, or anything of that nature. Students are always welcome.” At the end of the day, Long believes that the support and engagement of the community is going to be the biggest factor in reversing Poughkeepsie’s spike in gun violence. Referencing the African proverb saying “It takes a village to raise a child,” she explains that “It’s going to take a village to interrupt potentially violent conflict.”
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NEWS
November 19, 2020
How did we do it? Vassar admin reflect on COVID semester Continued from REFLECT on page 1 ability for students that was not punitive and left room for the nuances in these unprecedented expectations. “Our model of using a Community Care Team to work with people if they did not follow protocols has as its base education and restoration, rather than punishment or ‘enforcement,’” Alamo-Pastrana shared. The CCT promotes student accountability for not following COVID-19 guidelines through restorative justice measures and providing students with resources. Kuhn, who is a CCT member, explained that she and other students respond to and handle reports that come in of students breaking social distancing protocols. CCT members follow a process of educational conversations and “carefrontations” to address the reported situation. “I think restorative justice does work,” Kuhn explained. “Every conversation I had with people who were reported by their peers was very kind and productive,” she added. Kuhn clarified that CCT does not handle incidents of obvious disregard for safety, which would go through student conduct. As COVID-19 cases are on the rise both in Dutchess County and nationally, administrators and students understand that keeping campus safe takes both meticulous planning and flexibility to shift protocols as the situation changes. Alamo-Pastrana explained that Vassar’s Community Care standards are guided by public health protocols. As for next semester, no shifts in policy have been decided on. “It is too soon to say whether there will be changes [in Vassar’s safety guidelines] based on those considerations. Among the things we are considering is podding earlier, potentially allowing cross-dorm podding as well as allowing indoor dining earlier in the
Courtesy of Vassar College via VassarTogether COVID-19 Dashboard. semester,” Alamo-Pastrana said. As the United States and much of the world heads into a winter that could see the worst of this pandemic, news about successful preliminary vaccine trials signals a possible end in sight. For the Vassar community, an effective and available vaccine would be needed to end social distancing measures. Yet scientists have warned that a vaccine is not necessarily a silver bullet. These preliminary results of vaccine trials so far do not guarantee an effec-
tive vaccine. Even once a vaccine is approved, it will take months to vaccinate the millions of people needed to establish herd immunity. “It is too soon to speculate how the development of a vaccine would affect our protocols on campus,” commented Bradley. “We will rely on science and the guidance of public health experts as we make those decisions,” she added. Bradley explained that a vaccine’s accessibility, effectiveness and the length of time for which it provides immunity are all
factors that must be considered when deciding college-wide policy implications. She also emphasized that the ending of social distancing measures will likely be gradual. While the road ahead feels long and uncertain for many, the Vassar community has shown it has the stamina to sustain social distancing well enough to ensure a safe campus. “If not ‘best case’ scenario then certainly this semester has been a ‘very good case’,” acknowledged Alamo-Pastrana.
Juliette Pope/The Miscellany News MISCELLANY NEWS | VASSAR COLLEGE
November 19, 2020
FEATURES
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First-year shares COVID-19 K-pop flash dance experience Gwen Ma
Guest Columnist
“I
don’t wanna be somebody/Just wanna be me, be me.” K-pop group Itzy’s song, “Wannabe,” blasted through the speaker while I tried my best to hit every beat, fervently wiggling my body in the cold autumn wind. As curious passersby and supportive friends of my fellow dance crew members gathered around the field to watch the flash mob performance, I grew extremely excited and nervous. “This is the only time you got to show people what you’ve learned over the past two months and the effort you have put into this enthralling dance,” I told myself. Participating in a dance club during COVID-19 was a very unique experience. I signed up for Korean Dance Crew (KoDC) at the beginning of the semester hoping to learn the dance choreos to my favorite K-pop songs. At first, I didn’t expect any in-person meetings due to the pandemic, but I soon got an email about the opportunity to learn a dance in-person and to perform it on campus before Thanksgiving break. As I’ve never performed a K-pop dance in public before, I thought, “Why not give it a try?” Thus, I urged myself to
sign up. Learning the full choreography to this dance was not easy, and it took time and effort to achieve perfection. After I signed up for the performance, I had to attend dance practices every Friday afternoon for an hour. Often, I had to fight back my laziness of not wanting to go to practices on rainy and chilly days. However, once I got to the dance studio and when the music started playing, my body automatically started jamming to the music and all of my stress melted away. Even though we had to remain six feet apart, feel suffocated from wearing a mask, and sweat profusely, we were all energized by the new dance moves we learned at each practice. Nevertheless, I came across some obstacles during the learning process. There was one move I just couldn’t get right no matter how many times I tried. My body felt so stiff and my arms were swerving in the wrong direction. I felt so embarrassed when other members mastered the move with ease. Luckily, our dance teacher saw my awkwardness and offered to help me out. She patiently demonstrated the move multiple times, shared her insights on
how to dance naturally and encouraged me to practice more. I was greatly motivated by her to continue practicing the move back in my dorm until I completely mastered it. After finishing learning the entire dance, the dance crew was able to practice in harmonious synchronization. We were assigned to different positions as we prepared for our performance. The uniformity of the crew as well as the fun variations in some of our dance moves made the show an enchanting piece of art. Everyone was excited at the dress rehearsal to perform with a “black on black” outfit: black top, pants and mask. Finally, on a sunny Saturday morning, the dance crew was ready to show what we had. I put my arms behind my back, bent one of my knees and turned my head to the right, staring into my friend’s cheerful eyes as I waited for my cue. I could hear my heart pounding with the countdown and feel the tension of the dance crew in the air. However, everyone loosened up when the music started playing. Out of the corner of my eyes, I saw my fellow dance crew members stretching their arms, jumping up and
down and spinning around as if they had become the embodiment of those beating notes. Soon we were covered in sweat and panting behind our masks, but I believe smiles lingered behind those masks too. As I think about the time I spend in the dance studio learning with other K-pop dance lovers, hours spent in my dorm perfecting my dance moves and the successful final performance, I feel so proud of myself for not giving up and being brave enough to try out new things. This special dancing experience will forever exist in my memory and remind me to keep exploring new pursuits.
Courtesy of Soyoung Kim ’24.
As break nears, writer wrestles with feelings about hometown Helen Johnson Columnist
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his year will be the first time I spend Thanksgiving with my family since 2016. I’m from Iowa. When getting home takes an Uber, a train ride, a flight, two airports and then three hours in the car, it’s just not worth it just for four days—especially four days that fall right in between October and winter break. So, during my time at Vassar I have always opted to spend Thanksgiving at a friend’s house. It’s fun, but just not the same. The same might be true for other Vassar students, who live far away and for whom the trip home isn’t feasible. After three straight months without setting foot off campus, I am happy and relieved to be going home—although that relief is partially from looking forward to a week of break, which every exhausted, overworked and burnt-out Vassar student desperately needs right now. Home is Decorah, Iowa, a little town of just 8,000 people tucked away in the very northeastern corner of the state. It sits in what is known as the “driftless region,” which refers to the area that the glaciers missed when they moved through the midwest and made everything flat. Consequently, Decorah is surrounded by beautiful bluffs and rolling hills, unlike the rest of the state, which is comprised of miles of flat corn and soybean fields. There are 23 parks and recreational areas—more than any other town in Iowa—and a beautiful 13-mile bike trail that circles the town. It’s also a college town, home to Luther College, a small liberal arts college known for its music programs and phenomenal ensembles, especially the choirs. Decorah also has three breweries and three locally owned coffee shops, as well as numerous small businesses and restaurants. Topped off with a strong flavor of Norwegian heritage, Decorah is the quintessential small Midwestern town. It would fit quite nicely as the setting for a Hallmark Christmas movie. That atmosphere is compounded by the fact that I live on a Christmas tree farm. Every spring we plant hundreds of baby trees by hand, which will take approximately 10 years to grow. Then in the summer, we shear the larger trees, which basically
means taking a long knife and swinging it at the branches to shape each tree into that classic triangular shape. Our farm opens for business the weekend after Thanksgiving: Families drive out to our house, walk out into the forest of trees, pick out which one they want, cut it down and drag it back. We tie it to the roof of their car, and off they go. Living on a Christmas tree farm also means we usually have at least three trees in our house. One year my dad even mailed me a baby tree to Vassar. We also have cows, sheep, chickens, cats and a dog—and I used to have two horses. Growing up on a family farm in a small town in northeastern Iowa really shaped who I am today. I was a real farm kid, raising chickens, planting trees, doing chores and riding horses. I went to Decorah’s public high school of about 600 students, which was the only high school in town. It wasn’t until I got to Vassar that I realized in big cities some people actually apply to high schools. This notion was absolutely foreign to me, considering that where I’m from there’s one school for every district and that’s it. We had a football team and I played in the marching band. At the end of every school year we had a Drive Your Tractor to School Day. (My family has a tractor, but I never drove it to school.) Many of my peers came from farm families like myself. The town is so small that to this day I cannot walk downtown without a family friend stopping me and asking about college. Not many people leave Iowa, even fewer leave the Midwest and almost no one goes as far away as I did. Once I did leave my hometown, coming to the East Coast for college was exciting. I knew I wanted to leave Decorah, even though many of my teachers and friends expected me to go to Luther because I was so heavily involved in music. Music has always been an integral part of my identity; I’ve been singing since I could talk, and I also play piano and guitar. Growing up in Decorah means I grew up alongside Luther and the music culture the college emanates into the town. I took lessons from Luther professors, attended the Luther summer music camp and went to Luther concerts— especially the renowned Christmas at Luther, an annual spectacular holiday concert
performed by the symphony orchestra and all six college choirs. Even my high school choir director had graduated from Luther and sang in the top choir there. My high school choir experience was extremely rewarding and shaped me greatly as a musician. But I knew I didn’t want to go to college in the same place I grew up. I was thrilled to attend Vassar; the prospect of going to college on the East Coast, at one of the original seven sister schools, and a mere two hour train ride away from New York City was enthralling to me, a Midwestern farm girl. Now, I can add my years at Vassar to the list of the many places and experiences that have contributed to who I am. But even after four years, I still feel like the girl from the Christmas tree farm. As they say, you can take the girl out of the Midwest, but you can’t take the Midwest out of the girl. My time at Vassar has made me appreciate aspects of the Midwest and my hometown that I either didn’t notice or didn’t like before. “Midwestern nice” really is a thing, and it doesn’t exist here. I have also found myself sticking up for the Midwest or needing to explain aspects of the region to my peers at Vassar. Many people from the coasts look down on, don’t understand the region—or both, which I believe is detrimental to nationwide discourse surrounding politics and social change. I’m excited to return to all of these things for a couple months before I come back to graduate in the spring, and move to who knows where. Even so, I have some conflicting emotions about going home this November. The recent election confirmed my worst fears and doubts about my home state, and as a political science major who is constantly studying, reading and writing about the implications of politics for millions of people, I cannot set them aside. Donald Trump won in Iowa by eight points, even though the polls suggested it would be a tossup state. Iowa’s open senate seat was also one of the many Democrats were aiming to flip this year, but the incumbent Republican, Joni Ernst, beat Democrat Theresa Greenfield by almost seven points. Additionally, the House seat in my district flipped back to red, with incumbent Abby Finkenauer losing her seat to Republican
MISCELLANY NEWS | VASSAR COLLEGE
Ashley Hinson. My own county went red, despite the outwardly progressive appearance lent to the town by the college and outspoken liberals. On top of all that, our governor, Kim Reynolds, has proven herself a loyal ally of Trump and has exhibited a disastrous mishandling of the COVID-19 pandemic—she refused to even mandate that children wear masks in school. It is not surprising that cases have been on the rise in Iowa, and the safety of my friends and family—including all four of my grandparents who live in Decorah—has been a source of constant concern for me this semester. Thus, it is with a troubled heart that I return home on Saturday. Decorah is so small that in many situations, I know exactly which people voted for Trump. It is hard to imagine how to reconcile or rebuild when after four years of one of the most vile, catastrophic presidencies our nation has ever seen, so many people still support him. It is hard to even want to reconcile when what little common ground there is left is rapidly disappearing and it seems as though I have no shared values with many of these people. It is difficult in a small town because these people are your neighbors—but how do you act neighborly when they have voted against your and so many of your loved one’s basic human rights? I don’t have the answers. I know that I love my town and I love the Midwest, and as someone who grew up there and understands it in a way that most people who haven’t experienced it do not, it’s my responsibility to help make change. I was hoping that this year, Iowa would prove the coastal elites wrong and flip back blue. I was disappointed. But that doesn’t mean we stop trying, because too many people’s lives depend on it. I don’t know where life after Vassar will take me, and it probably won’t be Decorah. But for now, I’m excited to revisit my favorite coffee shops and walk down Water Street. The weird semester means I get to be home for all of Christmas tree season, and I get to watch a virtual version of Christmas at Luther, which I haven’t been able to see since high school. Will I get bored after a couple weeks? Probably, but if I didn’t, it wouldn’t be home. And I can’t wait for Thanksgiving.
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FEATURES
November 19, 2020
Underground art(ists): Examining Josselyn House’s murals Continued from Murals on page 1 the walls of Joss on their way out of Vassar), I had no way of tracking down the artists of the murals. After 16 emails, two conversations with House Advisors and a disappointing rejection from a private Facebook group, I felt defeated. Who were these mystery artists? Why were there murals here—hidden from most of campus—accumulating dust in what even Joss residents consider a dirty and scary cesspool? With nowhere else to turn, I decided to focus on the Joss residents themselves. As I waited in front of Joss like a cow in a field of snakes (house mascot humor), I intercepted and interviewed Joss residents as they traveled in and out of their home. As I stood out there in the cold talking to the students, I realized that there is a house spirit that can be adequately defined by my experience in its basement. And while I was originally scared to stop random people as they were heading places in a hurry, one thing became glaringly apparent: Joss residents love talking about Joss. When asked about the basement, almost every resident brought up the murals before I mentioned them. My friend Lorelei Essman-Freeman ’24 told me that it’s impossible to evade the murals, unless you never wash your clothes, as the artwork lines the hallway to the laundry room. “I enjoy doing my laundry because I get to see all of it. The cute messages are actually inspiring,” she admitted. It’s true—the walls are flooded with reassuring quotes such as, “You belong here!” and “Love isn’t about what we did yesterday: it’s about what we do today and tomorrow and the day after that,” the latter from activist Grace Lee Boggs. Another reads, “Queer Femmes of Color: We see you. We hear you. We love you.” Malka Fleischman ’22 told me, “I don’t know when the murals started, but I have noticed that every year there’s new stuff.” She continued that those most striking to her are “the inspirational ones, the body positive ones and especially the ones that surround themes of femininity.” Fleischman and her friend Anastasia Koutavas ’22 have lived in Joss for the past three years. They said that they have Joss to thank for some of their greatest friends at Vassar.
“Every house at Vassar has its own beauty, quirks and charm. For Josselyn House, it’s the colorful and inspiring messages painted on the walls of the hot, dusty basement.” “Every year, I do notice that people sometimes sign their names… Like maybe a group of friends who have lived in Joss for a while and now they’re either graduated or
The Joss basement walls teem with the traces of past residents, from affirmations to mere signatures to full-fledged paintings. Janet Song/The Miscellany News. MISCELLANY NEWS | VASSAR COLLEGE
moved to the TH’s, they’ll put their names and class year which I think is pretty fun,” Fleischman told me. I asked the girls if they would consider leaving their marks on the walls of Joss before they move out, to which Koutavas enthusiastically replied, “Now that you mention it, yeah!” While I was talking to James Nicholas ’23 outside of the dorm, he mentioned that a friend from his fellow group had begun painting murals in the basement last fall semester. Beatrice Vogelstein ’23 has lived in Joss for two years, and during the chilly final days before winter break last year she began decorating the basement walls whenever she had the “urge to paint.” Right before Vassar sent it’s students and staff home due to COVID-19 last March, she and her friend, Oz Turner ’22, created the beautiful orange, black and white mural that combines Turner’s eerie portraits and Vogelstein’s psychedelic patterns. If you were to notice just one mural in the Joss basement, this would be it. “When I went to Joss basement I always loved seeing the murals down there and I always wondered if it was the college or a club or some group that was behind it,” Turner told me. So when Vogelstein asked them to join her for a collaboration, they enthusiastically accepted. The collaborative piece took Turner and Vogelstein around three or four sessions to complete, with friends joining them to sign their names and doodle on the walls. I wondered why artists like Turner and Vogelstein would want to put so much effort into a mural that would not likely be seen by very many people, especially in a place that is so uncomfortable. “The basement is a scary, gross, really hot and sort of cursed place,” said Vogelstein. Despite that, she said of the basement’s appeal as an art studio, “I just really like to make art and I wanted to create something and there was a free canvas there.” “I think that because it is sort of a removed or run-down space it definitely gives people the liberty to just do what they want down there. I like the kind of homemade nature of the artwork on this super grungy wall and this poor lighting—it’s really cool art in an unexpected place,” Turner told me. I wondered if the works of art, random doodles, and calls for social justice that adorn the basement walls serve to represent the people who live in Joss now. Koutavas told me that while she has never known where the murals come from, she feels that, “They are something that we all collectively see and experience, it contributes to the Joss environment.” As a first year during “COVID-19 Semester,” I have only really become accustomed to my own residential house, Davison. I have grown to love its smell, its people, its bathrooms, and I can’t imagine living anywhere else. But visiting Joss made me understand why somebody would want and love to live there too. Every house at Vassar has its own beauty, quirks and charm. For Josselyn House, it’s the colorful and inspiring messages painted on the walls of the hot, dusty basement. Because deep within the house that is close enough to the edge of campus to hear the whizzing of cars passing by, past the left door held ajar by a stick, down a winding staircase and among the dust and dirt, there lies true beauty. The murals in the basement of Joss exhibit the colorful and vibrant community of the people who live there, despite the dust and heat. “It’s nice to leave your own little mark on a corner of Vassar,” Turner told me, “Joss basement kind of feels like a quilt of art throughout the years—you don’t find anything like it anywhere on campus and it’s nice to have contributed to it.”
November 19, 2020
FEATURES
Page 7
The Dump Diaries: Best and worst bathrooms on campus Janet Song
Features Editor
D
uring my first year at Vassar, I learned that college students have no qualms about their lavatorial activities. College is almost a communal experience—we all share this campus, and thus we share all the bathrooms. Therefore, students aren’t bothered by what their peers hear behind the stalls. I soon stopped caring—or rather, stopped giving a shit—whenever someone took a dump nearby. In fact, going to the bathroom could even start a conversation. I could pass by a stall in the library and be greeted with a hello from someone who recognized my shoes from down below. As a former self identified “poop-shy” student, it took a while to get comfortable about doing my business on campus spots other than my assigned bathroom stall. The environment of the bathroom, in particular, was a huge factor in my “poop-shyness.” Spacing, sanitation and the smell all are critical to the comfort of my bowels. If these three criteria look dismal, I can’t do the doo. And this failure to use a public bathroom leaves my bowels and I walking back to my dorm, ashamed of our cowardice. However, I am not the only one who has an “anxious anus.” The fear of going to the bathroom seems to be universal. But perhaps we can relieve ourselves from potty stress by knowing which campus stalls are best suited to our comfort, and which stalls are best left alone. Here are some of Vassar’s bathrooms from best to worst, as recommended by me and fellow Vassar students from the Facebook group “Vassar: The Virtual Version.” Swift, first floor Much is to be appreciated about this bathroom, but what I love most is that it is a single-room bathroom. You can be at peace while taking a dump, not having to worry about others hearing nearby. The lights in Swift’s bathroom have this alluring effect— sometimes when I wash my hands, I find myself entranced by their warm glow like moths near outdoor lamps. What ruins the otherwise tranquil experience of Swift is that you can’t enjoy yourself for long. Someone will knock, reminding you to stop hogging the toilet. New England, first floor A beautiful single bathroom. I love the setup of the walls. In particular, the wall that divides the toilet from the sinks gives the illusion of isolation in a spacious place. Seat your buttocks on the white throne and take a shit in peace, undisturbed. The lighting by the mirror makes for great bathroom selfies.
Olmsted, second floor When I asked on Vassar’s Facebook for best places to take a dump on campus, Devin Dufour ’22 recommended Olmsted’s gender neutral bathroom. “[It] is huge and [a] single stall and has a big mirror
Above, a portal to the Ministry of Magic on the second floor of the library. All photos by Janet Song/The Miscellany News unless indicated otherwise. for taking pics (nudes or otherwise idk what you’re into),” Dufour commented, “but also feels hidden enough that you can spend several minutes in there crying without anyone knowing what you’re doing.” Taylor, art hallway This bathroom in Taylor can be found in a hallway leading to the Art Library, and you’ll feel like a work of art while you sit on the toilet and admire such intricate details as the ornate lock above the doorknob As Emma Iadanza ’22 commented on Facebook, “Of course the art department has the best bathroom; we live for the Aesthetic.” Main, Rose Parlor I fondly remember that this was the first bathroom I used when I visited Vassar. Indeed, I think the Rose Parlor bathroom is the closest I’ll get to a life of luxury. Where can I start: the fancy wallpaper, clothes hangers and even a sofa/couch to sit on, not to mention the warm lighting for mirror selfies. The con, though, is that there are three stalls, so you don’t enjoy the moment(s) of solitude you would have at Swift. But the bathroom is also a nice relaxation spot for mental breakdowns—go ahead and cry on the couch! No one will judge you.
Bridge, second floor While the Bridge facilities lack the opulent aura of the Rose Parlor, I have never seen such a spacious bathroom. But like its fancy counterpart, the bathroom has a bench and is a nice spot to rush to after a long day of lab work. Library, first floor Release your bladder and yourself from the stress of midterms in this secluded stall. Located by the 24-Hour Section, this bathroom is a perfect pit-stop for those late night cramming sessions. While the stench of urine may crinkle your nose, the privacy to yourself is worth it. I’ve also
found that the bathroom is rather clean, though that seems to be the standard for most bathrooms on campus. Vassar students have better hygiene than my high school classmates.
Library, second floor The women’s bathroom by the elevator offers stalls that while small give you the freedom to defecate however you please. If you don’t have a paper or phone to read while taking a shit, you can entertain yourself by reading the graffiti on the walls. One inscription on the wall reads, “This way to the Ministry of Magic,” but I haven’t tested that out myself. Main, second floor Want to feel like you’re being beamed up by a flying saucer as you take a dump? Look no further than to the bathroom by the LGBTQ+ center. Sit below these bathroom lights and feel as if you’re transcending through space, observing time like a Trafamadorian. Sanders Classroom, ground floor I do like the bathroom that I’ve used here, but am annoyed that one of the toilets is obnoxiously high for my short legs. I almost have to climb when I want to squat over the toilet bowl. There is a nice Mary Oliver poem that I like to read while I take a quick piss; such graffiti seems to encapsulate the Vassar spirit of finding beauty and art in the most abysmal of places, like a bathroom stall. Jewett, basement The problem with bathrooms—especially public ones—is their smell. When you have so many people coming in, you create this pungent cloud, a culmination of the foul odors of the human body. But Jewett’s basement bathroom actually smells nice. This bathroom is also rumored to be the easiest bathroom to poop in, according to Leora Shlasko ’22. Referring to the bathroom as the “poop palace of the phallus palace,” Shlasko claimed, “It’s closer to the
MISCELLANY NEWS | VASSAR COLLEGE
center of gravity so it makes it EASY. Don’t blame me, this one is on science.” Davison dorms I want to also give an honorary shoutout to the Davi basement, but I do think that the dorm bathrooms also deserve their praise. Nice and clean, it easily impressed a Joss resident like me who has dealt with her fair share of filth. More on that later. Rockefeller Hall, first and fourth floor Personally, I’ve always resented these bathrooms because I’ve had too many classes here at Rocky, along with nightly Misc meetings (that have now since been converted to sessions on Zoom). As such, they’ve always felt dismal—when I hear the toilet flush, I hear my soul get sucked down the drain, and leave Rocky with a strange bleakness. The bathrooms on the first floor aren’t so bad, but the bathroom on the fourth floor is a tad too cramped. The fourth floor bathroom requires wiggle room and a little squat, and I prefer a more dignified dump. Chicago, basement When I asked Alexander Pham ’23 to describe this damp and small bathroom, he could not find any words to describe his dejectedness: “If I had to sum the bathroom up with an emoji,” he said, “it’s this one: :(” Main dorms What a letdown. You would think that Vassar could share some of the luxury of the Rose Parlor bathrooms with the bathrooms that most students actually use, but alas, the College can never set its priorities right. See this photo of a fallen sink and you’ll get the idea.
Courtesy of Jacob Stuligross ’22. Josselyn dorms In my first year at Vassar, I remember the joy of walking into puddles of pee, spotting chunks of poo and wondering if the water that I sat on was someone else’s pee or from the toilet bowl. I have also had the strangest conversations here. Once, a student who had one too many drinks asked me if you could get drunk from dipping a tampon into alcohol before shoving it up your butt. I glanced at a fellow floormate who was brushing his teeth, and we just exchanged the most dismal of looks, wondering if this was what our tuition was for. Skinner, basement A straight-up scene in a horror movie. You walk down an eerie set of stairs and enter a door with “Lavatory” printed on old mahogany. When you turn on the lights, expect yourself to wonder if you’ve walked into a janitor’s closet by accident, as you’ll find cleaning equipment next to what I would call the result of what would happen if a sink and toilet had a baby together. There’s a tiny stall next to all of this that doesn’t have much leg room, and you’ll honestly want to run out when you’re finished with your business.
HUMOR
Page 8
November 19, 2020
Breaking News
From the desk of Izzy Migani, Humor Editor
Vassar student drops real adult money on Wizard 101 membership
Dear Dr. G, Being home always means talking to all my relatives about if I’m dating anyone yet. Can you give me some tips on how to avoid these weird conversations so I have more time to swipe through hometown Tinder during the family Zoom? -Anti-Social Social Club Dear Anti-Social, For whatever reason, relatives are more obsessed about who you’re f*cking than that guy in your Poli-Sci class you hooked up with last semester, and more interested in your post-grad plans than your pre-major advisor. Plus, with the recent realization (or reaffirmation for many of us) that almost half of legal adults voted in favor of conspiracy theories, and that some of those people share a bloodline with you, it is reasonable to want to dip out on that whole family togetherness thing that is expected during the holidays. In preparation for this season, I have compiled a list of three tactics you can
use to avoid one of these discussions. Tactic Number One: Distract. This one is most effective for relatives whom you know have a short attention span, such as your younger cousin or your aunt when she tipsy of a glass or six. As soon as the box wine starts flowing and your aunt asks you if you’ve, “been seeing any cute boys recently?” this tactic can come into play. You can start off by talking about someone you know, but gently steer the conversation to something neat you’ve done, like fall off the Walker Field House roof, get a new job or make a polymer in your chemistry class. The plus side of this one is that you’re definitely prepared. Just reach back to some conversation where you overshared with your closest friend on campus about some totally trivial lesson or interaction you had and project that onto your relatives. You can also probably get away with it without anyone noticing, and everyone will come away knowing you’re the smart, funny and interesting cousin. The downside to this is that after so long in the Vassar Bubble™ you may have a warped perception of what is actually interesting enough to change the subject. Like, I wrote “making a polymer in your chemistry class” earlier, and that’s so f*cking boring, I doubt that your drunk aunt will be distracted from living vicariously through you by
some lame extremely important experiment. Sometimes to your relatives you’re an interesting and mature person, and sometimes you are the untapped potential for another generation of freaks, so take this technique with a grain of salt. Tactic Number Two:Deceive. This is by far the most versatile strategy you can bring with you to a family gathering, and works especially well on people who are more distantly related to you or don’t know you as well. Another name for this tactic is “lying” :). When your cousin’s new husband asks, “Do you have any game with the ladies on campus?”, just tell him an absolutely incredible lie to get him off your tail. A couple good go-tos are that there just aren’t many girls at Vassar, or that everyone is already in a relationship (two things that anyone who knows anything about Vassar would see through in two seconds). Or, take these last few days on campus as an opportunity to take a photoshoot with a close friend that you can pass off as your datemate for the foreseeable future. Sure, maybe when you’re on campus he’s just some guy you met in your Drama-102 class this fall, but to you family he can be the tall, dark and handsome Economics major you met at the gym during your first week of classes (he can also just be your beard, I didn’t come here to judge
and it’s not that deep). While these fantastic stories will captivate more estranged relatives, your closest family (siblings and parents) will see right through them and will definitely remember the pic of the two of you holding pumpkins on the Chapel Lawn as friends. Watch out especially for your younger sibling, they’re still not over you telling mom that they started vaping and have been waiting for the right chance to make you look dumb in front of your relatives. This technique is a house of cards. Tactic Number Three: Don’t! After all, we are in a global pandemic and you still have classes; if family interaction isn’t your thing, don’t pass up this golden opportunity to dip out. Say that you have a Zoom call for your creative writing course during a family dinner, that you have to study for an orgo exam that’s tomorrow morning. Hell, Vassar loves a liberal arts education with strange and obscure assignments, you could probably get away with telling everyone you’ve taken a language pledge and are only allowed to speak Korean for the break, they might believe that. And I have to add that given the way that my home state’s COVID numbers are going, entering the home of the oldest and quirkiest people… sounds like a bad call maybe, so perhaps it’s best to hit them with the “I value your life” card.
Check out these super maladaptive tips to ace your finals Rohan Dutta
Master Procrastinator
I
t’s finally time. The library is starting to get packed (at loose interpreted intervals of six feet). Break is coming up, but the upperclassmen aren’t acting like there’s a break anytime soon. Classmates actually start attending Zoom lectures. All signs point to finals season being just around the corner. So, how to prepare? Adjusting your study methods for the pandemic, especially if this is your first finals season, can be tricky. Luckily, I’m an expert at ruining my life every exam period, and I’m here to help you do the same. With this easy 5-step guide, you’ll learn to impress your friends, astound your enemies and disappoint your parents more than ever before. Tip #1: Forget about finals entirely The sensible thing to do before and during finals season is to manage your time well and space out your study sessions so that you’re not overly pressured or cramming. This is also against the spirit of finals season, so go ahead and ignore all of those essays and exams. So, if you’re going to GPA hell for one sin, you may as well commit a thousand sins and go down a legend. To spend your time on activities more worthwhile than studying, consider trying to see how much you can take from the Deece before someone stops you! If you’re a remote student, peer pressure a friend into doing it, and then ghost them once campus security show up. You’re supposed to enjoy Thanksgiving break, of course, (well, on paper) but go the extra mile! Invest 80 hours in one week into your pro Netflix watching career. Discover a new hobby, and then abandon it entirely. The presidential election is practically done, but keep up with it anyway!
Stressing over the widening divisions in a heavily burdened society can very effectively replace your exam worries. In addition, winter break means seeing family again, so your schedule will be completely full with distracting non-studying activites. Sure, you’re going to have to deal with finals later, but that’s a problem for the Future You. Tip #2: Panic Ideally, Stage One should last up until Thanksgiving break is over, and then a little longer after that. Approximately two days before the official exam season starts, enter into the panic phase. Make sure to suddenly realize your letter grades are at stake and there is no universal NRO to save you now. Extra points if you realize this just before you sleep, so you spend an hour in bed imagining how you will explain four failed classes to your parents. First, spend a good day worrying over your future and what you’re going to do. You applied to college—you’ve done this at least once before. Then, realizing the problem doesn’t go away if you panic enough about it, scramble to find a solution. Study groups are good, right? Try them out, and see how the ones you make with your friends inevitably get off topic and the groups you make with anyone else are too awkward to ever get on topic. Tell yourself you’re going to go to Metcalf, and never get around to actually doing it. Spend a couple hours highlighting notes, before realizing the highlights mean nothing because you don’t have a clue what the highlighted words mean anyway. You’ve tried and thought of everything, but nothing seems to work. You think about it some more, and you shudder with a terrifying realization—there really is no better way than to cram.
Tip #3: Sacrifice sleep for glory You know what, fine. There is no easy way out. You’ve accepted you’re not getting an A in this class, but you do want to get your diploma, and you’re honestly starting to doubt that you will unless you pull off something wild. In other words, you don’t have much in the way of choices anymore. Statistically speaking, your sleep schedule is probably already disappointing. But what’s stopping you from pushing it further? Cut your daily amount of sleep to six hours, then four. Then maybe three or two hours, if you’re feeling strong. Spend your newfound time rewatching lectures, and crying over your notes. Don’t worry—a lack of sleep never hurts your ability to study. For extra energy, replace all water in your life with coffee or Red Bull. It gives you energy, and you probably won’t have a heart attack. If your body starts rebelling, start taking caffeine shots at dawn to show it who’s boss. After all, health is temporary, but GPA is forever. Most crucially, you must complain to your friends about how bad your schedule is. Since we’ll all be off campus by this point, this will be difficult, but you can compensate by sending them a Zoom link without explanation and hoping they take the bait. Optionally, you can also study in between these sessions. Tip #4: Lose all hope. Life is ultimately worthless and so are we. The world’s overdue for a world war, and it looks like every world power is pushing to speed the whole thing up, and that might not even matter because we’re all going to be gone in a couple decades no matter what. Yeah, someone in your class is going to get straight A’s without breaking a sweat. So what? Neither of you are going to be able
MISCELLANY NEWS | VASSAR COLLEGE
to afford a home in the next ten years anyway. Is college even worth it? Even if the investment makes sense, the water levels are rising, the polar caps are shrinking and the people in power seem to be happy to ignore it until it’s not their problem anymore. Let these thoughts consume you, as you frantically burn textbooks into your mind. Do they help? Not at all. But you can’t stop them anyway. Tip #5: Take your exam with a smile on your face. You know what? That was a tad overdramatic. It’s fine. You’re fine! And you’re going to do great on your exam. (Well, you won’t, but you’re too caffeinated, sleep-deprived and socially-distanced to notice or care.) It’s okay. Vassar will put a note on your transcript that there was a pandemic (after an excessive amount of work from students prodding them into doing it) and recruiters will definitely treat your GPA more fairly, because being considerate is what they’re known for. It’s not like there’s a hundred thousand other applicants who’ve had their grades inflated in light of the biggest collective catastrophe of our lives. You take your test scheduled at 9 a.m. for some reason, marvelling at how every single topic you actually felt confident about is entirely absent from the final. After what feels like both a minute and a century, the clock on Moodle runs out, and it’s all over. Take pride in how far you’ve come! Sure, you might not get your bachelors, but you’ve successfully smashed through the five stages of grief, and in record time! Now, as you finally get to relax over winter break, think about what next semester has in store, and how much more you can disfigure your transcript. There’s always room for improvement.
HUMOR
Vassar: The hottest new retirement home? HOROSCOPES November 19, 2020
Vivian Phillips
T
Might Be 90 Years Old
here are so many events happening on this campus, it’s ridiculous. Never in my life have I had access to so many activities. I develop early onset arthritis in the knitting club on Saturday at 2 p.m., then stomp on a block of wood for an hour in beginners tap at 5 p.m.! A quarter of the way in, I realize the hike I signed up for is seven miles long and I’m too embarrassed to back out even though I haven’t had anything to eat yet and it’s already 3 p.m. and I am also wearing converse which are flat and have virtually no arch support so every once in a while I step on a pebble that is especially bulbous and almost fall into what might be poison ivy (but I can’t be sure because I was never a Girl Scout) with the Outing Club at 2! I’m convinced that I am in fact a delusional 90-year-old woman living in a very expensive retirement home who has lost all of her memories of adulthood. It would explain both my surroundings and the amount of naps that I take. The similarities between Vassar’s campus and the upscale retirement home in my old neighborhood are further fueling my conviction in this conspiracy. Yesterday I walked into the Deece to have dinner
and after climbing up the grand staircase leading into the dining area, I nearly took a brutal fall back down (Possibly out of shock, possibly because I’m a 90-year-old woman). In the middle of what looked like a hotel conference room filled with tables, a crystal chandelier the size of a meteor was dripping from the ceiling. About a quarter of my tuition was dripping from the ceiling. Until that moment I was completely unaware that an upstairs to the Deece even existed, much less that it had been housing an entire crown jewel exhibit. I was having lunch with what I thought was a friend but looking back, it could have been a visit from a concerned great niece or granddaughter looking to make sure I’ve been consuming enough liquids. The only thing about the Deece that leads me to believe that it isn’t the dining hall of a retirement home is the lack of Jell-O. But man, could I kill for a Jell-O right now. The student body is reminiscent of the retirement population in my old neighborhood as well. Walking around campus I see people on leisurely bike rides, people reading books on park benches, people wearing cardigans, people on their way to a knitting club meeting. All of these people, like my old neighborhood’s re-
tirement population, have restricted sex lives, do not trust the government and are desperate for social interaction. On Friday night my central social engagement was playing poker with six friends in our common room. This was a wild night in comparison to my other Fridays in which I have played charades, sung along to Elton John ballads in the piano lounge and gone to bed at 9 p.m. To be honest, it was a little overstimulating. If I in fact have been living in a retirement home for the past nine weeks, I only have a few bones to pick with the establishment. For all of the money that I assume my children are paying for me to be here, I think it would be reasonable to request that I not be forced to climb four flights of stairs multiple times a day in order to get to my bedroom. After all, I am old—I might overexert myself and die. Secondly, I would appreciate more visitation rights for my family members. Oh, and on the off chance that I do die while climbing up the stairs, please do not bury me in the on-campus graveyard. I would sooner see my ashes be mixed with gelatin and cherry Kool-Aid and turned into the Jell-O that the retirement dining hall is so desperately lacking.
Frog and Toad are Frenemies by Julianna + Olivia
Page 9
Madi Donat
Astral Projector
ARIES Mar 21 | Apr 19 It’s not bad to leave reality for a bit. Imagine yourself on a super-fancy boat, away from all the troubles of the world, a glass of champagne in your hand [EDITOR’S NOTE: THE MISC DOES NOT CONDONE UNDERAGE DRINKING]. TAURUS Apr 20 | May 20 Close your eyes and try to picture yourself in the belly of a deep, dark forest. There is nothing around you but the trees and the critters, and you can hear them scamper and scuttle as you breathe in deeply. Pure calm. GEMINI May 21 | Jun 20 Escape in your mind to the top of a building in your most favorite city. Admire the traffic from above, grateful you don’t have to be in it. The sound of the hustle and bustle reaches you even from high up. It smells like motion and togetherness. CANCER Jun 21 | Jul 22 In your mind, picture yourself in a park, a fountain behind you. The bench is comfortable, the scene around you quiet. Parents push their children in strollers; dog-walkers walk their dogs. You get to pet at least three. LEO Jul 23 | Aug 22 Your daydream escape is to a calming beach somewhere far, far away. You sink your toes in the warm sand and feel totally at peace listening to the waves crest on the shore. No one could bother you here even if they tried.
VIRGO Aug 23 | Sep 22 You are in the beautiful Art Deco greenhouse of an unimaginably fancy mansion. The bugs chirp and buzz when you walk in and your shoes click on the gilded pastel tiling. It’s green as far as the eye can see. LIBRA Sep 23 | Oct 22 Your dream involves a luxurious hotel room with huge windows that open to a balcony. In this reality, it’s always golden hour and everything—down to the fancy soap—is complimentary. A warm, glowing feeling everywhere. SCORPIO Oct 23 | Nov 21 Go, in your mind, to a concert—of any type. Maybe a small, indie gig at a local venue, or a floor-shaking show at a huge arena. Perhaps a sit-down, classical-type deal. You’re in the audience…or maybe you’re performing.
B’S CORNER BY B. GOMEZ
SAGITTARIUS Nov 22 | Dec 21 Whisk yourself away in your imagination to a town all the way across the world. You’ve learned enough of the language to get by and can shop and order food with ease. Nobody knows you, and you are awash in novelty. CAPRICORN Dec 22 | Jan 19 Imagine yourself wandering the grounds of a historic property. You can learn how these people lived—the furnishings, the dishes, everything down to the bed linens. You get to breathe in the fresh air of the gardens and feel a deep sense of security. AQUARIUS Jan 20 | Feb 18 Imagine yourself in a museum where you can lazily wander and glean everything there is to know about one perfect subject. Someone has an answer to each of your questions, and the alarms don’t go off if you get too close. PISCES Feb 19 | Mar 20 Your dream spot? The most comfortable bed you’ve ever been in. Maybe it’s the one at your childhood home, or your grandma’s house, or somewhere else. The bed that gave you your most restful sleeps and easiest dreams.
MISCELLANY NEWS | VASSAR COLLEGE
ARTS
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November 19, 2020
Students cultivate community around power of verse Continued from VERSE on page 1 to get through college.’ So I was thrilled.” While Kasper and Kass came up with the idea of forming a poetry group toward the end of the fall semester, it wasn’t until early February that they started inviting people to the group. What started out as a small gathering of five to six people in the Raymond parlor soon grew into meetings with 11 to 12 poets. When the pandemic hit and everything went online, the group could no longer meet in person to share their literary passions. However, they continued to meet on Zoom throughout the rest of the spring semester and into the summer. “When I was, for months, by myself, being able to see everyone on Zoom once a week to write poetry was a really amazing thing,” Kass expressed in a Zoom interview alongside Kasper. “In some ways, now more than ever is a time where we need to create art with other people, and having this community to fall on to, with so much going on in the world, has been really amazing.” Upon returning to campus this fall, the group had to find a new way to meet up, since they weren’t officially registered as a pre-org at the time that the semester started and weren’t allowed to meet indoors. The group found solace in, fittingly, the Shakespeare Garden, where they could sit in a large circle, socially distanced, and continue to engage with each other in person. As the current home for their meetings, the garden provides a relaxing environment rich with flora that helps nourish the students’ poetry. The group has met weekly in the garden (sometimes on Zoom, if the weather is too cold to convene outside) to read poems to-
Courtesy of Angela Clemens ’23 via @vassar_verse on Instagram. gether and later write and share their poetry with each other. By creating this creative space for people to engage with each other over poetry, the group has fostered a thriving community amongst student poets. “Sharing poetry is sometimes personal, so you learn a lot about people through what they share,” Deutsch said. “It’s been really nice to get to know people and feel like you’re really being paid attention to… It’s special when you can find a group that really pays attention to each other and
checks in on each other, and also comments on particulars in your writing…I think that’s the mark not only of a good writer who is listening to your work but just a good friend.” This strong sense of community and friendship is an integral and powerful element of the pre-org. “Poetry is a pretty vulnerable art, so it’s not something that you’re just going to like willy-nilly throw around, and so you kind of have to be in a space where you know other people are go-
ing to respect your work, not try and dig in too much always,” Kasper added. “I think that that is kind of the atmosphere that we try to create, one that is very open, very accepting and very friendly and comforting. It’s sort of built into the backbone of what the org is and trying to accomplish. We’re trying to create a space for people to come and feel welcome and feel accepted.” The group welcomes new members, regardless of experience, to come and join their community of student poets.
Carmen Maria Machado’s writing offers beauty in the grotesque Bryn Marling
Guest Columnist
C
armen Maria Machado’s name has floated in the literary ether around me for years, scattered through the bylines of publications from “Medium” to the “New Yorker,” stamped on the high-gloss hardcovers of “Her Body and Other Parties” that I shelved at my first job, and, in the form of her recent memoir “In the Dream House,” selected as the crescendo to the syllabus of my first college-level English course. In a rapid end to this slow-burn courtship, I read the memoir in a single night. Machado’s writing is intoxicating. Chasing each of the book’s three sections with trips to caverns of the Joss laundry room in an attempt to prolong the trance I found myself under, one refrain rang through the haze: I need to talk to this person. Last week, I had the pleasure of doing just that when Machado came to the College to deliver this year’s Gifford Lecture. Whether simply reading her prose or speaking with her over the phone, Machado’s intelligence is immediately palpable. Yet, what makes both her work and presence so electrifying is the way she alternates between an intellectual self and one of deep compassion and humor. Machado sacrifices neither for the sake of “In the Dreamhouse,” integrating critical histories of queerness, violence and pop culture into the book’s intense subject matter. The memoir, which details an abusive relationship Machado experienced in her early 20s, examines queer intimate partner violence as well as the less overt violence of growing up in a marginalized body through a kaleidoscope of metaphors.
I asked Machado how the absence of these marginalized identities in our cultural canon—a phenomenon she refers to using Sadiya Hartman’s phrase “the violence of the archive”— affected her own development as a writer. She said, “Very much so. Writers are all sort of made up of their influences and the books they come to. How those books come to them depend a lot on what we canonize, what we include in the archive, and so, it’s a weird sort of self-perpetuating problem. So, if, for example, if you don’t see women’s perspectives on something being portrayed or explained, or they’re just not in the canon at all, there’s just this sense of ‘I’m alone,’...You’re so…whatever you are that you think your experience is really unique, when in fact, human experiences repeat themselves with some regularity. So, I feel like it is what is, and you have to extract yourself from it and purposely work against it because simply going by the status quo, you are playing into that system inherently.” Machado breaches this system from its bones—the memoir, from its vignette structure to its content to its clever injection of horror, fantasy and choose-yourown-adventure is fundamentally experimental. She explained to me that fantasy and horror helped her by functioning as a means of articulating internal conflicts and fears. She described: “Every genre has its own way of pulling on some thread of human consciousness and concern in a way I think is really useful for all writers, not just fiction writers.” “For some reason it’s like my brain needs the fiction to be able to get myself around it in some way and then I feel able
and capable of writing the non-fiction,” she elaborated. Though Machado acknowledges this often isn’t the most efficient, interweaving fantasy and reality is essential to crafting the eerie tenor of her work. Machado endows the mundane and melodramatic moments of our lives with equal gravity, forcing us to comb through our own memories for the monsters and epiphanies that lurk at the corners. Though a memoir, “In the Dream House” reads like a cross between an autopsy and a fable—meticulous, gory and enchanting. Concerned as it is with exploring the literal architecture of Machado’s love-turned-horror story (the titular Dream House is in fact a real place), it felt strangely prescient in a time where we all have been somewhat trapped by our own houses, whether they are dreamlike or nightmarish. In discussing this and the strange, liminal atmosphere of the now yuppie-beleaguered American tourist towns, I was curious to know whether her relationships with the many emotionally-charged landscapes in the memoir have changed. According to Machado, it depends on the place itself and the strength of its “temporal umbilical cord.” “I spent a good chunk of my life moving to different cities and driving across the country for various reasons and trying to figure out where I went,” she reflected. “I feel like the book reflects that in the way that some of these movements are just very tied to these specific geographic locations.” This immediately reminded me of a quote from the memoir (“The only time I feel patriotic is when I’m on a road trip”), and I asked if she could explain the rela-
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tionship between those movements and her conception of the country. She answered, “Especially with natural beauty, there is this sense of ancientness…we’re just these tiny little beings in this large temporal field and that’s just what it is. This is a way of thinking of it for myself, like we’re very small ants in a very large space.” The image of us all as ants milling around an ancient land is strangely comforting. The same goes for “In the Dream House,” which might serve as something of a cautionary tale for young people navigating unfamiliar terrain. Machado emphasized the importance of finding good models for healthy relationships in order to avoid creating narratives that justify unhealthy behavior. She advised, “If one person’s fear and anxieties are animating the relationship and the other person is just adjusting around that, that’s not a good relationship.” Most importantly, she impressed on me her hope that young people will begin to see their happiness as justification enough for the romantic decisions they do or don’t make. “Sometimes,” Machado mused, “I feel like people want a reason…like, I can only break up with my boyfriend if he cheats on me, or if he does something bad to me, but it’s also okay to say, ‘I’m not happy and I don’t want to be in this relationship.’” Ultimately, though, the most salient piece of advice that Machado offered, which, like her writing, both terrifies and emboldens me is this: “When you’re twenty…you’re just a hot mess. That’s literally what it is. You’re just a hot mess until you aren’t anymore. And that’s fine and good.”
November 19, 2020
OPINIONS
Page 11
The post-Trump recovery: Why we must convert norms into law Benjamin Fikhman Guest Columnist
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merican democracy is obviously very flawed. The electoral college forces the voting system to be partially based on land rather than totally on population. In addition to this unequal voting process, there is a very deep lack of representation between state populations. California has two senators representing the state and the Dakotas have four, despite the fact that California’s total population is 24 times greater than that of the Dakotas combined. Politicians continue to place restrictions on voting, which often disproportionately impact communities of color and the poor. Today especially, we are witnessing a direct threat towards our democracy right from the executive branch of our government, the presidency. I argue that it should not only be enshrined in Constitutional law for a president to concede and begin the transition process when the election has been decided and verified to be absent of fraud by the proper bureaus with the Department of Homeland Security, but it should also be strictly required that the president publicly swear to the American people to unconditionally concede to the opponent in the event of a loss. The presidential transition of power should be governed by a symbolic law rather than a general norm, and it should be the centerpiece of further legislation passed to limit presidential authority for the sake of the people. We need stricter regulations against the expression of authoritarian language and behavior by a president, especially during a transition, even though I cannot know exactly how everything should be done. There is a multifaceted set of dangers behind an unnecessarily delayed transition, but first it is important to understand why
our country has allowed this presidency to reach the seemingly apocalyptic-like behavior that it seems to be undergoing. An overwhelming problem with our democracy is the loose nature of norms, and our lack of preparation for a rogue president. Donald Trump is a prime example of why we need to codify the necessary laws to protect against this possibility. Without any official political experience prior to the presidency, he was voted into office with the expectation that, even with an unconventional and controversial agenda, he would uphold democratic principles and maintain some degree of reverence towards the responsibilities of his powerful position. He has done the opposite. Trump continues to aggressively staff bureaus with loyalists, as well as the Pentagon, shaking Americans to their core in fear of a “slow-moving coup.” The FBI has concluded that his campaign had ties to Russia, people in his inner circles continue to face massive suspicions of corruption and he himself has failed to pay massive amounts in taxes and has potentially committed other offenses, which could be further brought to light once he leaves office. Now, worst of all, after the election that Joe Biden has decisively won, with the backing of the Department of Homeland Security’s Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency claiming that this was the “most secure election in American history,” Trump is vehemently refusing to concede. The president maintains an enormous degree of executive immunity, and that is exactly the problem. “We hold these truths to be self-evident…” the Declaration of Independence says. Unfortunately, “self-evident” applies to only conventional standards of our political system, and these are only held up in a system
that is based more so on norms rather than laws. If the sitting president was required to publicly concede in case of a loss once the election’s security has been verified by the Department of Homeland Security, as it has been now, more people might stay away from conspiracy theories and malicious patterns of disinformation. Trump desperately wants to stay in power and his dangerous insistence is dividing the country further. Trump never once clearly claimed that he would concede in case of a loss. That is also why he has repeatedly said that the only way Democrats could win was if the election was rigged. This kind of conspiratorial language, baseless lying and childish behavior should be made outright illegal for an American president to express publicly. Why? Because the president doesn’t choose who wins, but they does have a significant amount of leverage over the fate of tens of millions of Americans’ beliefs. As thankful as we should be for the checks and balances that have kept our government from turning into a totalitarian regime, they simply aren’t enough. News anchors, editors and politicians have called out Donald Trump for not “doing the right thing” and not “gracefully” conceding to his opponent. Though why should any of this be expected from a president who is a rogue outlier from the kind of standards that we have always deemed “self-evident?” Yes, Joe Biden will be the 46th president of the United States starting on Jan. 20, 2021, whether Trump concedes earlier or if he has to be forcibly removed as an afternoon trespasser. Biden and his transition team are doing what they can to prepare for the coming four years, but they are doing so without the cooperation of the current White House occupants, and it is dangerous. The transition
of power typically includes the passage of “operational and logistical support” from the lame duck to the incoming administration, and according to George W. Bush’s Chief of Staff Andy Card, a slow transition can drastically compromise national security. “The 9/11 Commission had said if there had been a longer transition and there had been cooperation, there might have been a better response, or maybe not even any attack. This is very serious, so we’re calling on the president to open up the transition office, give the money out, let people start transitioning, and get ready to take the baton at January 20th at noontime, even if we don’t know the full results,” Card claims. Now, in the midst of a climate crisis, public health crisis, economic crisis, an environment of intense political hatred and an election secured and decided over a week ago, there is no reason other than corruption or ideological selfishness for the Trump administration to delay the transition. But he will likely never do that of his own accord, and so it’s a failure of the American system not to prevent such behavior. Sure, presidents have acted out in previous years. Take Richard Nixon and the Watergate scandal. However, Trump’s attacks on democracy have characterized his entire term, and hopefully the Biden administration and potentially Democrat-controlled legislature can learn from the mistakes of what is about to be history, and advance legislation that strengthens our checks and balances to limit presidential immunity. This is something grassroots activists should push for along with current progressive agendas. We can only imagine the dark place our country would be in right now if the current authority of the executive branch was only a little bit stronger than it is now.
Carbon Neutrality ≠ Political Neutrality: The Case for Divestment I
n 2020, Vassar reaffirmed its desire to become carbon neutral by 2030 with a revision of their Climate Action Plan. There is one area, however, not mentioned in the revised plan: divestment from fossil fuels. We acknowledge the difficulty from a financial standpoint, as divestment will require years of research and much larger involvement from the whole of Vassar in their investing portfolio. The latter includes techniques like adding a student voice to the Board of Trustees and increasing transparency from our financial investors as to where our money is going. Nonetheless, we believe the Board of Trustees must pursue these options because divestment is essential to mitigating the climate crisis and entirely possible given the examples set by other colleges. Just as well, continuing our investment in fossil fuels is indefensible with the current arguments for their use. Therefore, we ask the Board of Trustees to begin the divestment process and add it to their carbon-neutrality goals to protect our future. Divestment from fossil fuels is not merely an interest of Vassar students. It is a necessity as we, a global community, move away from nonrenewable and damaging energy sources toward renewable energy. The fossil fuel industry keeps us dependent upon a finite supply of resources, meaning that divestment is inevitable. It also harms the well-being of our communities. Each day, approximately 10,000 people die due to air pollution. The average global temperature has already risen by one degree Celsius and is on track to increase. If this pattern continues, the impacts on the global com-
munity will be immense: Biodiversity will decrease, food prices will skyrocket, health will be threatened and violent weather will increase, just to name a few consequences. The Board has previously stated that it “believes that the endowment of the college exists solely to support the mission of the college.” If Vassar’s mission is, as they say, to “make accessible ‘the means of a thorough, well-proportioned and liberal education,’” we are all for using the endowment to make that happen. Yet, we are hesitant to support the endowment and, by proxy, the College if its mission is to support an antiquated industry that has been proven to irreparably harm the environment and warm the planet. As Vassar refuses to divest, the message that it sends is clear: Investing in fossil fuels is permitted under our mission statement. This sentiment is contradictory to Vassar’s
“‘It is a necessity, that we, as a global community, move away from nonrenewable and damaging energy sources.’”
overall mission, however, as iterated by Vassar’s Climate Action Plan. Why is the College acting in opposition to its promise to the community? As a higher educational institution, Vassar should have the goal of investing in future generations in all aspects of student life. Is this the future Vassar believes in? As an institution, Vassar prides itself as a leader in sustainability. Recent plans for the building of the Inn and Institute, expected to be among the most sustainable buildings in the Hudson Valley, demonstrate Vassar’s willingness to invest in projects that will distinguish itself from peer colleges. Still, it seems unaware of how sustained the advocacy for divestment has been throughout eight years of student work. Frankly, Vassar is falling short of its own expectations of leadership in higher education. Peer institutions that have pledged action regarding divestment include Barnard, Wesleyan, Smith, Bryn Mawr and Middlebury. Barnard has agreed to divest from all fossil fuel companies that deny climate science. Wesleyan has vowed to divest from all fossil fuel investments by the end of the decade. Smith is beginning a phaseout of all current investments with fossil-fuel specific managers in endowment. Middlebury has a phased approach that halts all new investments in the fossil fuel industry. And finally, schools like Bryn Mawr have agreed to initialize a divestment process by engaging in more detailed research among the Board of Trustees. Indeed, many of these schools have not pledged to fully divest from fossil fuels. What matters to us is that they have
The opinions expressed above do not represent those of The Miscellany News as a whole.
MISCELLANY NEWS | VASSAR COLLEGE
considered the possibilities, and they are taking some form of action. Progress is possible, and at this point, with several examples of what the road to divestment might look like, we are asking the College to at least do something. While we have established that divestment, or at least more conscientious investment, is possible, the main reason Vassar cites for not divesting is that the institution cannot openly take stances on social issues. However, we would like to challenge the very idea of an apolitical investment. Money is inextricably tied to systems of power, so any purchase or investment inherently involves supporting an industry and what they stand for. We say that consumers can “vote with their dollars,” and with our endowment, Vassar has quite a few votes to cast. But where to cast them? If a decision to divest from fossil fuels is read as a political decision to support climate action, then a decision to continue investing in fossil fuels should be read as a decision to support the status quo and blatantly ignore the exceeding urgency of climate change. Both decisions are inherently political, but not equal. Divestment strives to make a positive difference while continued investment actively bolsters the power of a destructive juggernaut of an industry responsible for devastating our planet beyond repair. What’ll it be, Vassar? We may pledge to achieve carbon neutrality by 2030, but until we divest from fossil fuels, there’s still coal and oil on our hands. This article was written by members of Vassar Greens.
SPORTS
Page 12
November 19, 2020
Kim Ng finally gets her at bat as first female MLB GM Jackie Malloy
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Assistant Sports Editor
im Ng had been waiting for 15 years. A University of Chicago wonderkid, she was first hired as an intern by the Chicago White Sox in 1991 at the age of 21. She became the youngest assistant general manager in the MLB when she signed on with the New York Yankees at 29. Ng’s next stops included the role of assistant general manager (GM) for the Los Angeles Dodgers and then senior vice president of baseball operations for Major League Baseball itself in 2011. Ng interviewed for her first general manager position in 2005, and has interviewed for the position with five different teams since. Finally, on Nov. 13, 2020, Ng was hired as GM of the Miami Marlins, becoming the first female GM in the history of any of the major men’s sports leagues in North America as well as the first Chinese American in the role. Intern to assistant GM in eight years. But 22 years to go from assistant GM to general manager. 15 years of interviewing for GM jobs. 30 years in the league total. Three rings to her name. It took until 2020. So, what took so freaking long? My question is rhetorical. I think we all know the reason. Ng has been proving herself ready for this job her entire career. She succeeded early as an intern and Assistant Director of Baseball Operations for the White Sox, impressing with her eagerness to learn, leadership and judgement. She became the youngest person to win and the first woman to present a salary arbitration case in the major leagues in 1995, a case against a client of mega-agent Scott Boras, nonetheless. Her talent and vision was valued and seen early as she quickly climbed the ranks of MLB front offices all the way to VP—which is in fact a role tradi-
tionally held by the general manager. By the time she embarked on her first interview for the GM role with the Dodgers in 2005, Ng had experience in three of the oldest major league organizations and the league office, had been working in the executive suite for 10 years and had won three rings with the Yankees. In short, she was respected and accomplished in player development and scouting. The Dodgers eventually ended up hiring Ned Colletti, an incredibly experienced and successful exec himself, who naturally kept Ng on as an assistant. Hey, maybe she needed more experience. She was 38, an undeniable talent and leader, but she would have plenty of opportunities to come. Five more opportunities to come, to be exact. While she worked for the MLB as senior vice president of baseball operations directing international dealings Ng was passed over by the Mets, Phillies, Giants, Mariners and Padres, prior to last Friday when she was hired by the Marlins. At this point, she was as experienced and versed as anyone in the game—so why did it take seven teams until one finally hired her ? Experience and age were no longer an excuse—at the age of 52, Ng is currently the sixth-oldest out of 26 GMs and her resume is as admired as they come. So, again, what took so freaking long? The answer is this: Kim Ng is a woman, and specifically a woman of color. And in a time when the hiring of a woman for a coaching staff or front office in any of the big four men’s professional sports leagues is news to be celebrated, women are still just beginning to be seen and listened to in men’s professional sports. The opportunities are hard to come by, but even when they may come, women have to be overqualified, fearless and thick-skinned just to get an interview. The major leagues of
professional sports have always been a boys’ club—emblematic of masculinity, strength, father-son bonding, competition. Women who seek to enter this closed-off world face isolation, doubt, projected fragility, questioning and harassment. Once a woman even gets her foot in the door, all of that is only multiplied. Ng has dealt with more than her fair share while working in roles that were never created for her: both publicly, such as when former pro and Mets front office employee Bill Singer mocked Ng for her Chinese-American ancestry during general manager meetings in 2003, and most definitely behind closed doors. And she was punished for trying to achieve her dream in an industry dominated by white men by being forced to wait 30 long years for the role she had always wanted. To put that in perspective, Ng has waited longer than Theo Epstein had been alive when he was named GM for the Boston Red Sox in 2002 at the age of 28. Not to say that Epstein hasn’t proven to be one of the most talented execs in the history of baseball, but who is to say that Ng couldn’t have been on a similar trajectory if
Kim Ng, the recently appointed general manager of the Miami Marlins. Courtesy of Ennoti via Flickr.
Technicolor by Reese Collins
The Miscellany Crossword ACROSS 1. Ticket bit 5. Need for a sundial 11. Boycott 14. Gamer’s Croft 15. Possessing 16. First lady? 17. Helps 18. Actress Wilde 19. Neither 20. David Lynch opus 22. Repair 23. Tina Weymouth’s instrument
24. For sure, for short 25. In combat 28. Possesses a speech impediment 33. Orca prey 34. Take a _____ (try) 36. Life token 37. Lennon’s favorite Beatles movie 40. Airport board abbr. 41. Singer Ross, famous princess, et al. 42. Consumes
Answer to last week’s puzzle: Dated Apps by Reese Collins
43. “The sky’s ________” 45. Book of maps 46. Diarist Anaïs 47. Culture prefix 49. Nixon’s undoing (in more ways than one) 51. Prince picture 57. Italian novelist Umberto 58. “Spy Kids” actor Daryl 59. Ticklish puppet 60. ___ Perkins of “Parks & Rec” 61. Mount Hood’s state 62. Broadway’s Hansen 63. Ensemble film about an ex-CIA agent who assembles his old team 64. NYC bookstore 65. Vocalizes DOWN 1. Quarry chunk 2. Follow 3. Language of Pakistan 4. 22-down’s sport
5. Solemates? 6. Some campus buildings 7. Tel ____ 8. Plunge 9. “Doing that ASAP” 10. Screenwriter’s union 11. Good 12. Shakespeare’s river 13. Computer wiz, stereotypically 21. Big FIFA issue 22. Ott who hit 511 homers 24. Fuel for Silicon Valley 25. So far 26. Pearly whites 27. Thoreau’s abode 28. What a ghost might do 29. “Mamma Mia!” group 30. Club owned by Walmart 31. Mr. Claus 32. Full-court defense 34. Partner of 8-down 35. Nets owner 38. Thor’s dad
she was given the GM job in 2005 at the age of 38? Instead, she has bided her time and waited until the sport finally appreciated and recognized her. “Who will be the first woman GM?” The question floated around Ng since 2005—the heir apparent, dangling above her head for 15 years, seemingly always out of reach. But now, she has finally been crowned, and uplifts with her generations of women, past and present, who have yearned to see someone like themselves in the highest offices of professional sports. Myself included. When I was in seventh grade, my best friend and I would imagine ourselves as President and GM of our own NFL team named the Bowling Green Bison, the BG Bison for short, after our own high school in Illinois. Our parents laughed at our imaginations, and we long ago moved on to more realistic dreams, but as I read that Kim Ng had—finally!—been hired as the first female GM in the history of men’s professional sports in North America on Friday, you’d best be sure I texted my best friend, “you still down to run a sports team?”
39. The Villages people 44. Alternative fact 45. Word that sounds like its second letter 47. It might read “kiss the cook” 48. Thyroid or pan-
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creas 49. Eye drop 50. Worry of many a Vassar student 51. Role 52. Lyft competitor 53. Style of Indian music 54. Edison’s middle
name 55. Wishy-washy RSVP 56. French refusals 58. “Help!”