Misc.05.21.23

Vassar

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Congratulations, Class of 2023!

Jacques Abou-Rizk Editor-in-Chief

Families from around the country and the world flew in to watch their beloved Class of 2023 seniors graduate in Vassar’s 159th Commencement Ceremony on Sunday, May 21, 2023. Speaking to the graduates is Dr. Margaret “Peggy” Hamburg, daughter of Beatrix McCleary Hamburg ’44, the first self-identified Black woman to attend and graduate from Vassar College.

Before seniors walked the stage, the Senior Class Council (SCC) organized the annual “Senior Week,” in which the Class of ’23 celebrated its final days on Vassar’s campus with a formal, a winery tour, one last late night at the Deece, laser tag and a number of other activities leading up to Commencement on Sunday, May 21, 2023.

There are many things that the students are looking forward to during their last week on campus. Taylor Gee ’23, SCC Secre -

tary, said, “SCC has tried a lot of new ideas this year. We put on Vassar's first ever silent disco and created the Vassar Womp Womp dessert with help of our class. This year's Senior Week is special because we exchanged the Booze

Karen Mogami/The Miscellany News.

Cruise for a bottomless brunch at Savona's. People might be more accustomed to the Booze Cruise which gave attendees a beer and a ride in a rowboat. The brunch and unlimited mimosas and Bloody Mary’s will be a lot more

fun!”

According to a written statement by Taylor Gee ’23, SCC Secretary, “Senior Class Council shares responsibility for planning Senior Week: the types of events that we put on, when they

occur, and executing those plans. I keep us organized by taking a lot of notes. For example, when we did a site visit to the Grandview I was writing down the capacity limit, how the cocktail hour would work, etc.”

Shannon Bender ’23, the SCC Treasurer, said she has been working with the rest of the Council members to manage the budget with suppliers and vendors. She explained, “While all of us on Senior Class Council have some defined responsibilities based on our roles, we really all work together to figure out the specific events we put on as well as the nuances of each event.”

Last year, Commencement reinvited parents and families to campus following the loosening of COVID-19 restrictions. According to Dennis Macheska, Associate Dean of the College for Campus Activities, “Commencement will feel like many commencements felt prior to

See Commencement on page 3

Meet Professor Prairie Rose Goodwin

Maryam Bacchus Guest Columnist

This semester, Professor Prairie Rose Goodwin finished her first year as a Visiting Assistant Professor of Computer Science. A Vassar alumna, she graduated in 2012 as a computer science major with correlates in Greek and Roman studies and mathematics.

Goodwin was initially drawn to Vassar for her undergraduate degree because of the classics de-

partment. She sought to expand upon a long-standing interest in the Romans, specifically their creations that have lasted millennia. While taking courses in the Greek and Roman Studies Department, Goodwin also took math courses, where she excelled. She decided to take computer science courses to explore the technical part of her brain and found that she enjoyed it. When explaining how she decided to change her major, she remarked, “Part of what has always

drawn me to the Romans is their technology and the fact that they were able to make aqueducts with levers and pulleys … So I gave in and decided that I was a very technical person after all.”

Recounting her favorite memories of Vassar, she recollected, “[Some] days [students] would take the fall leaves and turn them into giant peace signs and make campus into an art installation and that was really cool to walk through.

It was those little unexpected mo-

ments that were really fun to be a part of and to know that there was so much creativity going on at Vassar at all times.”

Following her undergraduate degree, Goodwin knew she wanted to attend graduate school, work in the tech industry, then return to academia. She attended graduate school at the University of North Carolina where she graduated with an MS and a PhD in Computer Science. After graduate school, she was motivated to gain real-world

experience she could later bring into the classroom. Goodwin first worked for a startup for SAS Institute, the latter being a data analytics company where she spent the most time. During her time at SAS, she was a Senior Product Developer working on Internet of Things (IoT). Expanding on IoT, she furthered, “It’s this idea of internet everywhere and connected environments and sensors that can send back gobs of information, and

Students dress up for annual Founder's Day

Sarah McNeil News Editor

Vassar students, faculty and alumnae/i gathered on April 29 to celebrate the Vassar tradition, Founder’s Day. This year’s theme was apt for the rainy Saturday, as students dressed for “Lost at Sea: Pirates, Mermaids, Sirens.” Despite the gloomy weather, the yearly festivities returned in full swing.

Lilly Masters ’26 commented

on her experience saying, “I love how the Vassar community really commits to the bit. In high school or middle school no one would, so it’s really nice that here everyone does which is really fun. I think it was really fun that everyone participated.”

The event’s numerous activities primarily took place on Noyes Circle, beginning at noon and ending at midnight. The site featured live student bands and DJs all afternoon, food trucks with

free food, face painting, and water slides. The musical headliner for the day, Mykki Blanco, reportedly canceled, but the show continued with nine student bands and DJs performing including Belakflip, DJNAR, Krampus, FEIFEI, PB Toast, Serial Milf, Switchover, Showface and UFOlogy. Founder’s Day goers were welcome to enjoy any of the three food trucks from the local restaurants La Cabañita, Twisted Sisters Soft Serve and Frites of New York. The day also

featured carnival games with the chance to win prizes and rides with a giant inflatable slide and tetherball.

Also on Noyes Circle, the Vassar Student Association’s Health and Wellness committee had a tent filled with essentials like snacks and water as well as small stress relieving activities. The beer tent for all those over 21 returned, located right next to the Founder’s Day merchandise tent that sold student-designed T-shirts, sweat-

shirts, bucket hats, shot glasses and tote bags. President Bradley gave the annual Founder’s Day toast at 2 p.m. with many members of the Vassar community gathering to hear her speak.

Other festivities included a barbecue at the Town House Circle with Dean Carlos Alamo at 3 p.m. and a puppy play pen in the College Center with three puppies that students could pick up and pet, organized by Big Night In. To

See Professor on page 5

Noteworthy news from this year!

Meryl Streep accepts AAVC Distinguished Achievement Award - Oct. 26, 2022

Award-winning actress and Vassar alumna Meryl Streep ’71 accepted the Alumnae/i Association of Vassar College’s Distinguished Achievement Award on Oct. 13. The event included songs and speeches with Streep giving an impassioned address to students, faculty and alumnae/i alike in the crowded Vassar Chapel. The original ceremony was scheduled for April of 2022 but was rescheduled following a bout of pneumonia that impeded Streep’s attendance.

Vassar launches Fearlessly Consequential Campaign to raise $500 million - Oct. 26, 2022

In October 2022, Vassar College announced the launch of its new campaign entitled Fearlessly Consequential. It is the largest fundraising campaign to date, setting the ambitious goal of $500 million. The funds are intended to support financial aid, create a new Center for Multidisciplinary Studies, improve residential spaces on campus, grow the campus’ health and wellness resources and establish the new Institute for Liberal Arts, among other goals.

Community wins fight for on-campus polling site - Nov. 16, 2022

On the eve of the November 2022 Election Day, Vassar College gained a polling site after weeks of legal action. The polling site allowed students and faculty to vote on campus throughout future election days instead of going off-campus. The site will remain at Vassar indefinitely as long as Vassar maintains at least 300 registered voters.

VSA approves restructuring for 155th Session next fall - Jan. 25, 2023

The Vassar Student Association (VSA) officially passed its restructuring legislation which will reduce the number of members affiliated with the organization. Many hope this change will help make elections more competitive and ensure all VSA members are properly compensated for their work. The restructuring will take effect at the beginning of the 155th session in the fall.

Vassar test-optional policy elicits mixed reactions - April 27, 2023

Vassar College Admissions has abandoned its testing policy for all applicants beginning in the 2023 admissions cycle. This change reflects a trend of colleges and universities around the United States that are adopting test-optional admissions following the COVID-19 pandemic. While garnering support from current Vassar students, the decision received mixed reviews from online commenters.

MISCELLANY

EDITOR-IN-CHIEF

MANAGING EDITOR

SENIOR EDITOR

CONTRIBUTING EDITOR

NEWS EDITOR

ARTS EDITORS

FEATURES EDITOR

ASSISTANT FEATURES EDITORS

HUMOR EDITOR

OPINIONS EDITOR

SPORTS EDITOR

SOCIAL MEDIA EDITOR

ASST. SOCIAL MEDIA EDITORS

PHOTO EDITOR DESIGN EDITORS

COPY EDITORS

ASSISTANT COPY EDITORS

GRAPHICS EDITORS

LIVE EVENTS CHAIR

WEBMASTERS

REPORTERS, COLUMNISTS

Jacques Abou-Rizk

Will Sorge

Sashinka Poor

Monika Sweeney

Sarah McNeil

Allen Hale

Jesse Koblin

Kai Speirs

Carina Cole

Luke Jenkins

Nicholas Tillinghast

Sufana Noorwez

Nick Villamil

Tracy Cen

Olivia Kahn

Richard Lu

Igor Martiniouk

Nandini Likki

Dominic Matos

Caris Lee

Tiffany Kuo

Emma Goss

Julia Weinberg

Sandro Lorenzo

Karen Mogami

Catherine Borthwick

Kai Chang

Michael Yang

Emma Adams

Britt Andrade

Yaksha Gummadapu

Anna Kozloski

Emma Lawrence

Gwen Ma

Jyotsna Naidu

Emma Raff

Oliver Stewart

Anna Terry

COPY STAFF

Kathryn Carvel

Willa Jewitt

Allison Lowe

Claire Miller

Ailynn O'Neill

Emma Sandrew

Emma San Filippo

Meera Shroff

Edward Welch Morgan

GRAPHIC ARTIST

CROSSWORD EDITOR

Tori Kim

Sadie Keesbury

CORRECTION POLICY

The Miscellany News will only accept corrections for any misquotes, misrepresentations or factual errors for an article within the semester it is printed.

The Miscellany News is not responsible for the views presented within its Opinions pages. Staff editorials are the only articles that reflect the opinion of a two-thirds majority of the Editorial Board.

Tori Kim/The Miscellany News.

Image courtesy of VSA.

Karen Mogami/The Miscellany News.

Image courtesy of Vassar College via Flickr.

Image courtesy of Karl Rabe of Vassar College.

Seniors graduate atop Commencement Hill

COVID—in recent years we were required to modify Commencement due to COVID. Returning to how Commencement traditionally occurred, without COVID modifications, is something to celebrate. In addition, this year, we are offering a larger affinity reception celebrating all affinity ceremonies on Saturday; we also moved the reception following the Commencement ceremony to Noyes Circle.” But Senior Week has many graduates

looking forward to life beyond Vassar. Bender added, “Senior Week is a Vassar tradition that celebrates seniors and everything they have accomplished during their time here.” She continued, “Vassar graduates end up all over the world so Senior Week might be the last time many of us will be able to see our friends in-person for a while, and our class in particular has had a challenging college experience, with most of our years at Vassar being affected by COVID-19, so I think having some time to spend with each other without any wor-

ries about classes and things like that is extra meaningful for our class.”

Bender expressed excitement for the other events planned: “Senior formal is the first and biggest event of Senior Week. We are also offering a visit to Millbrook Vineyards & Winery, a bottomless brunch at Savona’s Trattoria and laser tag right on campus. I am also looking forward to Last Late Night since there will be grilled cheese.” She added, “This is the first year senior week includes a bottomless brunch at Savona’s Trattoria.”

President Elizabeth Bradley made sure to note the accomplishments of the Class of 2023. She remarked, “Every class is unique at Vassar in its own way; this is the class that spent the most Vassar time in COVID and really set the tone and carried the College safely to today. So we honor them, we thank them, and wish them well, reminding them—Vassar for a lifetime!”

Gee ended her regards by saying, “The goal of Senior Week is a time of revelry and celebration. To anyone in the Class of 2023: Congratulations! I’m so proud of us.”

Students celebrate 'Lost at Sea' Founder's Day

end the night, Vassar provided a ten minute firework show and free cupcakes at Sunset Lake.

Students dressed as underwater sea creatures, mythical figures and pirates, all in celebration of Matthew Vassar’s birthday. Sabina Lopez-Jensen ’26 discussed their costume saying, “I dressed up as a crab, and I thought that was a unique costume but then I saw like, seven other people dressed as crabs.”

Founder’s Day is organized each year by the VSA Programming and Traditions committee in conjunction with the Campus Activities Office, Health Promotion and Education, Safety and Security, Dining Staff, Big Night In and the Residential Life Office. This undertaking requires months of planning and around 30 volunteers. Programming Chair Dhriti Seth ’24 said in a written statement, “Founder’s Day has many moving parts so we establish [a] few subcommittees that are chaired by volunteers that

handle different aspects of the day.” Seth continued, “The most important aspects to coordinate was recruiting volunteers to help out, finalizing vendor contacts and establishing plans of actions with other offices of the school such as Safety and Security and Health Services to ensure that the student body remained safe and well during the day.”

While the weather proved to be an unexpected hurdle for Founder’s Day planners to overcome, Seth reported it ultimately did not affect the day’s outcome saying, “The weather definitely threatened to put a [damper] on the event. We tried to plan for it by changing our tents to be fully covered with sides in order to protect against the rain. All in all, despite the weather we had a great turn out and it seems that people were able to enjoy themselves.”

In the week leading up to Founder’s Day, Vassar’s Engaged Pluralism Race and Racism in Historical Collections Working Group held an event entitled “Complicating Found-

er’s Day” on April 25 in the Villard Room. In a collaborative written statement, Brian Scannell ’23 co-chair of the Working Group and two librarians, Deb Bucher, the Head of Collections and Discovery and Melanie Maksin, Head of Academic Engagement, stated, “Our group hoped to use historical materials to reveal aspects of Founder's Day that may not be known to current members of the Vassar community—including the ways in which Founder's Day, particularly in the first half of the twentieth century, has been a site of racial and ethnic exclusion, cultural appropriation, and blackface and other forms of racial and ethnic masquerade.”

The event drew 120 attendees of both students and faculty. Attendees enjoyed a catered dinner while exploring the different materials present. Sections included acknowledging the many “founders” of the college, examining the recently uncovered photographs, and learning more about the

tradition’s historical evolution. Scannell ’23, Bucher, and Maksin reported positive responses from the event’s participants.

What Founder’s Day will look like in the future will continue to be an ongoing conversation on campus. Scannell ’23, Bucher and Maksin commented, “We think it's important to think critically about who has been excluded from these traditions and why, and how we might develop more inclusive, expansive celebrations that reflect our community as it is now and as we want it to be.”

Seth expressed similar sentiments, “Founder’s Day is definitely one of those and it is incredibly heartening to see the community come together to celebrate in such a manner. We must acknowledge that the history of the tradition is problematic in its own right though and actively work to educate ourselves about how far we’ve come in order to ensure greater inclusivity and respect within our community.”

Igor Martiniouk/The Miscellany News.

Misc Recs

Start your summer right with these Arts-Editor favorites

Jesse Koblin and Allen Hale Arts editors

Allen Hale"I Can Hear the Heart Beating as One" - Yo La Tengo

New Jersey trio Yo La Tengo’s most acclaimed project is also one of my go-to summer albums. The record’s 16-song tracklist runs the gamut of indie subgenres, including indie rock/pop, shoegaze, noise pop, dream pop and more. Although these labels signal the musical diversity within the album, they hardly summarize the full range of emotions on display. For instance, “Sugarcube” makes use of powerfully fuzzy guitars and droning bass to back its intimate lyrics, whereas “Green Arrow” is a calm, nocturnal instrumental with a hint of sorrow. “One PM Again” employs soothing, deep vocals behind guitar melodies resembling country style playing, a seriousness contrasted with the lighthearted delivery on the acoustic “Center of Gravity.” Whether you’re in love, languishing in the sun, driving through the night or simply sitting in your room looking for new music, “I Can Hear the Heart Beating as One” has a delightfully poignant song to match your summer experience.

Jesse

Koblin"Assassin's Apprentice" - Robin Hobb

Robin Hobb’s “Assassin’s Apprentice” is so good that I had to buy a new copy after saturating countless pages of my original version with inconsolable sobbing. This novel is, by far, the most evocative and emotionally-affecting fantasy story I’ve ever read. Hobb’s fantastical world is punctuated by slow-burn worldbuilding, expertly-written characters, and gorgeous Tolkien-esque prose. The descriptions of medieval vistas floored me and made this a wonderfully cozy read, perfect for immersing yourself in the vivid detail of seedy ports, rocky highlands and imposing castles. And, yes, this book will wrench your heart from your chest, but in the best possible way. It leads you from tragedy to ecstasy with each page turn and teases out cathartic payoffs perfectly, keeping you in an emotional chokehold from beginning to end. If you want to relax for the summer with some fantasy vibes or thoroughly drain your tear ducts, “Assassin’s Apprentice” is the obvious choice.

Allen

Hale"Punch-Drunk Love" - Paul Thomas Anderson

“Punch-Drunk Love” follows Barry Egan (played by Adam Sandler), an unmarried businessman who struggles with loneliness, anxiety and emotional outbursts due to the ridicule of his overbearing family. He encounters a woman named Lena (played by Emily Watson), a coworker of his sister who arranges their meeting after seeing him in a family photo. After a particularly destructive outburst, Barry uses a phone sex line for comfort; in an unexpected turn, the operator attempts to extort him for money. The film swiftly changes the viewers narrative expectations while maintaining its previous focus on the interaction between romance and mental illness, balancing differening genre tendencies with ease. Lena and Barry cross paths again after he flies to see her in Hawaii, leading to a romance quickly developing between the two as the extortion threat lingers in the background. In the ensuing action Barry’s courage grows, enabling him to overcome his socially-isolated nervousness and confront his enemies, motivated by the newfound power of love. The off-beat nature of the conflict combined with traditional elements of romance, comedy and drama swirl into a beautiful concoction of emotions. Fans of Sandler’s more serious work in “Uncut Gems” should give this film a shot, along with anyone looking for an odd yet charming depiction of budding romance.

Jesse

Koblin"Santa Clarita Diet" - Netflix

I’ve recommended the TV series “Santa Clarita Diet” to almost everyone I know. And yet, it always comes with the inevitable admission that Netflix canceled the show on a massive cliffhanger in its third season. Even considering this caveat caused by sadistic business choices, I genuinely believe “Santa Clarita Diet” is a must-watch dark comedy. The show blends the late-stage capitalist farce of idyllic suburban life with the onset of a vampiric plague to hilarious effect, with leading performances by Drew Barrymore and Timothy Olyphant being the standout element. Their portrayal of Sheila and Joel offers laugh-out-loud charisma as well as surprising tenderness. Watching the couple struggle to cover up Sheila’s vampirism is a source of humor, but their efforts also affirm their love for one another, even when faced with paranormal phenomena. Supporting performances by Liv Hewson and Skyler Gisondo also stand out, offering an equally compelling romance narrative between the punk eco-terrorist Abby and bumbling nerd-savant Eric. “Santa Clarita Diet” has jokes drier than Sheila leaves her victims, and its comedic timing is unorthodox, so its brand of humor may not be for all. Still, those barriers to entry and a premature cancellation only conceal the brilliance of this underrated gem.

Jesse Koblin/The Miscellany News.

Image courtesy of Ricardo Romanoff via Flickr.

Image courtesy of Gage Skidmore via Wikimedia Commons.

Image courtesy of Revjdevans via Flickr.

Professor Prairie Rose Goodwin finishes first full year at Vassar

Continued from Professor on page 1

what you can do if you can actually harness that information is really powerful.” Goodwin specifically worked on cloud-based solutions for IoT business applications. She particularly enjoyed working on problems that many others were unsure of how to solve, even though solutions were needed. After her time in industry, Goodwin went on to teach at North Carolina State University and The Arts Institute of Raleigh-Durham before returning to Vassar. In coming back to Vassar, she hoped to connect on a more individualized level with her students, which she mentioned is a trait specific to the school. Since being back, she has enjoyed the eagerness of her students to learn about the world. She has noted that the people in her classroom genuinely want to be there, and it has made a difference in her engagement with academia. Goodwin also mentioned that she also enjoys working with the department’s faculty, who she characterized as caring and supportive of their colleagues' success. She concluded that as of now, they are one of the most caring teams she has worked

on, whether it be in industry or academia.

I have had the pleasure of taking two courses with Goodwin: Data Structures & Algorithms and Analysis of Algorithms. Her teaching style is unlike any other in the department. She peppers her lectures with anecdotes of current events, as well as lessons learned from her time in industry. I believe she has been successful in connecting her real-world experiences to the classroom, and my understanding of the potential applications of computer science in my future have been expanded because of it.

Outside of the classroom, Goodwin enjoys creativity, which manifested itself in the form of an embroidery business she ran prior to the COVID-19 pandemic. She also enjoys video games and believes they are a great tool for teaching tenacity and thinking skills. Specifically, she enjoys that games are able to tell diverse and deep stories in a comprehensible manner that other platforms cannot.

Goodwin will return in the fall as an Associate Professor of Computer Science. When asked what she hopes to contribute to the Vassar community, she remarked, “I do feel like I have a fresh point of view having recently been in industry, especially postCOVID. ” She continued, “The world is different and having gone through that, I feel like I have really good advice for people who are just starting out in the workplace.” Goodwin specializes in human-computer interaction, which is a unique subfield she is bringing to the department. Over the next few years, she hopes to contribute academically to a new area of research as well as more personally with advice she is able to offer students.

Drawing three different maps of the library

Kai Speirs Features Editor

“Studyweek” is the official term for the nebulous time period that might better be called “hang out in the library week.” Studying comes and goes—library navigation is eternal. Instead of spending my time working, I figured I’d play a little game, a little creative writing experiment, of which you are now reading. How many different ways can I describe the library and all its concourses and steeples, crypts and catacombs, piazzas and breezeways? How many ways can I orchestrate a map that one could follow to safety or to doom—or worse, the U.S. Government documents stacks! Additionally, I could not have written this without Italo Calvino’s Invisible Cities, from which this article’s entire form—senseless rambling—takes inspiration.

1. Entering there and proceeding for two days towards the east you reach the arcade, an upside down well with many little windows which spill golden light like a harmony of silent faucet spouts. You’ve probably had such an experience if you’ve felt like a tiny speck in a large room when looking up to some gargantuan windows. But there’s a special quality to the light when it’s Sunday morning and you’re hungover but have nonetheless made it here before noon. All the multicolored glass panes shine down on you and you’re no longer a little squab who needs to write an essay but a glorious being made of pure light. You look to the high strung stained glass windows and think for a moment that they might be portals into a utopia called “post-essay,” you feel as if you could float up to them and dance in their sweet colors. A little voice cries “ooh!,” and a loud chatter of whooshing and banging

pulls you from apotheosis, you look around you and realize your bag has split open and all your things have scattered across the slip-and-slide floor. All you can think about now is how you wish to retreat into the synthetic underworld of the ground floor catacombs so that you can feed on the buzzing white lamps and never see natural light again. Oh how the white cubicles call your name, you can even scratch little messages on the walls and tally the years you’ve spent in your little white tomb writing an essay about an author even more ancient than you.

2. Six paces up the stairs. Pass through scantron-no-stealing-books machine. Traverse main lobby, approximately 15 paces. 90-degree turn, clockwise. Two paces forward. Descend staircase, twelve declinations. Grab door handle, bring arm to torso. Walk through the door, regardless of what might exist in your fore. If you feel glass, adjust three feet left, then three feet right. Once through the door, 90-degree turn, clockwise. Eight paces forward. Make sure the French literature is directly ahead. 90-degree turn, counterclockwise. Proceed down the hall, 20 paces. You should have arrived at a crossroads. 90-degree turn, counterclockwise. Six paces forward. 90-degree turn, counterclockwise. Third shelf from the bottom, halfway across. Blue spine, 13 inches long. It’s a book called “The Historie of Serpents. Or, The Fecond Booke of Liuing Creatures.” It’s a reprint of a book published in London in 1608. It’s awesome. Trust me.

3. There is a promised land here. I have heard of it from seafarers, aerial circumnavigators, sorcerers and metaphysical philosophers. A great room of sun, the loudest goddamn place in the library, a room with

weirdly comfortable wooden chairs, I will sleep on these couches if I must—it comes with many fantastical descriptions. I have only been there in a dream, and even then the dream was crowded with other people dreaming, so I had to turn around and make for the art library. Although I have heard many great things about this room, today someone told me of something that haunts the paradise place they call “the sun

room.” Half hidden by a wall of pure steel stands a great shelf devoted to the history of totalitarianism. A specter is haunting the sunroom. Four dozen biographies of Mao stand ready to sweep away the bourgeois leisure of so-called paradise in the sun room.

I could do more but I really gotta work, man. Next year, for better or for worse, I will certainly be exploring this place more.

Image courtesy of Maryam Bacchus '25.

Jacques Abou-Rizk/The Miscellany News.

"She peppers her lectures with anecdotes of current events, as well as lessons learned from her time in the industry."

How to say goodbye to Vassar as a senior

Carly D’Antonio Toodles

Saying goodbye is probably one of my least favorite things…probably my least favorite. I hate saying goodbye at the end of dinner, at the end of a party and most importantly, at the end of the year. And even though it pains me to say this, I am about to come up on some pretty important goodbyes.

College is kind of a sick trick when you really think about it. Not only are you paying insane loads of money to get a degree in something that you cannot see yourself pursuing (in my case), you are also put in a

place where you make amazing friends and join groups that all of a sudden you have to just up and leave…kinda BS right?

Now, in my column, I have already given my thanks to Ultimate Frisbee and my dearest friends have already gotten some lovely shoutouts to say the least. So I want to take my last Misc article to say goodbye to the paper that has given me the voice to air my grievances and reveal the aspects of my personality that I find humorous. Has my writing always been funny and well written? Debatable. Have they brought a smile to my reader's face? Also debatable.

Joining The Miscellany News my sophomore year was born out of a desperation

to establish my comedy writing skills, and also a desperation to be found funny with a certain amount of anonymity. Recalling my first article, a series of interviews on how students would respond to a zombie apocalypse, I cringe at not only the concept but also the fact that I relied on almost anyone but myself to come up with anything funny. Three years later, I find myself in a similar situation.

Now, that is not to say that I do not come up with any of my ideas. But, I will admit that almost every Sunday when I remember that I have a task of writing a Misc article I text almost everyone I know if they have any funny ideas desperately hoping that

HOROSCOPES

Madi Donat Astral Projector

ARIES

March 21 |

April 19

When letting go feels hard, remember that mostly you have to let go of things that no longer serve you. School has become vestigial, like finger webbing or your appendix. And even though it hurts for them to go in and cut school out of you, remember that you’ll get sepsis if it stays in. This metaphor is easily transferable.

LIBRA

Sept. 23 |

Oct. 22

TAURUS

April 20 |

May 20

GEMINI

May 21 |

June 20

Life is CRAZY! Jobs are CRAZY! More school is even more CRAZY! But so are all the other things, like grocery shopping or seeing your parents and having a different view of them now. If you are feeling crazy, remember that you aren’t alone and grocery shopping is hard for everyone. There is an evil beast inside of every Stop & Shop.

College was great for so many things! I learned who I was (someone who cries kind of a lot). I learned what I want (things that are often very bad for me). I know what I want to do with my life now (make enough money to buy a loaf of sourdough and a latte once a week). We are all lifelong learners. Remind yourself what you want, even if it sucks.

SCORPIO

Oct. 23 |

Nov. 21

they say yes. I then tend to compose those half baked ideas into very simple articles that are guaranteed at least one chuckle. Which, I think, is pretty true to my personality and my attitude toward academics.

So it is with this, this article that was frantically written on a Saturday afternoon while a party is being hosted outside my house, that I say a very warm and loving goodbye to my column. To all five of you, I thank you for your loyalty. And to my mother, I thank you for your much needed critiques on my writing.

So long, and thanks for the fish.

SAGITTARIUS

Nov. 22 |

Dec. 21

CANCER

June 21 |

July 22

LEO

July 23 |

Aug. 22

When the going gets tough, the body shuts down. Take care of your most basic of needs, even the annoying ones. You’ll know you need to do some deep breathing or sleep better when there are small sprites which appear out of the corner of your eye and steal your stuff. You need to be alert in order to catch them, after all.

Summer means goodbye to cold rain and hello to hot rain. With the warm weather only getting warmer, engage in all the bacchanal activities you were too scared to do when you still had to plan for a bag to put your jacket in. Go swimming, for example, or take off all your clothes and run around the library. Oh, you already did that? Cool.

Need a distraction that doesn’t involve ingesting poisonous chemicals? Try activities like baking or crochet or origami. What all of these have in common is that you can make little guys for all of your friends! Whether it’s a cupcake, an origami frog or a granny square, make something with your hands. It calms the soul-sucking demons, if for a moment.

CAPRICORN

Dec. 22 |

Jan. 19

“Where will you be next year? What will you do next year?” Ummm, make soup for my friends or something. Why can’t we all just live Paddington Bear lives? Why must I think about taxes and rent and utilities and cockroaches? Life is so hard as it is. Relish in these last few weeks of having most things sorted for you. The horrors will come soon enough.

Have these last weeks been hard? Have they actually been a little awful? Know at least that you’re not alone. When things are hard, I remember a couple of things: First, there is likely at least one animal in your life that loves you unconditionally. Second, actually I think that’s all anyone would ever need. You’re welcome.

Moving on might feel like the most natural thing in the world for you, but don’t let your love of adventure keep you from appreciating these last days. Are you going to the winery? I’ll be there. I hope they give us one of those spit buckets the professionals use to keep from getting too drunk. That’s my one dream. I have no other dreams.

Enjoy some time in the nature here before you have to exist in the terrifying Real World filled with Targets and highways and genetically incomprehensible rats. Even if you’re sneezing the whole time and your eyes feel like they’re going to fall out of your head, it’ll be worth it. Lying in the dirt and mud and goose poop is healing, actually.

AQUARIUS

Jan. 20 |

Feb. 18

PISCES

Feb. 19 |

March 20

Loss is a part of life. I lost a claw clip yesterday and I’m inconsolable. Tomorrow I may lose something else. Sometimes, loss is beneficial. Other times you’re running around to find your ID, calling your friends to let you into buildings you can’t get into because you don’t have your ID but you need to get into them to find your ID. Both are learning experiences.

Are you reliving all of your happy memories again in some sort of perverse ritual to convince yourself you don’t actually want to leave? Noooooo, don’t do that aha ;) But seriously, though; it’s okay to remember the past, but we can’t live in it or repeat it. It’s just like “The Great Gatsby.” And Vassar is like some girl you met in Kentucky once.

Well, folks, the stars have told me it’s time to say goodbye. It’s been an absolute joy being your astrological liaison these past four years. I can only hope I brought you some solace, advice or perhaps even light chortles. Thanks for everything.

Vassar athletics excel in Spring 2023 season

Nick Villamil Sports Editor

Thisspring, Vassar athletic teams were widely succesful. Throughout the semester teams excelled on a national stage and went further in conference competition than ever before.

Men’s

After a loss in their second game of the season, the Vassar men’s volleyball team rode a dominant 25-game winning streak all the way to the Final Four. On March 25th, the team clinched the conference regular season title with a 3-0 victory of NYU to finish United Volleyball Conference (UVC) play undefeated. On April 6, the team avenged its only loss to date to the Stevens Institute of Technology, the top ranked team in the country at the time. After finishing that week with two more wins, including one over national semifinalist Messiah University, the Brewers received their first No. 1 overall ranking in the American Volleyball Coaches Association (AVCA) poll in program history. As the top ranked team in the country, the Brewers continued to excel. The team won the conference tournament as the host school with a 3-0 win over St. John Fisher University, who ended the Brewers’ season in 2022 in the conference semifinals. The Brewers' streak also included two victories over perennial powerhouse Springfield College, who Vassar had not defeated since 2002. The team ended that run with a 3-1 home victory on Feb. 16th and started a streak of their own with a thrilling 3-2 vic-

tory road victory on March 31st—the first time Vassar has ever beaten Springfield in their home gym.

As champions of the UVC, one of the most competitive conferences in Division III men’s volleyball, Vassar earned the number one overall seed in the NCAA tournament. Vassar hosted Baruch College in the first round and advanced to the quarterfinals with a 3-0 win. The next day, Vassar faced off against Southern Virginia University and won 3-1 to advance to the Final Four for the fourth time in program history. The Brewers finished the season undefeated at home and saw their impressive season come to an end in the national semifinals against North Central College. In addition to tremendous team success, Vassar enjoyed an abundance of individual recognition. Head Coach Richard Gary was named the UVC and national coach of the year—the first time in program history a coach has won the national award. Similarly, Andrew Kim ’23 was named the UVC player of the year and the national player of the year, marking the first time any Vassar athlete has garnered such national recognition. Gavin van Beveren ’23, Jacob Kim ’24 and Adam Gulick ’23 also earned all-conference recognition and Tristan Christofferson ’26 was named the UVC co-rookie of the year. The Brewers also had van Beveren, Jacob Kim and Andrew Kim honored as first team All-Americans by the AVCA. At the Vassar Athletics Department’s Annual Brewer Award Ceremony, van Beveren was awarded the Matthew Vassar Outstanding Career from

a men’s team award and Jacob Kim was awarded the Betty Richey Performer of the Year from a men’s team award.

Women’s Lacrosse

Anchored by senior standout play and leadership, the Vassar women’s lacrosse team enjoyed a historic season as the Brewers advanced to the Liberty League semifinals for the first time since the league expanded the postseason in 2015. Seeded sixth in the conference tournament, Vassar defeated third seed St. Lawrence University in a thrilling first round matchup by a narrow margin of 13-11. Vassar finished the regular season with five Liberty League victories, the most the program has posted since 2019, and a total record of 9-7.

Offensively, Maddy Kretten ’23 led the team with 47 goals and 17 assists. Annie Uyeki ’23 thrived as the team’s top facilitator and finished the season with a team high 32 assists while also contributing 18 goals, which is good for fifth on the team. Kateri Sanseviro ’23 also had an impressive senior season, posting 27 goals and 19 assists. Emma Torkelson ’25 and Reilly Mulcahy ’25 emerged as standout sophomores, finishing the season with 34 and 24 goals, respectively. Tess Billings ’26 and Lola Wright ’24 also had strong seasons, each posting 15 goals and 2 assists. Lauren Johns ’24 led the way in goal with 143 total saves and a strong save percentage of .444. Trina Chou ’23 was another crucial part of the Brewers’ defense and won the Vassar Scholar-Athlete from a women’s team award. Also honored was Uyeki, who won

the Frances D. Fergusson Coaches Award. For their historic conference season, the team also had five athletes honored as All-Conference selections: Chou was named to the first team, Mulcahy and Torkelson were named to the second team and Kretten and Uyeki were named honorable mentions.

Women’s Tennis

The Vassar women’s tennis team also enjoyed a successful season with a 12-6 overall record and a 7-1 conference record. The team earned the top seed in the Liberty League tournament and defeated St. Lawrence University 5-0 in their semifinal matchup before falling to Skidmore College in the league championship match, the Brewers’ sixth straight appearance in the conference championship. The Brewer's best stretch of the season came in mid-April,when the team won five consecutive Liberty League's over the span of eight days. The streak began with a 9-0 domination of William Smith College and ended with a nail-biting 5-4 victory over storied rival Skidmore. During this span, the Brewers also enjoyed a shutout of Ithaca College in an away contest, a 5-4 home win against the Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute and an 8-1 road win over Union College.

The team’s impressive season also merited department-wide recognition as Macey Dowd ’25 was named a finalist for the Betty Richey Performer of the Year from a women’s team award and Erin McCusker ’26 was a finalist for the Vassar Rookie of the Year from a women’s team award.

The Miscellany Crossword

" ConGRADulations!!"

By Sadie Keesbury

ACROSS

10.

11. Things

12.

14. Ox

15.

19. Laughing animals

24.

25.

6. Georgia hub

7. Tiny green vegetable

8. iMessage alternative

9. First initial of the author of this crossword

11. Gross

13. Sports cheer

15. Relaxation station

16. Graduation hat

17. Phone download

18. Nada

20. The _____ and the Id, Freud novel

21. Neither partner

22. Shock

23. _____-cone

27. Chows down

28. Pig place

31. _____ James, "I'd Rather Go Blind" singer

32. Not yet decided, abbr.

33. Opposite of peace

34. That, en Español

35. _____ it in the bud

36. Rooster wife

37.

1. Goes off

6. Church recess

Outlook service

_____ of 32A, May 21st honorees

Digitize a document

Big _____ (David Ortiz)

Graduation outfit

Bad comparison to oranges

of

1. Engine action

2. Reddit Q&A

3. Lil _____ X

4. Shakespearean contraction

5. Enthusiastic slangy encouragement

Dirty towel 38. Palindromic poetic contraction 39. Subj. for bilingual hopefuls

Volleyball

Bringing Vassar with you wherever you go

Ganesh Pillai Outgoing Arts Editor

In front of me, I can’t make out anything concrete, but I can recognize the expanse of time that stretches out seemingly infinitely. Behind me is a lot clearer, faces familiar, the moments memorable, and the connections I have made remind me of how I got here. A whole life devoted to learning would in theory prepare me for such a situation, but I stand on the edge of something unknown and frightening in a way that I never have before. I have no idea how to say goodbye to a place that has given me so much. But if Vassar has taught me anything, it’s that you never know what trying something new will bring until it’s staring you in the face, asking you to somehow bid it farewell.

Reflecting on this space conjures in my head the images of all my favorite spots. My experience of our campus, like my journey throughout college, grew more complex and connected as time wore on. Anxiously, overwhelmingly arriving at Main Circle to crowds of enthusiastic Stu Fels feels a lot blurrier, especially compared to memories of mornings passed lounging on the quad, nights in the philosophy lounge and every-

thing in between. Some spaces came and went, etches in time. Nothing captures the contained chaos of sophomore year like the Math Lounge, or the stress and determination of finishing my thesis in the Library. And some remained stalwarts of college, whether it be the Deece, the Shakespeare Garden or the Miscellany News office.

Those memories feel close, but ahead of me I still await what is to come. I hear car honks, the unintelligible conversations of people I can never claim to meet. However, what brings me great comfort is knowing that the relationships I have made here will continue to be with me, each of us still carrying a piece of the place where they formed. People often wonder what it means to be a Vassar student, and of course there is no one definition—that’s the whole point. And yet, at this place I’ve found perhaps the most genuine group of people I will ever have the privilege of knowing. People care about what they do, earnestly dedicating their time to those things and people that they love.

Regardless of whether I feel ready or not, I know the next stage of life is coming, inevitably, unavoidably scary but not untraversable. When I came to Vassar, I thought I knew a lot, and I spent the next four years

coming to learn about all of the things I never knew existed. It may have been a life devoted to learning, but it wasn’t until college that I understood the potential of what learning could bring. In typical high-school fashion, I went from class to class filling my head with seven different subjects’ worth of information, entirely bereft of time to think about myself. I guess then you could say attending Vassar was the most selfish decision I’ve ever made.

Here, I learned how to exist within a community that cares for one another and about where they are going, how they impact the world. I learned how to be…me. It’s hard to put a price on realizing the joys of being truly free within yourself, or of understanding that you make your, and other peoples’, worlds better by feeling uninhibited to leave your mark. At Vassar, I came to embrace the seemingly simplest things, but to know what you love most in this life is a special thing. I won’t act like enjoying conversations with friends, sitting outside, going on long walks or listening to music makes me someone privileged with some grand realization of what life is all about. But they’re things that mean a lot to me and have provided me with experiences and memories I will keep with me long after I have left Vassar, ones

that have taught me invaluable lessons in how to make each and every place I go somewhere I can say I feel comfortable in.

Vassar showed me the potential within a world I didn’t know existed four years ago— one in which apprehension can give way to hope and where a pursuit of happiness can go unimpeded by the fear of losing myself in it all.

As I relistened to playlists of songs during my time here, attempting to inspire my reflection and write my goodbye to somewhere that has given me so much, I came to accept that not everything can be explained by words, or expressed in any communicable way. Everything I am grateful to have learned isn’t in here, and the things I will take away either, those are largely still yet to be entirely deciphered.

And so, as the future comes clearer into view, commencing a journey that is decidedly not one where I may lounge for hours in the sun or grab a meal with my friends whenever I want, I can at least know I will be ready for it. Even if I swap tree-lined paths here for skyscraper-saddled ones elsewhere, all of the lessons I have taken ensure that wherever I go, I can carve out a bit of Vassar within it, or as I’d call it, a little slice of home.

Knitting together a newspaper: Thoughts from a past EiC

Leila Raines Fall 2022 Editor-in-Chief

This semester, the final spring of my senior year, I learned how to knit.

On a dark Sunday evening sometime in February, my friend Taylor sat down next to me on the stiff couch in my SoCo and guided me through the basic motions of knitting. Awkwardly clutching the two wooden needles in my hands, I learned how to do a knit stitch. Then a purl stitch. Knit two purl two. Stockinette (basically just alternating rows of knit and purl).

Needle through stitch.

Yarn over needle.

Pull through loop.

I fumbled a lot during this first knitting session. Stitches fell off. The yarn frayed and unraveled into separate threads that tangled up in my needles. Holes appeared. My fingers slipped. It was a messy process at first, but at the end of the night, as I stared down at the patchwork square that I ended up with, I still felt proud.

I have wanted to learn how to knit for years now, but I didn’t find myself with the free time until this semester (“free time” being a generous term, considering most of that time was meant for independent work on my thesis). And never have I had as much free time as I have felt this semester, following the previous semester in which I was Editor-in-Chief of the paper.

I’m sure I could compare the process of learning to knit to any learning experience that I’ve had at Vassar: Learning to be a college student living away from my family for the first time; learning Italian during my first and second years; learning to step outside of my comfort zone to make new friends; learning to live in a new country when studying abroad; and especially learning to lead a student-run newspaper last fall.

Even as I am writing this piece, I am still debating whether making the analogy between learning to knit and working at The Misc is cheesy. But I think both of these experiences have influenced me in similar ways.

When I first stood in line to sign up for The Miscellany News email list during the first-year Org Fair, I was stepping into the group with no newspaper experience. Needle through stitch. When I wrote my first piece covering an author lecture on campus, I had no idea what I was doing. I ended up almost pulling an all-nighter, hunched over a Microsoft Word document and frantically typing out a story about Tommy Orange and his novel “There There.”

Yarn over needle. One semester later, I nervously walked into the Rose Parlor for my first interview to become a Reporter for the newspaper, preparing answers to potential questions in my head. The room buzzed with energetic chatter, as I found a circle of college students of all years sitting cross-legged in a circle on the floor. I sat down and joined the circle, thus kickstarting my path in The Miscellany News Pull through loop. Flash forward to Fall 2022, when I stepped into Rocky 203 to lead my first Editorial Board meeting as Editor-in-Chief. I had hardly imagined when I first started that I would want to take on such a big role in the newspaper, but the more I got involved with the paper, first as a reporter and then as an Arts Editor, the more I loved contributing to every weekly issue.

The biggest thing that I have learned about knitting is that, once you have mastered the basic stitches, the rest is troubleshooting. And one can look at The Misc in a similar way.

Stitches fall off.

Yarn frays. Holes appear. Articles fell through.

Production Nights sometimes lasted until 2 a.m.

Large blank spaces where content fell short had been filled at the last minute with extra ads, graphics, images, anything we could get our hands on.

But the end result was always a beautiful patchwork of student-created content: articles, images, graphics, crosswords, horoscopes, Arts, News, Humor, Opinions,

Features, Sports. Every Thursday, when I picked up my physical copy of the paper as I walked through the Bridge or was rushing out of the Deece to get to class, I always felt that rush of pride, holding that physical evidence of all of our hard work.

A lot of people assume that I want to pursue a career in journalism, after all of the time I’ve spent at The Misc. And a part of me does sometimes wonder what would happen if I did, but when I think of my time at The Misc, the journalism aspect was only one small piece of why I enjoyed my time with the group. Of course, journalism is important, and I loved being able to explore the campus and feature all

of the great things that students, faculty and community members were doing. But when I think of my time at The Misc, I also think of the Misc Office. Of joking around with other Ed Board members during Monday and Tuesday production nights. Of grumbling over InDesign. Or leaving edits on student-submitted writing on Google Docs.

Most of all, I remember learning. Of starting somewhere, and ending in a completely different place, as a completely different person. Just as I will now know how to knit probably for the rest of my life, I will carry these experiences at The Misc with me as I move forward.

Devote yourself to curiosity, enjoy areas of study

The Sports section is often an overlooked part of The Misc. Most people see sports as nothing more than escapism or an enjoyable waste of time. This is somewhat true, as all sports are just made-up games whose outcomes have no real impact on the world. But this is an oversimplification. As an astronomy major, I have spent the last four years studying the absurd scale of the universe and how small and insignificant we all are by comparison. If we want to be perfectly honest, everything about our lives is made up and has no real impact on the universe. So, as with every aspect of our lives, sports draw their meaning from the fact that we choose to devote our time and energy and emotions to them.

Being both the Sports Editor at The Misc and an athlete at Vassar has given me a unique perspective. I have simultaneously gotten to be someone who draws meaning from sports by participating in them, being an avid fan of them and covering them. Pardon the cliche, but through all these experiences I have learned that sports are a microcosm of life.

Over the past four years, I truly have seen it all. My favorite baseball team, the Washington Nationals, both won the World Series and finished dead last in the MLB while I was at Vassar. I have gotten to meet and interview people on campus who participate in and coach a wide array of sports, from rugby to lacrosse to soccer and everything

in between. I have learned about sports I previously knew nothing about, such as fencing and rowing, and I now know what a “dig” is in volleyball. As an athlete myself, I have gotten to experience the camaraderie that comes with being on a team with a unified goal, the relentlessness needed to spend multiple hours doing something physically demanding every single day at practice and the perseverance needed to overcome roadblocks big and small.

And, of course, I experienced all of this with a big fat pandemic right in the middle of it. I saw my ability to participate in the sport I have loved for most of my life disappear, unsure of when or if I would get to participate in it in the same way again. I had to write about sports in Vassar College’s student newspaper of record while there were no sports taking place at Vassar for the better part of two semesters. When the world became an uncertain and dark place, I lost one of the most comforting and, up until that point, constantly available hobbies in my life when pro sports shut down. If you need proof that sports are important in this country, then look no further than March 11, 2020, when the NBA halted its season because of the pandemic. Before that point, some schools had started to close and fear was certainly ramping up, but once the NBA shut down, the rest of the country followed suit. It was the true beginning of the shutdown.

And sports are incredibly political, too. Star athletes and big sporting events have real social, political and economic pow-

er. In my time at The Misc, I have written about China using the Winter Olympics for propaganda while human rights violations happened in the background, the NFL’s hiring practices which reflect larger issues of race in America, star NBA players and vaccine hesitancy, star athletes bringing awareness to mental health issues, the NCAA and gender inequality and so much more.

All of this is a long-winded way to say: Sports matter. I already knew this before I came to Vassar, but my time here has only strengthened that conviction. I had no clue I wanted to write for the Sports section when I first got here. I had no prior experience with a newspaper and had never considered writing outside of class. But in the middle of my first-year fall, I came across Mary Cain’s story, and it lit a fire in me. I had such strong feelings about it that I decided to write an article and submit it to The Misc. I thoroughly enjoyed writing about something that mattered to me, and the excitement of seeing my name in print was indescribable. Because the Sports section seems to be perpetually looking for new writers, I was asked to write another article. And another. I didn’t officially become a staff member until February 2020, but as soon as my first article was published, I knew this was something I would be continuing. At the end of my sophomore year, I was informed that the section needed a new editor for the following fall, and again I began to consider stepping into a new position I had never previously thought about. I had

no idea what I was getting myself into: long nights of fighting with InDesign in the Misc office, weekly Ed Board meetings, constantly scrambling to get enough content for the section every week. At first I didn’t enjoy it. As a section editor, you don’t get to write as much and all the aforementioned chaos adds a lot of stress to your life. But I continued doing it for four whole semesters because I grew to love it. I love all the people I got to know from Ed Board and production nights, it has been fun training my protégé, and I have gotten so good at InDesign that I can now lay out the section in under 30 minutes.

I am so glad I decided to write that article on a whim. The Misc has been such a meaningful part of my time at Vassar, and I will miss it dearly. I will miss so much about Vassar. But I think they got it just about right when they decided that college should be four years. It is time to move on. It is time for someone else to be editor of the Sports section, time for someone else to take the classes I took, time for someone else to be captain of the cross country team, time for someone else to sit in the Deece laughing with their friends for hours after dinner has ended. I am ready for something different, but I will always treasure my time here. It was truly priceless (except of course for tuition). Just like sports, Vassar draws its meaning from the fact that we all decide to devote so much time and energy and emotions to this place and these people. I am very glad I decided to devote as much as I did.

Confused Humor Editor experiments with sincerity

Donat Outgoing humor Editor

It has been, lately, a season of endings. In these weeks, I’ve walked halls and felt that unignorable thing in my chest, like: “What if this is the last time I’m ever in Rocky?” or, “What if I never lay on the Quad again?” or, “What if this is the last practice room I cry in?” Some of the goodbyes have been, well, just that—good; I can’t say I’ll miss wandering aimlessly around Retreat trying to find something I can put in my body for sustenance that won’t taste like squishy cardboard, or constantly whipping my head around anytime I talk about literally anybody on this campus because, no matter who it is, they’re always somehow right behind me. Some goodbyes, though, have felt too big to be known, like an insistent, stinging grief for something that hasn’t even died yet. And won’t ever be dead, I guess; not really. How can you mourn the thing that won’t even do you the dignity of leaving for good, but instead just continues on as though it didn’t hold you through the four least imaginable years of your life?

For a long time on The Misc, I didn’t do much. I wrote the Horoscopes every week because I liked making people laugh, and I was scared of writing full-length articles. As Assistant Humor Editor, I graduated to the infamous Word on the Street, a bygone game of dubious consent wherein I would ask random strangers questions that I didn’t write, most of which made them uncomfortable. It was the evil older brother of the fated TikTok trend, “Excuse me, what song are you listening to? And do you think women deserve rights?” I would wander the Deece or the COVID tents, the latter buzzing with yellowjackets and sticky with day-old ketchup, green grass plodded beige by students all too willing

to brave the freezing Poughkeepsie cold to eat dinner with their friends. I would shove my phone in people’s faces and transcribe their interviews by hand. I would spend my Sunday evenings poorly reading the stars— so poorly, in fact, that I sometimes had to wait to read them until Monday afternoon.

The Misc’s virtual year happened without me, basically. I was but a lowly Assistant, communicating only through email with a student who had now graduated. I walked into Rocky the first day of Ed Board in Fall 2021 fresh to my stint as Real Editor, and I knew no one. I knew nothing—I wasn’t left with a list of writers. I had no idea who to email for content. And, to everyone’s horror, I didn’t even know what InDesign was. I was guided, carefully, through the process of contacting writers and making arrangements for assistants by Upper Exec, and coached through Layout by Design Staffers. I sat at Production Night with my head in my hands, unable to fit a picture in a box. For months, I didn’t have enough content to fill up two pages.

And then, something remarkable happened. People started asking to write. Like, a lot. I was saying yes. I was filling page counts. I was learning where things went and how they worked. I was endlessly hyping up my friends and coworkers and writers when they became brave enough to get an article to me. (Every writer who has given me the privilege to edit their work has been a genius, btw.) And I knew people—and people knew me. Production Night slowly transformed from the most stressful night of my week to the most fun. Layout became, inexplicably, relaxing and exciting instead of dreadful and fearsome. The staff became a group of my friends who I waved to when I saw them, not just a scary, professional cadre who knew a lot more than me. I started writing full length

articles, and I started to love reading others’.

The thing about college, at least for me, is that you never think about it ending. You think about an after, maybe; I’ve cried to professors, advisors, voice teachers, friends, family about the big, uncertain future—about grad school, jobs, where to live, who to live with, why do anything at all. But in all of those conversations, through all of those tears, I never thought about the moment where it all ends. The moment you have to actually say goodbye to something. Once, at the end of a toolong winter break somewhere in the blur of Delta, I told my mother I wasn’t sure if I wanted to go back to school. “But you love The Misc!” she said. And I did.

You know, in the moment, that the thing won’t last forever. But it isn’t until you’re sat in a circle eating ice cream cake and hearing the words from the mouths of the people you’ve grown to love more than anything that you realize it’s actually ending. That moment, the line where one thing stops and another begins, is the worst one. Except for all the moments after that, because those are just filled with you reliving that impossible, instantaneous second, that physics-defying threshold of time and space and love. Is the true ending found in that one moment, or all the moments after that? Was it over when the last Ed Board dismissed, or must I live in this exhausting limbo until PB puts me out of my misery with a shake of my hand? Or is that, too, not long enough? Do I wait until I’m booted out at 9 a.m. sharp on May 22, a sweaty, migrained mess with arms full of IKEA bins?

There’s no one ending. I don’t become a new person once the diploma reaches my hand. I won’t start anew when I send in my last Horoscopes. That’s the hard part—you

just keep going. You leave the place that was your home, and the people that made it in any way tolerable, and the simple answer is you do something else for a bit. It doesn’t really matter what it is. And what you left goes on. The Misc goes on. In the best of hands, I must add.

Part of me wishes I could’ve sent myself off with more jokes. I loved being funny for you, and I won’t ever not love remembering how people would read my astrological predictions to each other in the Bridge or at the Retreat. But The Misc meant a lot more to me than my silly columns could ever convey. There’s humor in sadness and grief, too. One day, I’ll find it. The stars tell me it’ll all be fine. They haven’t been wrong yet.

Doug Cobb Outgoing Sports Editor

Madi

Outgoing Editor-in-Chief writes goodbye letter to The Misc

Nina Ajemian Outgoing Editor-in-Chief

Dear The Miscellany News,

I’ve written multiple drafts of this retrospective, but none of them have felt quite right. At first, I thought it was because I hadn’t yet found the perfect angle or the best hook or the exact words I wanted to use to sum up my time here. But now I realize that the real reason I wasn’t fully happy with what I had written is because as soon as I was, I would actually be done. It would be over. This is my last article. And that’s really hard.

Evidently, like with most things in my life, I put a lot of pressure on myself to make everything perfect. But no goodbye is perfect, by virtue of it signifying an end. Ends are crumbly and messy and happy and sad. I’m learning to be okay with that. It’s really hard.

I have also realized that no matter how different the set-ups of these drafts were, all roads led back to you, The Miscellany News

So I have returned to the very first draft of this retrospective: a letter. I’ve always loved letters. There’s something so personal about signing your name next to your own words, saying, “These are mine. And now they’re yours.”

When I was little, I hand wrote thank-you notes, crayon in small hand, to family and friends upon receiving a gift. Over the years, I’ve penned tearful letters to boys who have hurt or disappointed me—more for me than them and mostly never delivered. I’ve saved birthday cards from my best friends, notes from when I was on Lathrop House Team and a piece of pink paper with messages from other Misc staff members this spring. There’s a note addressed to me on the wall of the Editor-in-Chief office, and I just left my own note to our paper’s future.

Somehow, though, I’ve never written a letter to you, The Misc, the heart of it all.

I’d like to think of ours as a reciprocal relationship. You gave me community, my next chapter at grad school and dinner invites to

PB’s house. I gave you my free time and my class time and my sleep time and occasionally my just-about-to-go-out-because-it’s-Thursday-night-but-suddenly-there’s-a-crisis time.

In all honesty, though, you have given me far more than I could ever return. I don’t think I really knew myself before you. You helped me find a purpose. You made me realize that I’m good at getting things done and leading a group of people with comically different schedules and making sure that every Thursday morning, come hell or high water, 800 copies of our beautiful paper, with articles we are proud of, are fresh off the press and sitting on the loading docks, ready to be read.

You, The Misc, shaped my writing voice. Publishing an article for every section of the paper (I said I was going to do it, and I did!) has allowed me to explore different styles of storytelling and relaying information. What I’ve learned, though, is that all types have something in common for me. There’s this feeling I get when writing, especially something intimate like a letter, of needing to capture a very specific energy. A singular moment in time.

Writing is also one of the few things that has always come easily to me. Yes, I rewrite and edit and delete and take breaks and add maybe unnecessary commas. It is in this process, though, that I figure out exactly what I want to say and how I’m going to say it. There is nothing quite like writing yourself to your final destination. I’m proud of where we’ve gotten.

You also shaped my actual voice. Never in a million years would my first-year self believe that my senior-year self would be leading meetings of 20 people every week. Like, not just occasionally talking in the meetings, but steering the conversation and interviewing over 30 new/returning staff members and being the person to make the final call on decisions. She would not believe that her future self would become the person other staff members looked to for guidance, for answers to style guide questions, for her opinion on anything and everything related to the pro-

duction of this paper.

(Actually, most people would also not believe this, as I am very much a reserved person and take a little time to warm up—until we become friends, and then oh wow can I talk.)

Writing this letter has made me realize that I’ve grown tremendously and learned so much over these past four years on staff. I’ve learned how important being part of a team with a shared mission is to me. I’ve learned that outdated plugins can bring down an entire website following an unasked-for web hosting company migration. I’ve learned what a web hosting company migration is. I’ve learned how to say hello and goodbye and yes and no. I’ve learned how to trust myself a little bit more.

You could safely assume that I know a lot of words, as a writer/almost college graduate/ Editor-in-Chief. But I will never have enough words to describe how much you, The Miscellany News, have meant to me. I don’t think anyone not on staff would ever really get it anyways. You are my baby—my bundle of joy and also the reason I feel like I have aged five years in the past one.

And much like raising a child, it takes a village. So this is also a letter to the people on the paper, because, really, The Misc is all of

us. I love you guys, and am so grateful I got to graduate as your Editor—your Misc Momager, if you will.

This is also a letter to my friends, who might hate you (sorry!) at this point because of how often I talk about you—I don’t blame them and love them anyways :) It’s for my parents, for getting me through the bad news and being my biggest fans for the good. It’s for my brother, for allowing me to read my one and only Humor article to him over FaceTime to make sure it was funny and for being the coolest person I know. It’s for Papa, my grandfather. I wouldn’t be here, writing this, without your love and support.

And lastly, like anything I’ve ever written and will ever write, this is ultimately a letter to myself. The first time I walked into the weirdly lit, weirdly located and weirdly messy Misc office, I knew I wanted my name up on that wall. And now it is.

This retrospective may not be perfect, but it’s done. Sometimes that’s all you can do. It’s time to let go now. It’s happy, and it’s sad. It’s messy, and it’s okay. So I think all that’s left to say now is: Thank you, thank you, thank you.

Love, Nina

I hope I am more than a mark on a wall

Janet Song Spring 2022 Editor-in-Chief

One of my grad school application statements begins like this:

“Late at 3 a.m. in The Miscellany News’ office, I skimmed the walls of my office where former Editors-in-Chief had left their signatures. Out of the twenty names before mine, only one appeared as Asian. I began to wonder how many Asians, as well as people of color, had led the newspaper before me.”

In the statement, I go on to explain my research in finding that answer, consulting shelves of old newspapers, Vassar’s archives, Google, a book on The Misc’s history written by former Editor-in-Chief Brian Farkas ’10 and a LinkedIn message to Farkas himself when my evidence seemed inadequate. The result of this research is discovering that in the ’80s, the newspaper had its first Black Editor-in-Chief and its first Asian Editor-in-Chief in the 1990s, followed by the newspaper’s first female Asian Editor-in-Chief in 2006, and the newspaper’s third Asian Editor-in-Chief in 2015. This would mark me as the fourth Asian Editor-in-Chief and potentially the fifth editor of color for The Miscellany News.

I am not exactly sure of the accuracy of my research, but it’s the best I could muster

during my junior year while juggling classwork, studying for my GRE and managing Vassar’s student newspaper within the same semester. We’re often led to feel a sense of pride with these kinds of “firsts”—look to Michelle Yeoh, for instance, becoming the first Asian to win Best Actress at this year’s Academy Awards—without questioning why these “firsts,” or in my case, “fourths” and “fifths,” exist to begin with. As I wrote in my applications, I should’ve felt some form of pride upon my discovery. But instead, I felt a form of mourning, indescribable yet familiar.

I am often exhausted when writing about race, and yet whenever I write about myself I feel obligated to mention race as a pivotal component of my existence. Indeed, as I have overheard some of my international peers say, it doesn’t make sense why Americans are so obsessed with race, or why many of my Asian-American peers will describe themselves as “Chinese,” “Japanese” or “Indian” instead of American, even though they don’t have as intimate of a connection to the country of their ancestors as, say, someone who actually lives in that country. In spite of this supposed discrepancy, we Asian Americans are never given the opportunity to label ourselves as simply “American.” We are too accustomed to the deceptiveness of the question, “Where are you from?”,

knowing that people who ask this question don’t really care that we’re from New York or California—they want to know what Asian country gave us the monolids or other ethnic features that they are staring at. This question, “Where are you really from?” is so prominent that it has even become a cliche in Asian-American writing. Look at the poor protagonist in this work of Asian-American literature who can’t decide if she’s more Asian or American—it’s almost like she has dual personalities! And yet we succumb to these narratives. Plenty of my old work from creative writing classes often pits China and America as two separate worlds I exist in, both never mine to claim.

That is to say that unlike my other Misc peers, it is impossible to write about my time on the paper without sounding like other stories many students of color at Vassar are familiar with. The isolation one feels being one of the few students of color in a room filled with white classmates. The inanity of voicing your discomfort to those who have the privilege to not understand you—you repeat the same story again (“As a [BLANK] person I…”) and find yourself wondering, are you really explaining your circumstances well enough or do people just not care? A certain blank look on the face if you mention taboo words like “race” or “diversity.” And perhaps, to those of us in lead-

ership positions, the overwhelming dread that you are doing it all wrong or not doing enough for your respective communities. These are all the anxieties I have felt as I’ve moved up the ranks of The Misc.

Many people often forget how quick four years can go. Originally I was convinced that I could immediately transform The Misc into a publication highlighting marginalized voices on campus, only to inevitably realize that such a change would take time, and definitely not within a semester’s worth of leadership. And yet within those four years of seemingly no progress, The Misc transformed who I am as a thinker and writer. I am conscious of the narratives that surround our culture, and The Misc has been my platform in highlighting the various communities I am in. Still I wonder about the mark I have left at Vassar. Have I done enough? Was the four years of work worth it? Will it be remembered?

But the final questions I have for myself are these: How do I say goodbye to a newspaper that has given me both grief and joy? How do I acknowledge the hardships I endured, while also recognizing the people and experiences that made me a better person? As I leave Vassar, how do I want to remember The Misc? Quietly I leave my name on the office walls, close the door, and do not look back.

Image courtesy of Nina Ajemian '23.

“I know not all that may be coming, but be it what it will, I'll go to it laughing.”

― Herman Melville, from Moby Dick: or, the White Whale

Congratulations

I look forward to continuing to watch you experience life’s adventures, successes, and lessons through hard work. I wish you a lifetime’s worth of joy and happiness through accomplishments and gratitude.

I am so proud of you!

CLASS OF 2023

You’ve

Love Mom, Aunt Michelle and Jayden, Nana and Papa, Shelly, Joshua, Keke, and the Family.

made the most of your incredible time at Vassar and the world awaits you. You will do amazing things and we can’t wait to watch your journey. We are so very proud of you and we love you so very much!

“Take

pride

how far you’ve come. Have faith in how far you can go. But don’t forget to enjoy the journey.”