Bedazzled Gerbils or Distant Astronomers

First, let's get this snarled, so you know I know. You could care less whether I like Harvard or not: that's between me, my pet rock, and the folks who foot the bill. Phil Rubin--the editor behind this tangle of thorns--could care less. The message he left didn't ask for sentiment. It said, "1 page, single spaced." I heard, "two pages of the magazine down, five more to go, what about the Newbury Comics Ad?" I don't blame him.

So let's start again, in the optative voice, with you--hypocrite lecteur and all that. Why are you here? Even if you embrace liberalism, espouse it, have little liberals, wasn't Harvard a conservative engagement?

Somewhere back there a voice whispered, "Good bet. Sure bet. The big H!" If you heard this voice, even its faint echo from the study or the kitchen (some of you will deny even this), it doesn't necessarily mean the H stands for hubris or hypocrite. Chances are, you've come to such a conclusion yourself; perhaps you've already justified the choice into oblivion, purged yourself of any guilt. If so, you now belong here. You have kept your erasers in order.

Well, it happens to the best of us, justifying till we have no margins. It's no fun to think of this place as a lavish summer camp, or to ponder those restored, fortified gates re-assuming their imperious, exclusive positions; that's all the class of 1877 could come up with, really? If others had not been foolish we should be so.

Rocking the boat would remind us we don't yet swim well. Thus our rhetoric keeps us on our narrow paths, keeps us in the inner ring--as C.S. Lewis called it. Even when we leave a conversation, we justify ourselves away. "Well, I really have to go now, I have so much work to do." Why not, "it was good talking, bye"? Where did delight go?

Harvard has much to offer: $5 billion endowment, high-paid professors, over 2 million books, #1 in U.S. News! Yet these are statistical promises. Of all the books, few of us will read and remember more than a couple. Stellar professors can turn students into bedazzled gerbils or distant astronomers. And seniors can still expect a contribution call in the near future. But this might be expected, and one can both read more at Harvard and hang up the phone after it.

A professor at the University of Virginia once said he thought students came to UVA with the sole ambition of walking up and down Rugby Road--a kind of frat row--drunk, and with cups on their heads. At Harvard, there are those who are as proud of soberly donning their black "FCS" hats (Final Clubs Suck) as those who delight in sporting their crimson "H" hats. Other walk around wearing "X" hats, while a few wear "XTS" hats. Blake said it well, "Without Contraries is no progression." Harvard is a hundred competing parades with only two shared themes: direction, and a belief in parades. Perhaps this is our redeeming grace, why I like Harvard and all that...

Peter Nohrnberg '93 is president of the Advocate.