The Humbling of the Harvard Man

Warning: Intended for seniors. Underclass students may not understand.

Sitting curled up on my bed, eyes bloodshot and stomach growling, I steadily punch the keys on my laptop in order to make the next fellowship deadline. And then it hits me. I am back in my senior year of high school. The self-marketing blitz, the standardized tests, the clever essays, they all come rushing back to me. It seems like ages ago when we were all declaring to the world (or at least to our favorite colleges) that we were worthy, that all those Advanced Placements courses should count for something.

And now, for the first time in a long while, I actually have to prove myself again. After four years of Harvard, that's no easy task. From the first moments of Freshman Week, we are showered with messages of praise and adulation that even the most doting grandparent would be hard-pressed to out do. You're the smartest! The elite of the country! You can get any kind of summer job you want! Even star in MTV's The Real World! After all, you go to Harvard!

At first, we shun such fawning. We tell our family and friends that we go to school in Boston and avoid dropping the H-bomb that might make lesser folk uncomfortable. In polite conversation, we grow adept at unconsciously substituting "major" for "concentration," "resident advisor" for "proctor" and "TA" for "TF." We pretend we go to a school like all other schools, only with a slightly higher average GPA and a slightly worse football team.

But after a while, it gets to us. Resting on our laurels, we accept our exalted status, scorning deadlines and B-pluses, confident that our superior talents will carry us wherever we want to go. You begin to feel the righteous indignation. What, do you mean I have to apply to get tens of thousands of dollars to study abroad? I'm the elite! I could try out for The Real World! I mean, I go to Harvard! Alas, it is not so. The war we all won four years ago is being fought again. Oh sure, the battles have different names: GREs, LSATs and MCATs instead of SATs, and GPAs out of 15 instead of four. But the essays, the quest for originality and the unhesitating climate of self-aggrandizement is all the same. My roommates fight the good fight in business suits, interviewing day and night, or in jet planes, flying from one medical school to the next. I sit quietly with my computer, convincing my fingers to type great things about myself.

I am nearing the end of my rope. The amount of money I have spent on transcripts probably exceeds the annual budget of some small countries. I have declared my marital status so many times that I am tempted to adopt a few kids just to make that question on dependents more interesting. And please, don't ask me for my Social Security number; I'm sure you can retrieve it from one of the hundreds of forms out there that have it neatly typed in the upper right-hand corner.

Another night spent digging out the last liquid remnants of my roommate's white-out may spell my doom. If I have to ask for another recommendation commenting on the "suitability of my proposal," I may explode. Don't I deserve better than this? I go to Harvard!

For now, I must plod ahead and enjoy my remaining time here. The last snowy reading period, the carefree afternoons and my good friends (and my thesis) beckon to me. Someday, perhaps at our 25th reunion, perhaps sooner, we'll look back and laugh. We'll wonder why we worried so much about the future, which in retrospect will seem to have been quite clear. We will reach a point when those frantic high school days will have truly passed from existence, to rear their ugly head no more. We will have proven ourselves and we will be satisfied. After all, we went to Harvard.

Ethan M. Tucker's column appears on alternate Thursdays.