I Love You, You're Perfect, Now Change

I'm looking through you. Where did you go? I thought I knew you. What did I know? You don't look different, but you have changed. I'm looking through you. You're not the same." --The Beatles

The Beatles had been my favorite group. Then Anne introduced me to the Grateful Dead two years ago during a creative trip to Israel for North American Jewish high school students, and I fell in love with the band. Anne and Kim were best friends from Washington, D.C., and the three of us became a trio early on. We had varied but complementary personalities.

Just as my musical taste changed over the summer of '95, the three of us evolved over the last two years. They are preparing for college, and I've just finished my first year. Seeing Anne and Kim in Washington this past weekend showcased our differences more starkly than any letter ever could.

The two of them had indicated via letters to me that they'd grown apart--two soul mates severed. I had trouble comprehending the divorce until my visit, during which they reunited. A bond still exists between them, but each one's life is so separate now that we spent an hour on Saturday having them update each other on senior year.

In Israel, the three of us would giggle and smile together regardless of locale. Whether we were hiking under the intense sun of the Negev Desert or exploring a Tel-Aviv mall, we enjoyed ourselves. We sang incessantly, especially Beatles songs. "Rocky Raccoon" was our favorite; we wrapped the country in that song. At any given time, one of us would break into song and the other two would join in and belt out the notes. We never felt embarrassed.

An anything goes attitude ruled that trip. If it hadn't the three of us might not have become a trio. Kim and Anne were both extraordinarily nice, mucho fun and very mellow. Superficially though, they were different. Kim was a prep in training, and Anne was the resident Dead Head.

Seeing the two of them last weekend was a bit jarring. I juxtaposed my memories of two summers past with the current reality. Anne, who had wanted to experience all the pleasures and beauty of life, has since become seriously involved with drugs. About a year ago, she overdosed on acid at a Phish concert and had her stomach pumped. The situation terrified Kim. Since then, Anne has gravitated toward the druggies; Tim, her current and first serious boyfriend, is a former dealer and a yo! boy. As a pale, blond, blue-eyed, non-Dead Head, Tim is the opposite of everything Anne ever sought in a boyfriend.

While Anne still has "her babies," the sand colored Birkenstock sandals she lived in while in Israel, she now wears Nike Airs. I was shocked. Nikes just don't say "hippie." She's taken to high fashion and expensive clothing. Anne even adores J. Crew. Two years ago, she would have recycled the catalogue without a second thought.

In the meantime, Kim has moved in with the preps. She does her share of partying, but the most negative force in her life is her boyfriend, Josh, the 6-foot-8-inch giant who towers over tiny Kim. I was prepared to love Josh based on Kim's contagious enthusiasm for him. He was awful. Hostile is an understatement. He delighted in harassing me for being a Harvardian: "You have a lot of losers there, don't you." He insisted that losers are not omnipresent in American colleges. When Josh matriculates in two weeks, Goucher will certainly have one.

Josh's indifference to Kim's request that he find a tape that she had lent him and he'd lost also irked me.

He insisted that she be satisfied because he'd found another tape he'd lost. Anne noted that Kim is (now) willing to compromise with regard to relationships. On our Israel trip, Kim was involved with a genuinely nice, albeit somewhat socially backward guy. Clearly her boyfriend-standard has changed, presumably along with her needs.

How have I changed? By coming to Harvard. Kim and Anne, who have known and loved me from my pre-Harvard days are unfazed--even as one heads off to a state school and the other to community college--but they are exceptional. Like all Harvard undergrads, I am no longer part of the huddled masses. Nowhere did I feel that distinction more acutely than at a Joe College drinking party on Saturday night.

One of Kim's co-workers from day camp, Pierce, hosted the bash. Pierce is of legal drinking age, but most of the guests were entering their first years of college. People were friendly enough as I mingled, especially since I came with Kim. However, each time the conversation turned to my schooling, there was a change. No longer was I just one more girl.

I became the Harvard it-girl. Some people became uncomfortable and moved on. Others began to ask me if I knew the one person from their elementary school who'd gone to Harvard, the one class genius whom they'd known of, but not known. Some wanted to know if Harvard is "a lot of work" and whether it's hard. During the night, two guys asked me to confirm stories they'd heard about life within our mysterious Ivory Tower. Another guy was thrilled to meet me because he'd never before met a Harvard student; he'd known theoretically that we existed, but he'd never seen living proof.

Brian, the other legal drinker, who decided that I was not drinking enough beer, assured me: "even though you go to Harvard, you can still drink." Thanks. His phraseology interested me because it summed up my existence among this crowd. It was fine that I was visiting, but I was an alien in their midst. Had I met these people without Kim's introduction, I would have been relegated to the corner.

Within the Kim-Anne-Missy trio, I have changed because of my college label and all that it implies. Inside I am also different from the first-year who matriculated last fall, but that is almost irrelevant. For those blinded by the glitz of the Harvard name, my individuality is insignificant. It upsets me that my college affiliation is a social Great Barrier Reef and that our tight trio is evolving in three different directions, but we still have a bond. We will always have Israel, and we will always have one another. "In my life, I love you more."

Melissa Rose Langsam '00-'99 is living at home in New Rochelle, New York and is working as a researcher for a political consultant while also pinch-hitting for six different Republican campaigns.