Winter is Coming

I write bearing both good news and bad. The good news is that Aretha Franklin just released a cover of “Rolling in the Deep.” The bad news is that summer has officially ended.

I’m sure you’re looking around, thinking, “No kidding. It’s been cold for the better part of a week, and I still don’t have a job!” Indeed, the time for long johns and even longer cover letters has arrived. And so forgive me for writing this paragraph while lying outside on Sunday, getting a last minute sunburn before the sun follows all of Quebec to Fort Lauderdale for the winter. You see, I am writing this from the past! Just think: Relative to me, you are in the future. Frankly, I find this whole setup very meta. Call a DeLorean, or a psychiatrist.

There are others, I’ve found, who find autumn to be a little bit of a downer. Just the other day, I ran into a visitor who stopped me in my hurried tracks. “Excuse me, do you know where I can find some uppers?”

“Umm, like coffee, or Prozac?” I’m not so sure we were on the same page.

By Anna Papp

Moods notwithstanding, the signs of change are all around us. The Jewish high holidays are in full swing, bringing with them all sorts of acts of repentance and essay extensions. Once the holidays start, we barely have a chance to catch our breath before they start all over again next year. Before you know it, we will be celebrating Hanukkah, then Free Pancake Day at IHOP, then Passover, all of which have their own culinary traditions and religious implications.

It’s been tricky of late, though, to figure out why someone is wearing a suit. Sometimes it’s for holiday services. Other times it’s for job interviews. Or it might be a sophomore or junior headed to a punch event. As former Harvard President Larry Summers so eloquently opined, “One of the things you learn as a college president is that if an undergraduate is wearing a tie and jacket on Thursday afternoon at 3:00, there are two possibilities. One is that they’re looking for a job and have an interview. The other is that they are an asshole.”

I suppose Harvard could have just birthed a small army of Brooks Brothers-clad sphincters, or the department store might have hired them all for what must have been an expensive marketing campaign. Or maybe there is a particularly large crop of applicants for Eleganza. I don’t really know.

What I do know is that I’ve spent far too much time watching these long processions of fashionistos. I also know that those walking around in suits do not leave much time for problem sets. Between picking out their multicolored socks, and tying their ties, and marching around, and untying their ties, the whole day is taken up!

I was watching one of these pageants the other evening, listening to some of the most ridiculous conversation I’ve heard since sitting in the back of Rosh Hashanah services, and right on cue a freshman took it upon himself to check his watch and realize that he was late for section, or lab, or whatever he had that particular evening. There is absolutely nothing more entertaining to a senior than watching a freshman run with a backpack, with the possible exception of watching multiple freshmen run with backpacks.

I already miss the lazy days of summer, when we hadn’t yet started looking for a place to spend the next few years, whether it be J.P. Morgan or the Porcellian. But the time has come to solve our problem sets and essays and finish Crimson articles that were apparently due an hour ago. After all, winter is coming.

Just don’t forget to listen to Aretha. It’s a pretty good upper.

Jacob R. Drucker ’15, a Crimson editorial writer, is an economics concentrator in Mather House. His column appears on alternate Thursdays.