Anonymous asked: hallo good sir *tips hat
hi
Anonymous asked: hi colby this is taylor swift will you go to prom with me?
Yes I thought we already agreed on this!
Call me ;)
Darn
I’m already back at school which means I probably won’t write much for the next few weeks.
Pt. 3
1. 13 inch. MacBook Pro, that is (for all you people thinking dirty thoughts. :P) I’m not really a tech junkie, so I don’t really have much of an opinion on the 4S, other than that it’s a nice phone.
2. Not saying that. At all. In fact, I was definitely very excited when I got my UT acceptance letter today. I didn’t mean to sound elitist, if that’s the way it appeared.
3. In order: a) Taylor Swift at Madison Square Garden b) coming home and seeing my family again c) baking cookies for people d) man date with Jaemun e) my English teacher telling me that he gave me a really good grade on my Hamlet analysis paper.
4. I don’t know. The answer to that question is totally up to you :)
Pt. 2
1. Everyday except Sunday.
2. It’s pretty difficult, in my opinion. I definitely don’t get enough sleep at Exeter, because of all the schoolwork and extracurricular obligations. And it’s near impossible to break into the top 5% of the class.
3. Classified info.
4. Yes, I would consider it.
5. Maybe. I’d rather play polo than swim.
6. The school doesn’t rank students, so I don’t know…
7. Also classified.
Pt. 1
1. Nope, not at all! I think it’s definitely possible to go out and proactively be friends with people, even if you don’t normally spend much time with them. :)
2. Exeter definitely has diverse student body—geographically, socioeconomically, and in terms of character and personality too. There are certainly some snobby elitists, but they’re everywhere. Most people, in my opinion, are genuinely good people. For me personally, there are few people here that I don’t like. Exeter students are interesting people, with different interests, ambitions, and life stories. That’s what I like most about this place, the opportunity to meet all kinds of different people.
3. That’s gonna change soon!
4. Let’s not jump to conclusions…
5. Not enough xD I probably spend about 2 hours on homework each day/night, more if I’m working on a paper or project.
Marry me, Taylor Swift (and I’m gonna start writing more often)
I’d like to begin with an apology.
I have not written—at all—in the past two or three months. In fact, my last few posts are merely pictures that required little thought at all. I have not been responding to friends on Facebook, Tumblr, or text. I confess, I have logged onto Facebook and Tumblr—I just haven’t been active; I’ve been reading and looking at what others write and post.
For my unexplained absence, I am sorry.
I have no excuses. I can complain that this term—the infamous “senior fall”—has stripped me of mirth, optimism, and sleep, but it’s just not true. This term, I’ve had nights when I’ve slept little, and I’ve had nights when I’ve slept plenty. I’ve had days when the sun is shining, the birds are singing, and Taylor Swift is playing, and I’ve had days when the cold pries its way into my wet, clammy shoes, when I lose all confidence in my college admissions prospects, and when I realize that I’ve hurt the people I love and trust most. This term has been both good and bad, and while the workload has been stifling compared to any year before, it hasn’t been unmanageable.
In this post, I want to write about three things that are important to me—music, character, and friendship.
First, music.
Last night, instead of going home to Boston, I bypassed the city entirely and headed straight for New York City, the so-called “concrete jungle” glamourized by so many Hollywood films. There were three of us who were headed to Madison Square Garden, the last stop on Taylor Swift’s 2011 Speak Now World Tour. When we were looking to buy tickets in August, they were already sold out, so we had to buy them from a third party, making them over twice as expensive. It didn’t matter, though. It was Taylor Swift.
Still, all of Tuesday up until 9:22pm, when we finally stepped into the Garden, seemed to be part of a divine vendetta against us. I don’t know about Shinri’s or Vanessa’s Tuesday mornings, but mine began with a cryptically difficult physics final—one part of a problem in particular stumped me for nearly 20 minutes. After classes ended at 12:30, we boarded the bus to Penn Station, hoping to finally remove ourselves from our hectic lives at Exeter. But at around 1:45, to the dismay of all 50 students on the bus, we turned around 30 minutes into our trip to pick up a student—ONE student—who had made the critical mistake of thinking that the bus left at 2:00. No compensation for the other 50 passengers. No. We were all instructed to sit quietly and wait for this student to place his bags on the bus and take his time finding his way into an empty seat. The extra hour spent driving back to Exeter—multiplied by the 50 other students on the bus—was all lost because of one irresponsible person. Ms. Trueman tried to remind us that we all make mistakes, but she failed to make one distinction. We may all make mistakes, but we don’t all make mistakes that hurt 50 other people. Especially when 3 of them are headed to a Taylor Swift concert.
Not only did we have to turn around to pick up a student who missed the bus, but it was also raining heavily outside, intensifying the rush hour traffic clogging our path into New York. As we stood in the sweltering heat, waiting anxiously in the aisle for our plodding arrival at Penn Station, the hundreds of dollars that we’d spent on the tickets was rapidly becoming a reminder of the importance of having a Plan B.
Yet, as Harvey Dent reminds us, “The night is darkest just before the dawn.” And sure enough, events soon began turning in our favor, transforming this entire ordeal into perhaps the most memorable night of this term.
After we drop our bags off with Vanessa’s sister, we run, sopping wet, along and across streets to reach Madison Square Garden. As we’re running, I get the feeling, increasingly, that this chase scene belongs in some kind of movie. It’d be even better if Taylor Swift’s “Haunted” was playing in the background. As if to make this 5-minute episode even more movie-esque, Shinri completely wipes out as we run up the stairs to the Garden’s entrance, right into a puddle of water. Doesn’t matter. As we enter the main lobby, we hear Taylor Swift playing over the speakers. We’re getting close. We keep running, up stairs and escalators, until we reach Section 104. There, instead of a light at the end of the tunnel, it’s darkness, with scattered lights emanating from it and “You Belong With Me” ringing in our ears. Gosh, it was beautiful—panting, sweating, gasping beauty.
We stepped foot in the arena at about 9:22pm, 52 minutes after Taylor began performing, so in reality, we didn’t miss nearly as much her show as we had thought we did (although we didn’t get to hear her sing “Sparks Fly” or “Mine,” much to our disappointment). Honestly the best part was not just hearing Taylor Swift play live or being there for the last stop on her tour. What I remember most is Shinri and Vanessa next to me, screaming their hearts out, absolutely loving it, and radiating with pure joy. Because she’s had a tough fall term with PEAN and classes and volleyball and whatnot, it was especially unforgettable to hear Shinri screaming, “I LOVE YOU TAYLOR!!!” and belting out the lyrics along with Taylor. Despite the awkward glances from the overwhelmingly underage girls around us, I was proud to be there with her and Vanessa. There was no better way to end senior fall than this, seeing Taylor Swift live in New York City with two of my close friends.
I should probably sleep now, so I’ll write about the other two things later.
Love,
Colbs
Anonymous asked: I don't get it. I liked your post about not stressing and not worrying about success. But throughout the post, you casually name-drop Ivies, you scoff at rankings which clearly aren't up to YOUR standards, you talk about all the awesome essay-writing you'll get done, and it reeks of pretension and hypocrisy. You use 'praeteritio' to highlight everything you say doesn't matter. I'm not asking you to free yourself from the ridiculous pressures all Exonians face. I just want you to stop pretending.
If you can, I’d really like to talk to you more in person, if I don’t already.
I can see where you’re coming from. Just because I use Ivies as examples does not mean that I expect to get in. Noooooo. Not at all. Quite the opposite, actually. I use Ivies as examples because, well, I don’t really know. It just happened that way. (See my last post about Hopkins).
I don’t think I ever said or implied that my essay-writing would be awesome. It’s pretty far from awesome right now, to be honest.
Pretentious? Admittedly, yes, sometimes. And, recently it seems, quite often. I apologize sincerely. Being a pretentious hypocrite really sucks, and I’d rather not be one.
I had to look up “praeteritio” for its definition. Gosh you’re smart. But yes, I read through my post again, and I do mention things by denial quite often. I’m not sure how it’s necessarily a bad thing though.
Thanks :)
Allow me to explain myself
In my last post, I posed the question, “And how did Johns Hopkins even get to No. 13?” Yes, it implied that Hopkins didn’t deserve such a high ranking. But no, that does not mean it is a bad school. Rather, it is an excellent university with a superb international relations program and an even better medical school. I’m seriously considering applying.
So, to explain…My uncle on my mom’s side got his Ph.D. from Hopkins. And when he was studying there when I was younger, he used to make kind of a big deal out of it. Specifically, he told us that eventually if I was good enough to get into Johns Hopkins, he would pay for half my tuition. Yeah. That’s why I took a jab at Hopkins in my last post.
The neighborhood might be a bit shabby, but it’s really a great school.
Sean’s tumblr is seanykins.tumblr.com
1. Specifically, I really don’t know. But it’s always good to be confident and easygoing.
2. Hahahahahaha neither.
1. SEAN OLIVER, POST MORE YOU SILLY CHILD. OR I’LL UNFRIEND YOU. (jk no I won’t, but please post more).
(I copied this into his ask box.)
2. You’re absolutely right. Problem solved.
To the Colbear Nation
To the Colbear Nation:
I apologize for my recent writing dry spell. It is completely my fault. You have not done anything to wrong me; I have simply been lazy and negligent. That said, please continue reading.
I’m heading back to school on Tuesday, so I spent all of tonight packing (I never realized I had that much STUFF…). Today was a relatively chill day—church, friends, and family. After church, we went with another family to Good Harbor Beach near Gloucester, MA, and spent the afternoon playing volleyball and frisbee on the beach/in the water. One note: Northern Atlantic water is pretty chilly—every time I hit the volleyball my wrists would ache. Anyways, it was much more fun than I bargained for. I hadn’t even intended on getting in the water; I had originally planned to do some writing at the beach. But, the waves beckoned, and I obliged.
What I want to write about today is hopefully a topic that is pertinent to my readers. For seniors, many of us are stressing and agonizing over college apps, where we’ll end up next year, and how to cram as much fun into this year as possible without screwing up our academic and career trajectories. Juniors/uppers, you’re probably a) wondering if 11th grade really is the toughest year and b) dreading senior fall. Sophomores and preps, gtfo. Just kidding, I love you guys. But seriously, please enjoy what you have. Because you will want to do terrible things and commit unspeakable atrocities when you find out how stressful the second half of high school can be.
I don’t know if this is completely true, mostly true, hardly true, or completely false, but I’d like to put forth the hypothesis that people who are generally considered more “successful” typically don’t worry much about being successful. And no, I’m not saying that they don’t worry about succeeding or not because they already have succeeded. My conjecture is that they don’t stress.
Recently, we’ve become a society of comparisons. (Note that this is not true for everyone, so please don’t condemn me for generalizing a bit). My parents used to compare me to other students literally all the time. Now, not so much, but my mom will throw in the usual “(Insert name) is doing this. Why can’t you do it/Why don’t you know about this?” every once in awhile. Beauty is often relative—we measure ourselves not with an objective metric, but with the many and very different and always changing groups of people that surround us. In short, our physical self-image often depends on the attractiveness of the people around us. Having a six-pack is nice—until Jan shows up with his 8-pack. Rankings are perhaps the best and most obvious symptom of this obsession with comparisons. In many public schools, students are ranked based on GPA. Those of you in Plano know very well how destructive this can be. Colleges are ranked—based on a sometimes completely arbitrary and inappropriate set of criteria. Who’s to say that Princeton is a better school than Yale? And why didn’t Forbes place Exeter ahead of Andover in prep school rankings? (Because they made a mistake—Exeter is clearly a far superior institution).
The problem with these comparisons is that they pry their way into our lives. Eventually, we lose sight of our own goals, our own aspirations, and our own individuality, because we’ve been following an inconsistent definition of what success is. So let’s say you get into Harvard, the world’s top university according to the (abominable) U.S. News and World Report rankings. Does that mean you are successful? According to U.S. News and World Report, but not according to the rest of the world. In fact, Forbes would tell you that you’re only 6th most successful, after Williams, Princeton, West Point, Amherst, and Stanford. Ouch.
So, what was I saying earlier…oh yeah, successful people tend to not worry about being successful. It’s easy to pick out those “successful students” and to believe that they manage to accomplish what they do because they have excellent genes. Or that they work hard. Or, that they’re lucky. But, you know, I think part of the reason that they succeed at what they do is because they stop worrying about other people and focus on what’s important. We waste so much time fretting about other people, whether it’s calculating other students’ GPAs to get a picture of class rankings, worrying about how many students are applying to a certain college, or just agonizing over what other people will wear. All this precious time could be used to do something useful, to get work done.
Look around you. Those people who rise to the top—they don’t look below them and worry about if the others will catch up. They don’t look above them and worry if they’ll be able to keep climbing upwards. They don’t look around them and hope that their rivals mess up and fall back. They look forward, determine where they want to be, and go there. This is one of the reasons why I have so much respect for Martin (martinmoon.tumblr.com). This guy is incredible. He’s focused, he’s driven, and he has a clear idea of where he’s going. That doesn’t mean he’s an wound up tight—he’s one of the chillest (is that even a word?) people I know. If things don’t go the way he expects them to, then screw it. Start over. Punch in a new destination and hit go. “All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy,” so he takes time to build friendships and hang out. But he still sees the big picture and what his ultimate destination will be. Work hard and play hard, that’s what he does.
This hypothesis probably isn’t true for everyone. There are certainly people who rise to the top because they a) step on others to get there, b) cut corners, or c) don’t sleep and end up wound as tight as a spring. Frankly, I don’t think it’s worth it. In fact, if someone has to make these kinds of sacrifices to reach the top, I wouldn’t even say that they’ve succeeded. Success without integrity or health just isn’t whole.
For me, this whole post is, in a way, me taking a stab at rationalizing this whole college application process, an attempt at justifying a lower stress level for this fall. I don’t want to go to sleep every night worrying about whether I’ll get I’m good enough for the Ivy League. I don’t want to grow angsty and break out in pimples. I don’t want to neglect friends. So, I’m not going to worry about this stuff. Tomorrow’s my last day at home, and I’m going to make it count. Family comes first. You know what they say, bros before hoes. I don’t have a bro, but I guess my sister counts.
Okay, fine, maybe I’ll do some college essay writing tomorrow, but it won’t be that much. I promise. Maybe I’ll just spend the afternoon at Starbucks. Or just a few hours, depending on how much self-control I can muster up.
Love,
Colbert
Anonymous asked: HI COLBY.
HAI.
