day one

Today was the first day of the Michaelmas Term (pronounced "mikulmus"). It's also been one of those offbeat days I have now and again that makes me question whether or not I'm fit to function in the modern world. No need to belabor the point, yet an anecdote about this evening's dinner adventure more or less captures the general tone of the day:

To begin with, I missed cocktails at the Stats Department and the subsequent meeting with reps from UBS, an international investment bank, because I was preoccupied scheduling for the week and drafting a personal budget. Bummer. "That's OK," I thought, "at least I have a tasty second hall dinner to look forward to in a couple minutes." Then I flipped through the grad student handbook to double check the price of second hall and read that tickets to second hall must be purchased the morning of. Bummer again. "No worries," I said to myself, "after drafting this budget I'm realizing that eating in the hall every meal is going to break me financially. I'll go grocery shopping." Though pickings at Sainsbury's are pretty slim by 8.30pm, I picked up the ingredients I needed for spaghetti and meat sauce and headed home. After I got back I realized I'd purchased egg noodles, which, it turns out, taste nothing like real spaghetti. Yet I pressed on. After fighting with our erratic stove for 45 minutes to bring a third of a pot of water to boil I finally got the pasta cooked, and in the process of trying strain it dumped the whole batch in the kitchen sink. Sigh. I turned on the cold water, fished out the noodles by hand, and after a successful second attempt sat down to giant plate of soapy, overcooked egg noddles and fairly decent meat sauce. I distractedly offered up a half-hearted prayer of thanks for how well I eat, finished my meal, and came up here to write this post.

That's kind of how transitions go, I've noticed. Wherever you go, there you are. For all the build up, at the end of the day we're simply people trying to get along in the world. Moreover, our idiosyncrasies have a tendency of following us wherever we go. I may be a Rhodes scholar, studying a challenging subject at one of the world's most prestigious universities, yet disaster-fraught days like today make me marvel that I manage to stumble my way into opportunities like these. "You keep coming back, kid," Tim would say to me over the summer, "and in the end that's what matters." I may not be the sharpest stick in the box, but when it comes to getting things done I guess I function pretty well as a blunt instrument :-)

Typos and sour notes are inevitable in the process of crafting novels or composing symphonies, though, and as I prepare to turn in for the evening I'm reminded of how much there is to be thankful for here. After spending quite a bit of time on last weeks preterm exam I'm entering week one confident that my basic grasp of the mathematical theories and techniques necessary to succeed in my course are strong. Class went well today. I landed a spot in the Hertford Chapel Choir and am looking forward to developing my singing. Last weekend I walked down to the Worcester College boathouse along the banks of the Thames under a warm October sun: I'm eager to try rowing, and have heard that the end-of-term Christ Church Regatta is nothing short of an absolute blast. Relationships with my fellow scholars continue to deepen as well: last Friday night our friend Jason hosted a dinner at his place that included fine wine, cheese, homemade foccacia bread, and pasta. Finally, rather than confronting the challenge of a scarcity of fellowship I'm having to be discerning in choosing which of the many awesome Christian groups to associate with at Oxford.

So in the end all's well. Interestingly enough, however, I feel strangely disassociated from all this, even as I'm in the middle of it. After striving intensely through four years of undergrad it's as if I've come full circle, except this time I'm a "fresher," not a "freshman." I suppose some of the novelty has worn off by this point, which I think is a good thing. It leaves me more free to honestly question the purpose of my time hear and structure my life accordingly.

Love you all, thanks for staying tuned!