Meet Silvia.
Silvia is our new mascot. She is a stuffed rat that my sister taxidermied for one of her classes. Silvia has decided to accompany us on our adventure, because my sister’s boyfriend does not want her to stay in his house in Boston while we are away.
Perhaps I should introduce my sister. Her name is Erin. For this adventure, we are pretending to be twins. This is her with a bowl on her head. As personalities go, we make very compatible twins.
Erin is actually 23 and has graduated from Middlebury, but for the purposes of this SEA Semester adventure, she is 20, a junior at Middlebury, and has adopted my birthday so we can turn 21 together in March.
Just as Erin is not actually 20, Silvia is not actually female. In fact, Silvia used to be a male rat with certain “frighteningly large” attributes. Erin decided not to stuff those, so Silvia now lives her life out as a female stuffed rat.
As we drove to Woods Hole from Boston on Tuesday, Silvia adorned our dashboard, sprinkling it with dandruff as her lovely white cotton ball eyes gazed down the rainy roads. Finally, after months of anticipation, we were on our way.
Fortunately, Silvia did not accompany us to orientation. She may have given us a great conversation starter, however, I’m not sure how much she would increase our chances of making friends.
Perhaps it was Silvia’s absence, but it seems that we have successfully made friends in what I would consider record time. I was shocked by how many different kinds of people are in this program. East coast, west coast, that middle part. Even Italy and Mexico. Yet despite the differences, each and every one of these individuals is incredibly friendly, charismatic, and very willing to play frisbee.
I live in “A” house, while Erin lives in “B” house. Since houses spend a lot of time together doing daily activities such as cooking, grocery shopping, talking about feelings, and sliding down the stairs on mattresses, it doesn’t take long to bond with your housemates.
After orientation, Wednesday dawned bright and sunny, reminding all of us that we were starting school again. We were familiarized with classes, professors, and the community of Woods Hole.
The tour of Woods Hole was especially fascinating, with the visit to its Marine Biological Laboratory Library being the highlight. Very casually, our guide pulled out old science journals, Nobel Prizes, and even a signed copy of the Origin of Species.
Old science journals – each is hand-painted with illustrations of each species.
Yup. A real signed copy of Origin of Species.
A Nobel Prize for the discovery of green fluorescent protein – a discovery based in Woods Hole.
Within the first couple days, Nautical Science has quickly become my favorite class. I’m relieved that most other people have also never sailed before. This probably shouldn’t comfort me, but at least we’re all clueless together. In this class, we cover topics like reading “charts” (the nautical word for “maps”, apparently), celestial navigation, knots, and other important topics pertaining to how we will actually sail this boat thing.
Sailing this boat thing will require a little more than just Nautical Science, it turns out. It will also require all the twenty-two students aboard to put aside small squabbles or grudges, and work together as a team. Within the first three days, there are already some very interesting and charming characters emerging. My roommates are boisterous and endearingly inappropriate. My housemates are a calm and jovial group, with many gushy feelings, delicious recipes, and never-ending support to share with each other.
As the days go by, my other classmates’ personalities have become more and more evident. As we prepare to spend six weeks basking in each other’s body odors, it’s nice to know that I’ll get along well with everyone in this group. Everyone here is slowly but surely cohering as a (semi) functional group, and this gives me hope that in a few short weeks, we may actually be able to do this sailing thing.