Since the smoldering hues of October's leaves grayed into the monotony of November, I've been craving Thanksgiving break. It's not so much about the very brief pause in classes (but really, why can't we just have a week?).
My mother's stuffing, though constantly "evolving," is not what lures my mind away from endless readings on the Cold War, and if I'm being completely honest and objective, my bed on Winthrop Street is cozier than the one to which I return.
It is instead an ethereal yearning for "going home" that brings giddy eagerness to the insipidity of the mid−semester lag. Home for me has become emblematic of everything my current life lacks.
It is a mystical place frozen into flawless wonder, an alternate reality where my intellect is crisper, my smile is brighter and my idiosyncrasies are charming: this world that knows none of the imperfections that speckle my college life and overlooks the dysfunction and blemishes of any genuine past.
A disappointing test, a botched attempt at flirtatious banter, a lackluster Saturday night and the Hot Vermont Cereal mornings at Carmichael — all these pains find a simple solace in daydreams of a boundlessly blissful home.
I know a lot of people that don't feel this way. Many find themselves liberated by the ability to detach from their past worlds, blazing new trails and crafting fresh identities. Rendering your former self as an artifact of the past seems to be the code to enter into the club of adulthood and success — after all, there's nothing sadder than the 30−something who still relishes in the glories of high school, or the aging parents who keep sultry teenage photos on the mantle.
Popular culture depicts life as dictated by an inevitable pendulum of luck, and everyone hopes the peak of its swing is still to come. The alluring underdog narrative, after all, begins with a melancholy adolescence.
Even for those who occupy a healthier middle ground on the nostalgic spectrum, returning home forces one to stand squarely with a past largely constructed by our self−selected memories, and it shakes the identity we've made for ourselves since our departure.
As it turns out, it is neither eternally radiant nor perpetually storming in our real hometown, and the cracks in our seamless adaptation of the past threaten to rupture at any moment. Likewise, we gracefully tumble back into our role as the youngest child, the eccentric musician, the domineering friend … no matter how differently we may introduce ourselves on the Hill.
Of course, Thanksgiving is often quick enough to glide over a lot of this. The euphoria of reunions and home−cooked meals can endure for an extended weekend and provide enough exhilaration to glaze over the fault lines of a fabricated memory. Our selective remembrance of home as emerald and enchanted just may persevere through finals because we were too busy devouring turkey to pay any attention to that mediocre man behind the curtain.
The painful brevity of Thanksgiving break may force us to travel on the worst days of the year, but perhaps Tufts had our best interests in mind after all.
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Amanda Johnson is a senior who is majoring in international relations. She can be reached at Amanda.Johnson@tufts.edu.
