When packing for college, I was completely and utterly lost. What was a normal amount of clothes to bring? Should I bring that jacket I always say I’m going to wear but never do? Do I even own a pair of jeans that I actually like? By the end of the process, I was sure that I hated all of my clothes and that I'd be walking around in sweatpants and an old tee shirt everyday no matter the weather. 

After unpacking my closet in my dorm (with many comments from my father about how absurd the amount of clothes I brought was), I felt somewhat better about the decisions I made. I also realized that I was so stressed about not just the clothes I was bringing, but the way people would view me at school. I knew absolutely no one when coming to Pitt except for my roommate that I had a few conversations with on Instagram before moving in. So, in my mind, the way I looked was my first impression, and I wanted so badly to woo those around me into wanting to be my friend. I thought that maybe they wouldn’t see how nervous I was speaking to them if they were distracted by a pair of sparkly earrings. 

I soon realized how flawed my plan was. I was putting on a facade, a performance even, to try to be seen by my peers. I didn’t want people to only like the polished version I presented to them; I wanted them to just like me. 

Soon enough, I was lucky to have found people that feel like home, even hundreds of miles away. 

After settling into my college life, I quickly became my friend group's communal closet. Every weekend I either lend a jacket, tiny top, belt, or some other accessory for one or more of my friends to wear out. I don’t even particularly like most of my closet still, but to them it seems to be gospel. As I walk over to their dorms with a spare pair of boots in hand, I think about how lucky I am. I get to watch some of my favorite people carry a small part of me with them and I feel so grateful that they trust me not only with their outfits, but their friendship too.

Written by Sara Duffy

I spend most of my classes hearing others talk about the current day and age. And without missing a beat, almost always, a political statement is prefaced with ‘not to be political.’ And while in part, this may be because of institutional pressure to continue with a specific narrative, I find myself perplexed by the statement. Not to be political. Well, then you know what you are about to say holds some type of political weight. And yet we all shy away from this idea. And more and more I find myself annoyed with the statement. If you’re going to say something, say it! But then I think a bit deeper, and I understand how the current (and not so current) political climate has made people apprehensive to state facts that have become politicized. But as we venture further into this reality we find ourselves in, I don’t accept the statement not to be political. 

For one, as a woman, my existence has become political. No longer are my reproductive choices, my voice, or my rights solely my own.  But as a white woman, I understand that I am also granted privilege within this world. So, when I hear others say not to be political, it is hard for me to understand as I know I am one of half the world’s population whose humanity has become politicized on the sole reason of my gender, let alone any other reason those within the world find their existence at the core of politics. I don’t want to hear in my writing intensive class on dystopian futures, a political genre at its core, not to be political. Because if this deeper understanding of what is political versus what is propaganda is not dismantled within our education system, we cannot fight through these times. Times in which everything is political, we should not be scared to counter this narrative. Health care should not be debatable. The right to a meal should not be able to be voted away. And a person’s identity should not factor into their right to be humanly treated. Not to be political. 

I’ve always been enamored with the mundane and everyday elements of life. There is something so raw, real, intimate, human about the unintentional marks we leave on our environment. Last year, while living in Squirrel Hill, I would walk by a USPS blue collection box on Beeler Street on the days I couldn’t catch my typical bus line. The reasons varied, but it was never a walk I took by choice or with enthusiasm. Often, I found myself alone, walking down a cracked and weathered sidewalk as the rain drizzled and the leaves muddled with the runoff flowing down the steep slopes of neighbors’ houses. On this route, there stood a lone, rusted, chipped, and absolutely-not-blue, USPS collection box. I was initially drawn to the box on a day similar to one just described. The collection box seemed to blend into its dreary grey environment like it was camouflaged. Despite its age, there were never any stickers or graffiti on the box; its only adornment is the worn orange tag on the side of the box. This observation felt jarring– USPS blue collection boxes are usually rotating displays of new tags, slap-ons, posters, flyers, stickers. It felt abandoned on a street so bustling with energy and life. I never saw anyone use the box either, so I remained wondering. Did anyone interact with this mailbox? As an artist, this lack of community interaction with the box in any format felt intentional. Its weathered appearance raises the question of “was it ever blue?”. It's odd how a once bold stand-out feature of our built environment could devolve to a decaying feature blending into its natural environment. The box always felt like a wallflower, and I was the only one who ever acknowledged its presence. 

I find myself drawn to USPS blue collection boxes because they act as a community hub. While the intended purpose of these boxes is to mail letters or postcards, it is also a place of creative expression of thoughts and imagery. When walking through the neighborhood of Oakland, where I live now, I see bright blue, rather pristine, collection boxes covered in stickers, messages, graffiti, and missing pet posters. No matter where they are located, all of these collection boxes are constantly adapting and changing in relation to the people around them. Every mark is purposeful, every mark is a testament to the human spirit. We crave connection and interaction with our environment. Whether this interaction is mailing your mother on the other side of the state a birthday card, or writing “LOVE THY NEIGHBOR,” on the box in bold letters it all has the same purpose. The contrast in its intended use and the social function it exhibits in its community is fascinating: it allows for communication in the local and the global. These public fixtures are not owned by any one person and as a result, they may be considered a mundane object to the average observer. They exist, but not beyond the realm of that fleeting moment you pass it on the street. It is not a desired object, not something someone wishes to possess individually. I find this to be a rare feature in the modern world, as almost everything is attainable with money. 

USPS blue collection boxes are a community staple. Even if someone were to purchase a retired USPS blue collection box, its allure and social function would be negated. They rely on the people around them to function and the environment to welcome them. The box I am most familiar with has aged drastically, bearing witness to children growing up and new generations being born. It still functions as a mail receptacle, while also wearing the stains of time and the marks of people who once occupied this neighborhood.

In order to find closure you must get everything off your chest. It’s hard. It’s uncomfortable. It’s vulnerable. It’s necessary. If you don’t lay everything out on the table, you’ll constantly wonder if things could be different. You don’t want to live your life without loving loudly and speaking your truth. 

I had a massive crush on one of my friends, and we started talking. One night the line of friendship was crossed. We agreed we needed to talk about it. When talking I was caught completely off guard that he wanted nothing. I didn’t say what I really felt. In part this was because I was shocked. For the next two months he continued to lead me on. He didn’t know I still wanted him because I told him otherwise. How was I supposed to get over him if I resented him for dominating our conversation, and his continued faux interest in me? I needed to get it all out. 

Jumping into the New Year from the comfort of my hometown friends and bubbles of champagne I call him and briefly explain how he made me feel. He apologizes. It’s not enough. I block him. I can’t leave things like that. I still see him everyday. I still haven’t explained my side. He doesn’t know how I feel. 

We come back for the second semester and we talk. I am so panicked that no matter how hard I thought about it, I still don’t know how to articulate how I feel. I panic. I read to him from my journal. I find the way to walk him through my feelings. There’s no blame. There’s no judgement. It’s about how I feel, and helping myself get the closure I need to move on. Unfortunately, it’s not about him. 

Life is too short to not tell someone how you feel. You need to have vulnerable and candid conversations to work your way through a difficult situation. Without truth you can never have closure. It’s your life, get it all out or be held back by the anxiety that you could have done more. 

For the past year and nine months, my relationship with my boyfriend has taught me so much about myself and how I navigate life. 

Although the honeymoon phase of my relationship has worn off, the awe of being loved by someone hasn’t. Every day I look forward to seeing my boyfriend, and I am always willing to drop all to help him with whatever he needs because I know that he would do the same for me. 

But, slowly, I noticed that I had started to center my relationship around being perfect for him, and not the actual connection between us. 

Most days when I woke up in the morning, I got ready thinking, “What would a girlfriend wear?” When I went grocery shopping, I thought of meals that I know he would like, even if it’s not something I would typically eat, and numerous times throughout the day, I would text, call, or even just wonder what he’s doing.

At first, I thought nothing of this. Habits shift when you're in a relationship, but what I thought was consideration was turning into clinginess. I started to become insecure about myself. That's when I began to wonder, “When did I lose myself in my own relationship?”

Before my boyfriend, I had never dated anyone– I had never even had a semi-successful talking stage, so when we started dating, I created this idea of “the perfect girlfriend,” and she was who I aspired to be. The so-called selfless things I was doing for him were fueled by my own insecurities. He’s never asked me to make him dinner, but in my mind, the perfect girlfriend knows how to cook (something that I am terrible at). He doesn’t ask me to help him tidy his room, but in my mind, the perfect girlfriend offers. He doesn’t ask me to pick him over my friends, but in my mind, the perfect girlfriend chooses her boyfriend above all. 

Sure, being in a relationship changes other things in your life, too, but being “the perfect girlfriend” became my whole personality, and it wasn’t something he had ever asked of me. It's cheesy, but I wanted so badly to be the girl that you take home to your family for the holidays or the girl that you buy flowers for every Friday, that I forgot who I am, what I stand for, and how to be content with myself. 

Although it took a while, I started to remember that he knew me before I was a girlfriend. When I was just me, dressing in what I wanted to wear in the morning, never offering to cook a meal for anyone, and especially not trying to be perfect for a man. I can’t create an unrealistic expectation for myself because, at the end of the day, he fell in love with me, not “the perfect girlfriend.”

Growing up, I had a unique combination of being shy while also badly-behaved. I was curious, and, naturally, a little bit annoying. I had chunky blue glasses, and I was the tallest girl in the classroom until I eventually peaked at 5’5”. “Why?” was my favorite word, and I wouldn’t hesitate to ask it! Even in inappropriate settings, because I had no situational awareness. 

Writing came easily to me. In elementary school, I won the end-of-year “Best Writer” certificate three years in a row. My high school superlative was “Most Likely to be a Famous Writer.” My dad once told me that me choosing not to write would be like Muhammad Ali choosing not to box. That hurt my feelings, and I couldn’t tell why. 

Writing was something that I could use to make myself easier to understand, because, at the risk of sounding corny, I have felt hard to understand for most of my life. Personal essays allowed readers to see me for who I was beyond their initial perceptions. 

In college, I obviously chose to major in English Writing. Thinking back, this is probably when I started to fall out of love with it. 

We have so many talented writers on campus. I quickly realized I was no longer the best. In fact, I may be terrible! 

As late assignments started piling up–even as a senior, they still pile up, and I feel like I never fully adapted to a college workload–I got more and more discouraged. I would write whatever got me a passing grade, and I faded into the background as a below-average student. I write for fun, it doesn’t work. It feels like nails on a chalkboard. 

The fear is, maybe I only wrote because it was what I thought I was supposed to do.

I recently had a meeting with one of my favorite professors in the English department. I was listing my concerns to her, and she said words that were equally freeing and terrifying: “You don’t have to write anymore, if you don’t want to.”

My first thought was that I still have to finish my major, so she’s technically wrong, but she had a point. Why does this have to be my creative outlet? I’m not chained to writing personal essays, but consciously choosing to give it up entirely feels like a death sentence. 

So, I concluded that I do love writing–maybe just not right now, or at least, not in the way I used to. I like writing scripts, and talking about media critically. I like interviewing people, and researching. I guess I’m just not in the mood to get personal. 

Maybe I finally don’t feel the need to justify my every action to you through recounting my own inner dialogue. I now need to understand the world as I see it. But, one day, I have faith that I will inhale and exhale again. You’ll all hear from me when I do. 

During one of my literature classes this week, we discussed whether or not parents should have a say in what books are being shelved in school libraries. I’ve always found this question quite ridiculous, because, though parents may have kids, that does not make them experts in children’s development. There are people who dedicate their entire lives to studying what children should and shouldn't be reading, what good material looks like for kids, and how to best present information to children. People dedicate their entire lives to this study, so why all of the sudden do people think that they know better than these experts? 

This was the question that raised in my mind that then led to a line of thinking about why everyone nowadays thinks they need to be an expert in everything – or worse, why they think they already are. It's an interesting phenomenon and something you see happening throughout everything; whether that be proper medical treatments for certain ailments, or nutrition and health sciences and the best diet plan for you! A large part of this has to do with the idea that we can learn everything because of our access to technology. The development of these technologies, and our access to information, is a good thing. I'm not trying to dispute that or change that by any means, however, I do think that it is important to notice that you aren't an expert on something just because you've read an article on it. You do not know everything about vaccines or global politics because you simply have not dedicated your life to the study of these fields. And that’s okay. I think people nowadays are really uncomfortable with not knowing things. Which is unfortunate because this is how communities and relationships are built. You don't have to know everything because there are people around you who do know these things. I'm lucky enough to have friends who are not all English majors; some are biology majors, some are education majors, some are urban planning majors, and others are film and art history majors. My friends all have different subjects and the other people in my life contain these differences as well. My mom is a psychologist and my dad is a property developer and my brother wants to be a sports medicine doctor. Together, we have a plethora of knowledge and our combined knowledge leads us to being one whole community. One that's able to help and pick up the pieces where others lack. It's important to not know everything. 

It's important to not be skilled in everything, because if you were, then what's the point of talking to anyone? What's the point of trying to learn other people's skills and getting to know what other people are good at? What's the point of learning if you already know everything? And we need to learn to grow.  

I was recently scrolling through Instagram reels after a long day of classes. Tini, my maybe 3-month-old kitten (she’s a barn cat, so the age is a guesstimate) was biting at my toes when I came across one of those inspirational videos of people being surprised. I’m a sucker for a feel-good funny moment, so I stayed and watched. About halfway through the video, a scene of two older women, titled as being best friends, were reunited. As I am scrolling through the comments and as they laugh and hug, I stumble across a comment that says, ‘imagine how many times they had to forgive each other.’ This really struck me. I’ve never thought about the bad times in friendship longevity. I guess I had assumed everyone got along and were magically perfect. Never did I think a connection like that was a thing that was worked for. 

Of course I have had my own hardships in the friend section. And more recently, as I grow—and scroll—I realize not everything is cut and dry. Things are messy, people are messy. And that is the best part. The mess, the joy, the excitement, the passion, the love. But friendship doesn’t just stop there. With every mess, there needs to be clean ups. There are apologies, and brevity, and awkwardness. I’ve realized that doesn’t mean things are broken, it doesn’t cancel out the good times. Instead, it is a testament to the foundation that love is built upon. Forgiveness, as well as accepting when one is wrong, isn’t an easy feat. If it were, nobody would fear messing up. And to be honest, I don’t think the two women on my screen would be as happy as they look. If every building fell in San Francisco when an earthquake hit, people would stop living there. But the city thrives. Because in our hearts, as people, we forgive. We pick up the mess, even when it isn’t easy. And we keep going. Because everybody deserves to be the people on my screen, at 10pm at night, making me tear up at the love radiating through the screen. Okay, maybe the tears are from Tini, but the effect is still the same.