Three Days, Free Days

           President’s Day meant a three-day-weekend, and I think everyone needed it. For me, Thursday was the low point in last week. Instead of just snowing, it rained on and off all day long, which made for very slushy, very inimical weather. Besides that I was trying to get a bunch of things done, and more things kept appearing that needed doing, and my physics lab ran half-an-hour late due to technical difficulties. I had hoped that the devices in physics labs would like me better than their chemistry counterparts, but it wasn’t meant to be. The day ended with the 12:30 am submission of a grant application before I finally got to sleep.

            I’ll get to the weekend in a second, but I wouldn’t want to skip Valentine’s Day. They had candy hearts in the dining hall – the last time I remember having those was 1^st grade! Apparently it’s a tradition in UC for the guys and the girls to get together and do something cute for the other group. And this year, everybody forgot, which led to a series of awkward secret meetings and conversations.

“How are you guys doing with the song?”

“The song – oh, yeah, we’re doing great! What about the girls?”

“Oh, yeah, it’s great! Ah - let’s just do sectionals a little longer, okay?”

“Sounds good, okay!”

Everyone turned a blind eye to the fact that we obviously weren’t in sectionals: half of our tenors are girls, and they were with us. We did eventually get the song learned, and just as we were finishing up, the guys came into our room with an awesome rendition of “My Girl” – or in this case, “Our Girls.” We coupled this with our own performance of “Just the Way You Are.” It was really sweet. And we also had truffles, which make everything better.

Saturday, though, was the real high point of the week. It takes a lot to get me to decide to do something – without a lot of prior planning, I’m liable to just stay on course. Apparently, this is the metaphorical version of mass: conformation to inertia. So I was pretty excited when I determined that I was actually going to go into Boston for the morning.

I visited the Museum of Fine Arts, but I got there before it opened, so I spent thirty minutes just walking around and enjoying the scenery – there were some monuments in that area, and an adorable little bridge over a half-frozen stream with lots of squirrels and ducks and geese to take pictures of. The museum itself was also splendid; I didn’t get to spend nearly as long as I would have liked, and I want to go back (it’s free for Harvard students). The most popular exhibit was the impressionists – Van Gogh, Monet, Degas, Cézanne, and others. I hadn’t been to a museum in forever, and I had a great time.

I had lunch in Boston and then headed back to Harvard to visit the Harvard Museum of Natural History (HMNH) and Peabody Museum (both also free). They were much smaller than I’d thought, but very interesting. I’ve never seen so many skeletons and stuffed animals on display before. Those displays were more for education than pleasure – now I’ll know a wombat if I see one – but they were enjoyable as well.

The only really weird part was seeing a human skeleton standing next to those of various primates in the Hall of Mammals. It was kind of sad looking at all the stuffed animals, imagining how much power and magnificence they would hold if they weren’t dead. But a human skeleton used to be a person, a person with dreams and wants like mine, who could communicate with me if they were still alive. Who knows? Maybe that’s where my skeleton will end up someday.

As I walked back from the HMNH a light snow had begun, and the street was quiet enough that the hush of the new-fallen snow could be appreciated. It was a perfect, peaceful ending to my holiday. After that it was supposed to be back to work, since it was only early afternoon, but I couldn’t bring myself to do it, so instead I gave up on my other goals for the day and finished my short story instead. It turned out longer than I’d thought – 49 pages, single-spaced – but I like it, which is more than I can say for some of my writing when I’m done with it, so I’m happy.

The rest of this weekend has been spent drafting papers, working through a take-home physics quiz, and reading through chapters and articles for various classes. We had a social for UC last night that I went to for a little while, which was pretty fun. And now it’s time to sit down, plan out the rest of the week, and make sure everything gets done. But my feet are propped up on the heater and comfortably warm, my sweats are soft and comfy, and at the moment I’m very calm and satisfied with life, and with the weekend in general. So I’d say, in the overall balance, this week was a success.