morning shrine by Veronica P. '27

this morning i was awake at 6am. on the other end of one of those things i do where i allow myself to fall asleep, once my brain has settled to mush and past it’s point of productivity, and i tell myself that when i wake up early the next morning, i will be clean, shiny, and focused, and do all the work i want to do. in this grey-blue light i am not quite clean, shiny, or focused, but i am renewed and on my way to being those things. the sweat of a sleep well slept is sticking onto my skin, and the weight of my blanket is insisting that i don’t have to be at my meeting until 11:30. why not stay a while?

when i wake up i face the side of my dresser. i’ve taped a sign my friend made when i picked her up from the airport my sophomore year: “HAPPY BDAY VERO <3.” last spring i added, atop the dresser, a box from my roommate that reads, “RONNIE’S 21st!” the idea of these being the first words i read each morning reminds me of a taylor swift lyric. i don’t love it, but i have enough nostalgic sentimentality towards t.s. to know it: “I’m so depressed, I act like it’s my birthdayyyyy every day!” it doesn’t quite apply, at least currently. maybe it can be called a preventative measure.

last spring i also added, to this morning shrine, an award i got from doing well in one of my classes. it is the single most tangible piece of academic validation that i have gotten at this institution, so i cherish it with A+ fridge-magnet levels of pride. for some reason, when i look at it this morning, i think of a conversation i had at 3am this past summer, on a rooftop on beacon st.

in the midst of catch-up, i mentioned that i had just decided to try for grad school, post-MIT. a good friend, the second friend i ever made at this school, overhears and interjects with an exaggerated sigh of relief: “finally.” when prompted, he explained that it was obvious that this was the path for me. any of my “confusion” over these past few years was just fear manifesting: intimidation about straying from my industry-oriented friends, dread at the thought of going for what i truly want and not getting it. it was the “finally” of a reader who had figured out whodunnit by Chapter 2,  finally getting to see the detective piece together that the killer was right there all along. 

i don’t know how much of that friend’s conviction is true. the thought is nice to contemplate, to believe every once in a while. certainly when i am budgeting times to chip away at applications and planning professors to ask for letters of recommendation, it is reassuring to buy into the idea of a true calling. a purpose that exists for each person to uncover from their depths, right there all along. the veil lifting is my litmus test, the indication that i have matured enough to look my calling in the eye and pursue it.

it is nice to believe it is true. words like these instill a confidence, perhaps undue, that i need to make it through the worst parts of this Fall. to push through the weight of my blanket and convince other people, not just myself, that grad school could be a tangible next step for me. not like when i asked my academic advisor, a week ago, if i might not be ready, compelling her to adamantly affirm, “yes, you are.” i take these words as part of my morning shrine, as well, and work on being that affirmation myself.