There and Back Again

            I was about to go home for Thanksgiving break, about to see everyone who had been everyone I knew up until last August. My childhood home was a certain lovely way of being with certain people whom I loved. By this definition, I ardently hoped that home would essentially reform when we all returned. If the interactions between people changed dramatically, or the people themselves were greatly altered, my home would be gone. How would the profoundly novel experience of college under everyone’s belts manifest when we all regrouped?

            I hypothesized that my grade’s popularity hierarchy would evaporate. Such a hierarchy is sustained by people below thinking that they are lesser, while those above them are greater, and by people above thinking the opposite. At its core the popularity hierarchy is a socially accepted gradation of status. This status, however, came to determine who was friends with whom, and who went to what parties. I assumed that because my grade was no longer forced to interact, forced to look at one another while we looked at ourselves, that we would not be compelled to define ourselves relativistically. I figured that without status relativism, certain people would be empowered while others would be disempowered.

            During break, I observed an interesting phenomenon. The previously “less popular” people neither thought of themselves as lesser, nor thought of the previous popular people as greater: they undermined the past hierarchy, and were generally accepting of anyone into their parties. However, the previously “more popular” people were exclusive with their own gatherings, and they took advantage of the generosity of the other groups. Exclusivity only generates esteem when others want to join in. There wasn’t so much a reversal of power as a removal.

            My relationships with the Wellesleyites I love were largely irrespective of the original hierarchy; therefore, the “new order” did not jeopardize my home. Furthermore, I found that my friends, like myself, had new ideas and abilities but the same hearts. I was truly able to go home.

            Now I’m at my other home.