BUT THE THING dorms are interested in most of all is studying. Everyone is willy-nilly identified as a student and thrown into a schedule that has a relentless momentum of its own. There is no sense for the individual when she wakes up in the morning that she has a day to do with as she wishes. Studying is not a free and personal thing but a compulsory activity by which an atom holds its place in the mass. Everyone studies all the time and worries whether everyone else isn't studying better, another imaginary cheese mistake. "Are you working again?" peoule ask each other in deprecation. It worries them to see others working, especially if they seem to be enjoying it.

What happens is that the conditions of the dorm limit people's ability to make their own choices. The individual is subordinated to the rules, to the pressure of friends, to the harrassment of the crowd. The worrying about work is a sign that the individual can't find out, much less fulfill, her potentialities. Instead, she adopts the common standard and resorts to comparisons to measure her own worth. Her initiative is cut off. She needs friends to an artificially-heightened degree, and the reliance on friends promotes conformity and excessive hunting for security. The groups of friends that spring up are defensive units, mechanisms for keeping out the threats of existence. Their cost is resistance to new and unexpected alternatives. Awareness gets lost and apathy takes over. Guilt -- the feeling of not doing what one could be doing--pervades everything. Energy is diverted from action to depression, and talk flips back and forth on two-way switches.

The Plural Life

Here is an actual conversation over heard at lunch and at breakfast the next day:

Two round girl with identical meals sit down at lunchtime.

"It's tuna. I love tuna," the first says.

"They should have tuna twice a week."

"Oh no--we forgot to take our pills this morning."

"That's right."

"I'm going to start my paper right after lunch."

"You're too conscientious."

"Did you see Steve today?"

"Yes, I saw him when he came out of class and I said hi and he said hi and we walked together all the way to Mass Ave. and he didn't say anything and I didn't say anything. It was awful. I don't know what to do."

"We'd better do our exercises."

"Yes. We forgot on Wednesday."