For twenty-nine days I had been waiting for February to be over--and it finally was. But somehow, I wasn't feeling much better. I was fed up with Harvard, fed up with anality and fed up with the male-dominated economic superstructure that, according to all the anal Harvard students in my classes, dominated modern society.

Luckily, I was not alone in my winter of discontent. My roommate was feeling the same way. "Wouldn't it be great," she said, "If you could simply turn off all of this stuff and get out of your brain for a while?" I snorted and turned to my latest copy of the Crimson.

And there, in huge, block letters, was the solution all my problems, my key to understanding.

"LEARN TO MEDITATE: FOUR MEDIATION INTENSIVES."

The ad jumped off the page and into my inner conscience. In the middle of the page was a computer-drawn picture of Buddha, floating in an utterly tranquil, vaguely Eastern-looking landscape. My soul fluttered with excitement as I gazed at the sketchily rendered mountains, caves and lakes swimming around the serenely smiling Buddha. "Enlightenment...nirvana...soul mates ...concentration and meditation," the ad guaranteed. I was sure that here, in these totally "FREE" Boston Meditation Society sessions, was the remedy to my malaise.

My roommate was a excited about this as I was. One Saturday afternoon, we schlepped over to the Inn at Harvard, where these exercises in growth were to be held. As we entered the hotel, we had very little idea what to expect. Robed monks with shaved heads? Lost hippies in beads and ethnic clothing? Shirley Maclaine?

What we resembled none of these. Instead, we beheld two clean-cut yuppies in pin-striped suits two introduced themselves as Larry and Steve. They ushered us into the neat, pastel-saturated meeting room and offered us a beverage of our choice. The drinks were on a table set with a tablecloth, doilies and long-stemmed water glasses, the chairs were lined up in neat little rows.

All of this would have completely normal if we were attending a real estate seminar or a Harvard Club function. But a mediation session? My roommate and I exchanged glances and sat down.

This is not what I expected, I thought as I looked around. Shouldn't we be sitting in a circle with our legs folded? Where's the incense? Why are Larry and Steve dressed like stockbrokers, and shouldn't they have more glamorous names? I knew I looked puzzled. Larry must have noticed it too, because I soon saw him coming toward me from the corner of my eye.

"So," he said, casually sticking his hands in his pockets," How'd you hear about us?"

"The Crimson," I said, smiling.

"Oh. Did you see the Eastern ad or the Western One?"

I looked even more puzzled.

"We had two different ads..."

"The Eastern one," I said slowly, the smiling computer Buddha floating through my mind. "The one with the Buddha."