"I play a game with the registrar," he says. "It leads to great sectioning problems [because] I don't know how my schedule is going to look until well into the course."

But for Bresman, who is now trying to settle on a thesis topic, indecision goes well beyond academics and choosing majors.

"I have that typical indecisiveness," says Bresman. "Supermarkets are very problematic for me...they are fun on several levels."

While Bresman says he enjoys the challenge of trying to choose from the various types of foods, he is often distracted by his fascination with watching elderly people shop.

Categories of Indecision

Bresman's case may seem somewhat extreme, but his dilemma is shared by scores of undergraduates who spend the first few months of each semester filling out add/drop forms and trying to return books to the Coop.

And the breeding ground of indecision may very well be the Yard, where hundreds of first-year struggle with majors, housing and Room 13's eternal question, "Was I the mistake?"

One embarrassed, advanced standing first-year, who could not decide if he wanted his name to appear in this article, said that in his first two semesters, he has already dropped four classes and nearly declared four different majors--he even considered taking three of them together as one big joint concentration.

But he says the problem has not been indecision. Instead, it has been difficult for him to realize his own limitations.

"I found out I was crashing, it was really bad," says the disgruntled first-year. "I had no idea what college would be like, [and] the other first-years seem to know exactly what they want."

Originally, the first-year had intended to tri-major in engineering, economics and East Asian studies. He has since settled on economics, with Japanese as a sub-field.

"I lost my confidence, I got blown away but I'm getting better now," says the Yardling, who is currently taking five classes and wishes he could be taking a sixth.

"It's shopping period still, isn't it?" he asks innocently.

Fellow first-year Juliet Lee says that upon arriving in Cambridge, she, too, out of place.

"Everyone else here seems to know what their doing," says Lee. "Sometimes it takes me some time to decide what it takes to make a decision."