I left the country for the first time, I crossed the Atlantic for the first time, I went to Europe for the first time—all to be sexually attacked by a drunken birthday girl in a club (sadly, also for the first time).

Oh, and theatre. I love theatre. It’s a passion that has really become a large part of my life in the last couple of years. Hell, I’m the theatre editor. And this summer I got to see shows on the West End of London, in the Kennedy Center in Washington, at an outdoor amphitheatre in the D.C. area, on and off-Broadway, at a barn in Vermont (featuring my blockmate, Samuel H. Perwin ’04, who makes a dashing Harold Hill), and at a regional theatre on Long Island. And what was the number one theatrical experience of the summer? Well, I’ll be writing a column on that in the fall, so this paragraph was basically a teaser.

But this summer gave me enough material for a dozen columns and action-packed teasers for all of them. It was a rare summer. It was full of substance—a 9-week Congressional internship working 9-hour days, and sometime 15-hour ones. It was full of firsts and exciting people and places.

And when I think of it, at least while it’s still going on and before I’ve returned to Cambridge to digest more fully, it just keeps coming back to me in moments and in images. I think I will probably always view it that way. There will be the signs and lights of Leicester Square, the overpowering family circus that is the Vegas strip, the look on the face of a man who waged his last political campaign and must adjust permanently to life as a private citizen. The memories of this summer won’t soon fade, but as the years roll merrily along, I know what will remain brightest. I won’t have to search for the memory or close my eyes to call it up. It will always play in my mind’s eye. That view.

Adam R. Perlman ’04, a government concentrator in Currier House, is associate arts editor of The Crimson. This summer, he came home one day to find two bisexual girls in his room, wearing his clothing, and telling him he looked like Prince William. That's weird—because he doesn't see the resemblance.