It wasn’t on my to-do list. It wasn’t a New Year’s resolution. I ate. I slept. I showered. I wrote in my journal. For nearly a year before starting college, I wrote in a journal regularly. It wasn’t regimented or planned. Just as I shower when I feel dirty, I wrote when it felt right to write. 

I recounted events from my life—what I ate, where I went, and with whom. I filled pages with rants and opinions about things big, small, and positively minute. I wrote full essays, bullet points, and disjointed narratives cut off midline by my encroaching sleep cycle. I would stay up an extra few minutes because writing felt necessary. Some entries I could reread sitting in front of a fire and others I’d rather throw into one.

Since arriving at Harvard however, I’m thankful that I’ve felt the need to shower far more times than I’ve felt the impulse to journal. Recently, I realized I had only written three entries since August. I was about to add “journal” to my to-do list before I stopped. Journaling had been something I genuinely enjoyed and wanted to do.

What had changed?

Why should I force myself to do something I no longer desire?

Perhaps I loved writing because I was on a gap year when I began the exercise. I was meeting new and interesting people. I was able to live abroad for months at a time. I worked at an outdoor center and learned (or at least attempted to learn) a new language. I laughed while dangling from a bungee cord and screamed after jumping out of a helicopter. But freshman year is not as dissimilar as one might assume. It is possible that I met more people on the first day of FOP than I did during my entire gap year. I’m living within a tourist site, the type of place I sought out on my travels. I’m here to learn new languages, but also entirely new subjects. I’ve been a few feet from Vice President Biden and a few yards from Barbara Walters. I may not have screamed after jumping out of a helicopter since arriving on campus, but there have been bridges to jump off instead, and primal screams to let loose. So why don’t I feel compelled to write?

My gap year was an endeavor that I shared with no one else. I didn’t consistently have someone to turn to who would understand my stories without further contextualization. Here, on the other hand, I’m surrounded by people whose current experiences are much like my own. In many ways, simply by observing those around me, I see something to compare and contrast my own actions and days with. If I want to vent, I can walk into Annenberg and someone will understand where I’m coming from. I need not write down my daily activities because between my friends’ recollections and my own, I can piece them back together if necessary.

I’m not writing because I’m no longer alone. Colorful people have replaced my journal’s white pages. I feel securely a part of a community so much so that I am willing to rely on its collective memory and standards rather than write my own. In some ways this is beautiful thing, something I hoped to find in college.

But there’s a danger in this comfort as well. 

I’m beginning to cherish this community because of the individuals who comprise it. But sometimes I worry we are too quick to give ourselves over to the communal experience. We live in close quarters and it can be hard to find time to be alone; most of us compile our memories in a common space online rather than documenting them ourselves; the norm is to discuss our days with each other rather than thinking about them on our own. Often it seems we reflect upon and judge our position within the Harvard community more often than as individuals.

In order to continue to contribute to a vibrant community we must demand that we continue to develop as individuals outside of it. In the past, I’ve found myself able to do that through writing. I may have initially dismissed the idea, but if placing “journal” on my to-do list gets me to put pen to paper, and make these valuable reflections, it’s worth it. Considering my individual experiences, in my own words, for myself, is a worthy endeavor, whether it comes naturally or needs a little provocation.

 

Leni M.G. Hirsch ’18 is a Crimson editorial writer in Grays Hall.