All I know is that I feel a little faint when my British English professor reads the line, “What do I think about life? A little and a lot,” from “Effi Briest”. He’s read this at least four times in lecture, and each time I felt something escape my chest. I felt light.

I know that when I walk downstairs to the dining hall and see tutors’ kids waddling and toppling—see them dressed in Superman capes in November or wrapped in only a towel, see them throwing peas on the floor or gazing up, starry-eyed, at the ceiling—my legs get woozy, and I have to hold tight to the railing as I carry my tray up.

My friend still believes that it’s my iron deficiencies causing these corporeal reactions. She might be right. But still, I know that there’s a certain reverence for life, a certain overabundance of awe, that washes over me sometimes, unannounced, hammering on the heart’s door at 4 a.m. I know that my heart loudly beats at these moments because they remind me that every moment is in fact fleeting, that every moment should be imbued with an extra ounce of meaning.

That every moment calls for me to be “made of such gushing meat / in the middle of the day on a quiet street.” Or at least, to live like I am.

Aisha Y. Bhoori ’18 lives in Pforzheimer House. Her column appears on alternate Mondays.