Train Ride Reflections
Hmmm…..I’m currently sitting in a train at North Station, waiting to head back to Beverly. I just had a two and a half hour dinner with Matt. I feel very fulfilled by this. I am once again filled with the feeling that this is where I am supposed to be. And it’s Nice. I feel very much at ease here; and by here I mean the Boston area.
For some reason, Boston feels both familiar and unfamiliar at the same time. The physical City, the customs, the lifestyle; all of that is very new. But the feelings, the people, all feel very familiar; to the point of being comforting. I feel a lot calmer about things than I did a month ago. I’m not as frightened about coming out here. Things just feel right.
I think a lot of it is just the number of Princeton faces I see on a regular basis. I’ve seen a lot of friends from school, and so I get a sense that I’m back there. We’ve grown up a bit, so now we don’t sit around in ratty t-shirts and class gym shorts. Now we dress in a manner that’s a bit hipper. Stack and I were both sporting collars (thanks Syd) and wearing non-digital watches. Yet, it still feels a bit like college. It helps that a lot of people either are still in school (as graduate students) or are working for them (MIT Lincoln Labs). It’s as if we both grew up, but yet remained young at heart. Which is what a lot of it is. It’s the same way I felt so comfortable at the Nerdhouse. It was like camp again, just without the campers.
I also feel less like a stranger here. People are more tolerant here than they were in Seattle. (minus the Nerdhouse crew and a few other exceptions) I went to a party with Nicole on Saturday, and not once did people feel the need to bring up Politics, Intelligent Design, Abortion, the President, or the Gulf. There was no being grilled by people about how I voted. No one made any assumptions about my religious beliefs, nor did anyone really make any comments about them, other than me pointing out my Boston based Jew-crew. I met new people and had a good time. I partied with people I didn’t know, we joked we laughed, and it was cool. And the best part is, I KNOW these people have differing social opinions. I know that one of my friends there, is a liberal pot smoking hippy, but he doesn’t go berating people for not being that way. It’s just…nice.
I also feel more comfortable about having gone to Princeton here. It’s funny that I say this being stuck in the middle of Hahvhad (sucks) country. But then again, Ivy League schools have a different meaning. They are the local schools. People don’t balk or try to validate themselves if they didn’t go there. They’re as normal as every other school. And ultimately, people let it go. They’ve seen people from MIT, Harvard (sucks), Yale (sucks even more), Dartmouth, Brown, and all of the other east coast private school. And they only care in what YOU can do. Not what school you went to. At work, I get more jokes from being from “Redmond” than I do from being from Princeton. (Which is to be expected, I was hired partially because I am from main campus and can get them moving in the MS direction) And it’s just…peaceful.
Looking back, I don’t think I ever really fit in Seattle. It just wasn’t the kind of place for me. And that’s one of the reasons I had to leave. Some people say it was the people I met in Seattle, if I met more people, I’d have a different opinion. The problem is, I met a good deal of people, and it’s just not the place for me. I know there are people who love it there; who think it is the end all be all in cities. I just can’t agree with that. Especially having come here and felt so much more comfortable being here. Then again, this level comfort probably also explained my eagerness to always come visit Nicole on the East Coast. I needed to come back to what felt right.
