Tuesday October 8
Last night the first of a series of concerts took place on campus (next
time is Byron Janis) and this particularly you may want to hear about. This
is what happened: [untranscribed long description of Erick Friedman playing
Bach, Franck, Bloch, Saint-Saens, Ravel].
My feeling at the end of the concert was one of inadequacy, inadequacy
in understanding as I should like to and inadequacy of expression, inarticulacy
in contrast to the composers and musicians who are so superlatively articulate.
And one of aloneness - true, the concert is perhaps a more intense experience
when it is attended alone, but experience seems so valueless without expression.
I was very pleased when Bob, who had been a ticket-taker, suggested going
to the coffeehouse for coffee after the concert - we talked philosophy,
getting a bit excited too whenever we thought we'd struck something that
meant something - until a bit over midnight. This Bob-thing is pure casual
though - I have my eyes on a strange bird in English class, and will tell
you about Thomas A Hathaway later sometime.
Meanwhile, tonight also warrants tale-telling. The Levana Society, the
campus organization of Queen's women, officially took in the freshettes
tonight in a candle-lighting ceremony. Each of us had been assigned a senior
student in a sort of big-sister relationship. Mine is a pretty redhead named
Nancy. Tonight, with our senior, we went to Grant hall. There our seniors
donned the black academic gowns that are generally worn to graduation. Then,
in double-file lines, we wound down into the darkened auditorium. On the
candle-lit stage were the executive people of Levana. We were reminded that
the ceremony was a traditional handing-down to us of the glory and responsibility
of being Queen's women (I thought, WOMEN? Gadzooks! Who, me?). Then we had
to kneel and vow to be loyal and conscientious (someone raked me with a
high heel in getting up again). With that, the senior took off her robe
and put it on us. A taper was passed down the rows, and Nancy lit my candle
with it. These candles are interesting, loaded with pagan symbolism - the
color of the ribbon on the candle indicates the faculty of the man you're
to marry. My blue meant medicine. The number of wax drips indicated the
number of children - I had one.
Noisy hour's over -
Weds 9
Now, about Thomas A Hathaway. The minute he walked into English class
the boy next to me whispered "He must be a genius." He looked
like one: tall and very thin, nearsighted with round wire-rimmed glasses,
rather anxious blue eyes, a detached absent-minded expression, wearing thick-soled
shoes and tweedy sports jacket with leather elbow-patches and definitely
non-dress (looks like a type of khaki) trousers. He carries a big briefcase
with him everywhere, haunts the library, and seems a stereotype shy intellectual.
Fascinating! By luck (not guile, honest) I sat next to him in philosophy
this morning and got to know him a bit - he's an English major who wants
eventually to teach high school, rather courtly, altogether approachable.
This is somebody I'd like to land for a friend, but it may take some manoeuvering.
(But subtle of course.)
This afternoon a visiting French philosopher and lecturer from the Sorbonne
in Paris, formerly from the University of Strasbourg, spoke in an open lecture
about "The Possibilities and Difficulties of a Philosophy of Will."
He was a vastly intelligent man, speaking to an audience for the most part
also vastly intelligent - I was lost. If his speech had been printed so
that I could have read it six times and looked up all the terms (every other
word) I didn't understand, the lecture would have been stimulating and provocative,
as it was to the people who did understand him in spite of his peculiarly
French stresses in English constructions. All in all, though, the experience
was a good one: a feeling of intense stupidity is supposed to be becoming
to a freshman.
Music classes are becoming more interesting all the time: we have moved
from the period of plainsong or Gregorian chant, the strange recitative
music you occasionally hear on radio-broadcasted masses, through the first
awkward attempts at polyphony, and now to some of the beautiful church music
of Palestrina and some of the folk-songsy madrigals. Dr George with his
delicious sense of humour and warm personality makes our classes exceptional.
I have no 'lemon' professors! But there is so much to learn and do and try
to understand all at once, and sometimes when one thinks his mental tentacles
are closing around something important the pace sweeps him on to new ideas
and new aspects, so that even his most tentative grasp is swept away. Begin
again? Of course.
There was a package for me this morning. Grandma had sent me a small
package of dried apples and pears.
Thurs 10
With the explosive pump-pump of band practice puffing into my room through
the open window and only half an hour's lieu before baby sitting for Sloanes
again tonight, what else but some communication with this family?
A funny thing is happening outside - a hippopotamine street cleaning
apparatus is crunching by, scooping all the leaves from the curbs into its
hippopotamine pockets.
Reminds me of last night - after studying in the library my friend Jim
- the Englishman with the naughty smile - 'happened' by (claimed he'd schemed
it) and suggested "une autre tasse de café." And after
sitting in the Union staring at people over the coffee we walked home across
the lawns, scuffing and kicking them up. A troop of rugger players was doing
fitness exercises in a shady part of the park: from a distance sure an'
if they didn't look like the little people.
Did I ever tell you about the famous graces of the Reverend Dean? (Not
personal qualities: table graces.) She stands at the curve of her round-table
and, while we surreptitiously wriggle our knees against the table to hold
our napkins there, she stands on tiptoe (we aren't supposed to be looking,
you understand), screws her neck up to its longest projection, and shouts
out into the room a Latin grace which sounds like this: PRO BENEFICIIS ACCEPTIS
LAUDAMUS DEI - for goodness received let us praise God - A-MEN!
The weirdest combination of sounds results when band-practice and bagpipe
practice overlap -
In a music appreciation study period last week we listened to Tchaikovsky's
#1.
We are still having lovely weather, sun and breeze morning after morning,
no rain, little cold, falling leaves and green grass.
Tomorrow begins the Thanksgiving weekend - the campus will be deserted,
only a few far-from-home or studious souls will be here. The IH is throwing
a party tho, for Kingston DPs, on Monday night.
And next week too, a landmark - at last I'm old enough to give blood
and I'm going to, wheeeee!
Friday 11
This weekend, or rather, Weekend, begins tonight, leaving only myself
and another girl on the floor. Her name is Marg. I've been wanting to tell
you about Marg, who is about the liveliest, merriest, funniest, good-heartedest
girl on the floor. She has straight thick unruly brown-red hair, pale blue
eyes, freckles, a good-humoured round pair of eyebrows and a nose with a
personality much like hers - forthright and humourous. We are all fond of
her - the Ban Righ jester with the soft heart. She lives across the hall
with Karen K in a room full of clothes, records, radios, negligees, chat
and giggles. Karen is about three times as heavy as she ought to be, and
for this reason (this isn't fair, but ...) rather repulsive to me tho she
is very friendly and generous.
Down at the end of the hall is another Marg, a tall pretty girl with
enough freckles to be enticing, a warm feminine mouth, shiny eyes, perfect
curves - she is in a Nursing Sciences degree program, beginning her five-year
stint this year. Across the hall from her is Janet, tall, blond, brown-eyed,
curly-haired, giggly, but not too much so, slim, alert, and winsome. Across
the hall again, next to Marg, is Cathy - short dark hair, snapping black
eyes, tanned complexion: witty, toujours gai personality with a certain
briskness that seems associated with Nursing Science girls (she is another).
Next to Janet is a double - Nancy and Olivia.
Nancy is a slim redhead, not shy but rather austere, pretty though, and
pleasant enough. She has an eight o'clock class, so is usually the first
girl I see in the morning.
I have told you about Olivia - the slight, brunette English girl who
has invited me for Christmas. She is a very alive person, emotional, up
and down and deep up and deep down, rather irreverent generally, her conversation
sprinkled with explosive little 'heck's' and 'damn's'. I like her enormously
- she is one of the few spontaneous people I've met here.
Across the hall again, next to Cathy, are two singles, Bonnie and Marlene.
I've told you about them both. Next is me, with the bathroom across the
hall, then another Karen, Karen Kniseley. She is a tall blond curlyhead,
another of our second-year proctors who helps Marlene keep us in line and
moderately quiet during quiet hours. Then is another double, Barb and Sue.
Barb is a petite, willowy and very attractive brunette phys ed major, admittedly
here for a man and/or a degree, in that order. Living with her is another
phys ed girl, Sue Cheshire. Sue I like! Blond, chunky, capable and athletic
looking but emotionally very feminine, natural, easy-going. She plays folksongs
on her banjo, sings them plaintively until the rest of us bang in and demand
that she play something we can sing too.
One of the songs we sing often, one that harmonizes breathtakingly and
one that I like is a spiritual that says:
- Lord I'm one, Lord I'm two,
- Lord I'm three hundred miles,
- Lord I'm four hundred miles from my home.
- If you hear the train I'm on,
- then you'll know that I am gone,
- you can hear the whistle blow
- a hundred miles
We also like Coom by Ah, Michael, Where Have All the Flowers Gone, If
I had a Hammer, Yellow Bird, Jamaica Farewell.
News! Mrs Sloane invited me to have Thanksgiving dinner with their family
on Monday. And I made another two dollars for reading magazines in their
cozy-elegant living room for three hours. Mr Sloane appeared in a different
context: instead of the slick handsome rather arrogant young man gleaming
with success, last night appeared a thin tired doctor with thinning hair,
a winsome half-grin and wire-rimmed spectacles. And bedroom slippers, rather
worn. I liked this Mr Sloane better.
They have another daughter too, Joanna, a lanky straight-haired adolescent
with braces on her teeth and an unselfconscious manner that suggests a Cinderella-blooming
when she's eighteen, curvy, and emerges with perfect teeth.
Saturday morning 12
Let me tell you about the International House party last night. There
were many Nigerians and Jamaicans and Indians whom I'd not seen before,
and a boyish-looking Scot with a pointed nose who is here on the exchange
scholarship with Saint Andrews in Scotland. Alfred and Lawrence are two
Nigerians who came in costume, baggy trousers with very tight cuffs and
flowing tentlike overgarments, with brightly coloured little round caps.
Gorgeous! Alfred is a very handsome Negro, here with a detachment of the
Canadian army I think. Lawrence is a tall thin man with a round wry face:
mobile, full of secrets, merry. He seems to be another genuinely spontaneous
person, shown by the way he dances: white, sheet-like tunic flying; unselfconscious
grin spreading slowly from the middle of his face to all the outside edges;
greatly exaggerated rhythmic movements. And he loves to dance, cha-cha,
rhumba, anything, and all with high enthusiasm. If no one is dancing with
him he dances by himself - joy to watch.
Alfred has promised to have dinner with me in the Ban Righ dining hall
some night (we're allowed male guests on Friday nights and Sunday noons)
and in his national costume. THAT should cause a bit of a sensation! (Think,
Judy, what Mrs Reimer in Yarrow would say to this fraternizing with non-Mennonites)
(and after all her warnings!). I invited another friend - Bob, I'll tell
you about him in a minute - to dinner on Sunday, as he isn't going home
for Thanksgiving either.
Now: Bob is the Canadian ambassador to Japan's son, who grew up in England,
Europe, Argentina, Venezuela, Brazil, and Columbia and is studying mining
engineering here at Queen's, third year. He is very tall (6'3"), very
thin, appealing with a small-boy face and innocent blue eyes, casual and
fun to be with, generous, very likeable. We talked most of the evening,
he walked me home, and invited me to dinner tonight. This ought to be a
real adventure, for he and his roommate live out and cook their own meals
- so if they can smuggle me past their landlady, my dinner tonight should
be excellent.
Washing cups after coffee is rather peculiar at International House ...
for we haven't any kitchen there, and so have to wash them in the bathroom
sink, hand them out in a cup-brigade from the drier to the stacker. Last
night we had no tea towel so ended up using a regular towel which we hoped
was clean.
And when I got home, Marg was still up so I moved into Karen's bed for
the night - talking, listening to the radio, munching Spanish peanuts; this
went on until three ayem, but we were up in time for breakfast anyway. She's
a great kid, full of spontaneous affection and friendliness. From what I
gather, her parents were very close and their home was saturated with the
'smell' of consideration and love. She lost her parents five years ago in
an accident, but her love-foundation seems to have been well-enough built
up to last even until now: she likes everyone, is overly generous, has extremely
optimistic ideas about marriage.
It seems that there are only ten people left in the entire residence;
everyone has evacuated. My friend Jim is off mountain-climbing in the Catskills
near New York City.
-
Noon - Marg brought up a letter this morning, two one after the other,
and Judy has her GG!!!!!!!!!! I admit to feeling rather maliciously smug
about not having the coveted award go to Trudy Toews. Judy, you rascal,
you dignified medalist! I've got to write Frank about this, wheeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee!
[Governor General's medal for county's highest marks in grade 9 provincial
exams]
You asked a few questions - would I like cookies for kaffee klatches
sometimes? Oh you know I would! Packages are the miracles of our existence,
someone else's CARE bundle receives rapt attention from all the rest of
us.
Another question, the enrollment is about 3700 intramural students (UBC
and U of Toronto are nearer 12-13-14 thousand). Queen's is thus relatively
small, smaller than the University of Alberta I'm sure, tho I don't know
how much smaller. The enrollment this year is larger, with more freshettes
for a change than freshmen. There are a few first year students living 'out'
but most of them are in residence, together with a number of second year
and graduate students.
PS the return bus fare to New York from here is $26.85 - I've got $5
saved up from babysitting. Maybe -
Sunday afternoon, October 12
Dear homefolks,
I'm still so excited about your GG Judy, that I tell all sorts of people
who couldn't possibly be interested in what amazing wonderful things my
sister in Alberta has been up to.
Dinner last night. Bob came to get me about six. Marg had lent me a dress
and I had my hair up in a fairly sophisticated style that I'd invented last
week. The red shoes.
We walked to his apartment which is just across the park, climbed three
sets of narrow winding stairways in a brick window-shuttered house to their
four rooms just under the roof. He and Guy, whose home is somewhere in England,
do their own bachelor cooking and have a generally confused diet, but last
night they really splurged: a roast of lamb and foil-wrapped potatoes in
the oven, a bakery apple pie and ice cream in the refrigerator, vegetables
ready to boil, a bottle of red wine. (Evidently one never has anything but
red wine with lamb, one of the unwritten laws of current protocol.) The
lamb wasn't quite done, still pink in the middle, so we got out his (Bob's)
slide viewer and looked at some of the pictures he took in Japan this summer,
of the beautiful embassy garden, a Buddhist parade, temples, the Golden
Pavilion. Then we had another look at the lamb.
This was where the fun really began. In setting the roast back into the
oven, Bob tipped the pan and the juice ran onto the oven-element, sending
up billows of smoke. We didn't dare leave the oven on, so decided that rare
lamb might be like rare steak, good even if raw. With the windows open and
a stiff sou'wester sweeping through the apartment, the smoke cleared out
eventually. The comedy of errors went on as we set up a search for the wine.
Guy finally found it under his pillow where he'd stuffed it when he thought
that the landlady was coming up the stairs.
But finally, dinner. They had set up a card table, draped it with a white
sheet, and set the table meticulously. (I thought the tablecloth was genuine
until Bob said rather wryly "I wonder what the landlady will say when
she sees wine stains on the sheet!") The wine was fairly bitter Canadian
wine, not particularly strong, and we had only a little, for the sake of
the atmosphere mainly. I don't particularly like it - no signs yet of alcoholism.
The lamb was excellent. The potatoes though, which we had decided to boil
after the oven disaster, burned at the bottom. What we eventually did with
them was mash them up, still in the skins, and pour in a lot of butter.
They were grey and speckly, but sumptuous, really!
After all that dinner we listened to the tape recording Bob had been
surreptitiously making while we ate, and then to the recordings of Argentine,
Paraguayan, Bolivian, and Venezuelan music he'd brought from South America
(two summers ago he worked on an Argentine ranch) and some of the Italian
music he'd recorded when they went to Venice, Florence, and one of the Italian
off-shore islands. We talked for a while, getting-to-know-you style, and
then he walked me home because I had to be in by eleven - it was so cold
suddenly that we could see our breaths, and is cold even today. [What I
didn't mention was first hearing Joan Baez at this dinner.]
Still haven't met any men.
Monday, Thanksgiving Day Oct 13
I was about to tell you about something else that might interest you:
as Bob's father was affiliated with the Canadian Embassy in Paraguay too,
Bob could give me a bit of an inside view of the Mennonites in Paraguay,
from another angle. Evidently they are not extremely popular with the other
Paraguayans, and then, when persecuted, claim their Canadian citizenship
and rush to the embassy for help. The position of the diplomats on this
practice is one of annoyance as they, the officials, do not like to recognize
the Canadian citizenship or claimed citizenship of people who have never
seen or are likely to see Canada. So the Mennonites are considered rather
nuisances, tho useful for the development of the country.
Today is supposed to be a study day - I'm in my studying uniform, great
long white shirt and kneesocks and a blanket, and have the door locked for
extra insurance against chatting and am bashing away at a book about - of
all things, but profitable - how to study; and have worked out a detailed
schedule of what to study when. Will it work? Ask in April.
Incidentally, I dreamed last night that I was going to die on November
14, next year: if it happens, tell 'em I knew it all along.
Went to an Anglican church yesterday morning to see what it was like
- a little like United, a little of Catholic, rather dull in all. Am not
likely to go back. There is a Baptist church on the program for next Sunday.
Satisfied?
Tonight is the party with the Sloanes and an International House coffee
party.
Have I ever told you about "Knock"? (The K is pronounced.)
It is a recording of a French play which repeats itself over and over, while
we listen through earphones and follow in the book. The purpose of this
is to teach us to understand naturally rapid French speech. It should be
helpful. But I am having a HORRID time with French - the challenge is enormous.
But I like it. And my lack of prerequisites will be taken into consideration,
so ...
Tuesday 14
At five-thirty I arrive at Sloanes' to find the dining room table set
with place cards and mulberry candles, decorated with bright ears of Indian
corn and winter squash, waiting in anticipation. In the kitchen Jessica,
a friend who had come with her children as the other guests, was sipping
sherry (which is beautiful - gold-colored and clear - but tastes like rubbing
alcohol), while the monsterous turkey (it filled the entire oven) roasted
complacently before the eyes of the kids who were watching it through the
oven window like a television program. When the kids had been herded off
by various big sisters to wash their hands they were installed temporarily
in their places and left to admire the food being carried in. Their remarks
were interesting: "No, this knife is for eating and this one is for
butter and junk, 'n this crap is for dessert." That was Billy explaining
silverware ettiquette to one of his guests.
Mrs Sloane passed out our plates: ham, turkey, sausage, baked potatoes,
cranberry sauce, sage and onion dressing, smoked meat dressing, peas, gravy.
Wednesday 15
And pumpkin pie with whipped cream for dessert.
The Sloanes are without a maid now - a funny story connected to that.
Lois had been a reserved ladylike person who as Mrs Sloane recounted, would
always say things like "I do not believe I shall have any sugar in
my tea, thank you," in "this terribly affected voice." One
night she left early, saying she was going to her sister's. Her sister phoned
later asking where she was. Her boyfriend sat outside in his car waiting
for her until one thirty ayem. She came home, and had "a dreadful row"
with him, marched upstairs, got Mrs Sloane out of bed, and shouted in a
voice rather different from her "I-don't-believe-I-shall" tone,
"There are some damn funny things going on around here!" And after
she finished her tirade, she went out again and was gone until six in the
morning. When Mrs Sloane went up to get her for breakfast (carefully stepping
over the bottle of gin on the floor) she was gay as a cricket. She made
herself an enormous breakfast, dressed in a black lace cocktail dress, and
announced that she was going to Toronto.
There are advantages to sitting in the front seats at classes: in psychology
this morning Mr Campbell asked for volunteers to usher at the Film Society
programs once a month. This involves simple ushering, and has as its benefit
free tickets to the exclusive foreign films, the best from Europe, that
are shown to ticket-buyers for about nine dollars a season. Of course he
had more than enough volunteers, and being in the front row I all but ambushed
him at the end of his class. Even before he put the period at the end of
his last sentence - bang! And I'm on.
Also in headlines: Thomas A Hathaway called last night, to ask about
philosophy of course, but this is PROGRESS.
Also gave blood last night. They fed us orange juice, Cokes, cookies
as a bribe to good behaviour (and to dilute our blood?) then laid us out
ceremoniously on high tables and let us bleed. Then watched us carefully
for fifteen minutes while we took our only legitimate chance to loaf. Not
painful: rather fun with the Coke and the kidding.
Thursday 16
With November exams looming, with two enormous essays to be written,
with a minute-pinching schedule to be slavishly followed ...
We are still having summer weather, really hot in the afternoons, and
often warm even at night. And all day the dry brown leaves whirl down, so
that the lawns are all thickly covered now.
If you are interested in what we are up to, in English we are studying
Middle English: Chaucer's Canterbury Tales and Ben Johnson's play
Volpone, both written in English that has to be translated into American
before we can understand it. We have an 1800 word essay due on an abstract
analysis of the satiric function of one of the Volpone characters. Ycheaah!
In psychology we are studying scientific experimental method in connection
with modern techniques and have another great long essay to write on this.
Dr Dugal Campbell is a dear! And he is a family friend of the Sloanes, so
I can find a few morsels of information about him - he is Scottish, educated
in a Quaker school, psychologically trained in the London University school
of psychology that Dr Sloane attended as well. Likes to sail but is rather
clumsy at it - and that would be typical of him. I wish you could see him
bound into the classroom and fly straight to the window to get a gale started
circulating around the sleepy students! And his most elf-like expression
when he begs to be allowed to escape the barage of questions and go on with
his lecture, "Please, could I get back to that later?"
In music we have gone on to dissect various types of music, and I find
to my distress that I cannot usually detect a change of key.
In French we are concurrently taking, in effect, four courses - a grammar
course, a French civilization and culture course, a vocabulary course, and
an auditory-oral course. With this I have to study elementary university
French grammar by myself - wow!
In philosophy we are still trudging (raggedly, but not quite beaten yet)
through Plato's Republic. It's actually a very good and sensible
course, this philosophy 1. If I pass everything fairly well I'm thinking
of switching my second minor to philosophy rather than French.
- Oh, that's all. And my schedule demands some attention to French, NOW.
-
A wee short note from Grandfather Epp - he talks about rain and the
grapevine and Willie Reimers. It is good to know that all of this is still
there, as it was, even if my new environment knows nothing of it. I still
often catch my breath and think, "This is university. You are really
here." And at times when I am deep in a book or close on the heels
of an idea, the thought that this, incredibly, is to be my life for the
next long stretch of years is (clichéically!) too good to be true.
Friday 17
It seems that Ban Righ has a small undercover network of espionage agents
- people checking our rooms to see if we are tidy! Mrs Lush is what is called
a house manager, a checker-upper-on-window-screens and collecter-of-complaints-about-sticky-irons.
This morning she made a reconnaissance of our floor. Consequently I found
on my dresser a little note from her. I've enclosed it because I'm so ludicrously
proud of it (Ridiculous to be exhilerated about a small thing you parent-people
have been trying to screw into our minds of years: ordnung!)
Please notice the Queen's crest on the envelope: I have stationary to
match it, very handsome. I'm so glad to be here that I have to strut the
school a little, and this is one way of doing it. A sort of patriotism,
NOT however developed in that crappy initiation fuss. Developed rather from
the gradual realization of the knowledge and ideas and tradition of learning
that are here.
I have an intensely interesting appointment this afternoon. Through a
friend of a friend, I heard of a blind student who requires readers, and
as the experience of learning to know a blind person (and moreover helping
one to achieve his nearly heroic task of getting through university tho'
blind) appeals to me very much, I volunteered to read to Jerry Dirks from
Vancouver for at least an hour a week. Jerry is working on his Masters in
politics, so I hope to learn something from his reading too. I'm very excited
about this particular venture, because I've spoken to Jerry on the telephone,
and he sounds - dynamic, vital. We'll see.
Saturday 18
And dynamic he is. I spent my hour reading to him from a book on Australian
government. He retains an amazing amount from what he hears, and always
knows what the general sense of a paragraph is even when the sentences are
complex and I would have to go back over it to get the general points. He
takes notes in braille, punching holes on a cardboard sheet with an ingenious
device that I'll diagram for you. Afterward, because he writes his notes
from right to left, he can flip the sheet over and read them from left to
right. He has a wrist watch with braille numbers and hands that he can feel,
and a cane that folds up to fit into his pocket when he isn't using it.
His attitude seems good - matter of fact and cheerful.
When I walked into the map room of the library where I was to meet him,
he looked up from his notes and said "Hello Ellie." (His recognition
of voices is superb - when someone passing on the street says "Hi Jerry"
he says "Hello Donald" with no hesitation.) When we had finished
our session he walked directly to the table across the room, picked up his
coat, opened the door for me, locked it after him, and barely touching my
elbow, walked down the two flights of stairs and outdoors, never feeling
for a step or a sidewalk. A block further down the street he said "We
are just passing the drive to Grant Hall." And so we were! At the exactly
right spot he guided me across the street and left me at Ban Righ to go
on alone to his residence.
What I found strange was not having to look at him when I was talking
to him - actually it would be difficult to look at him because he has rather
large dramatic eyes and seeing them so rigidly fixed on nothing is disconcerting.
The experience of reading aloud is good, for one has to become very conscious
of diction and pronunciation and voice inflection, all of which are so very
important in reading a complex or technical passage (as advanced politics
is) meaningfully.
19 Sunday 12:10 pm, after church.
I feel like discussing things with you, several things. This is an extension
of yesterday's day-long discussion mood. I'll tell you about it first. It
was a glorious warm day to begin with, a stir of breeze shaking down the
leaves, small boys playing baseball in the park, college men reading under
the trees with their bicycles propped up beside them. I went for a walk,
roamed, read some non-text books, lay flat under a tree and looked at the
sky, thought a bit for a change. Then, restless, I roamed back to the residence
to check whether there had been anything for me in the afternoon mail. Nothing.
So upstairs. And a number of other people were feeling restless too, so
we soon had a group in my room. It was thoroughly good companionship - I
am very glad that I'm in residence this year: I'm discovering girls as people
and friends. You know too that until this time my friends have been predominantly
men - that is, good and companionship friends. But I think it is very healthy
to discover now that girls are intelligent and responsive and warm too.
Anyway, we moved from ordinary girl talk to the vital issues of: Why
are we here? What is our motivation? - grades or social development or new
experience or general knowledge? What can we do to make our social contacts
less superficial? How can we girls convince the boys that even if we are
female and glad to be, we are PEOPLE before we are women?
These are the questions that are bothering us most. The last one I have
under control very nicely - it is simply a matter of explaining your external
policy (ie principles), and if Joe or Bob never calls again - he wasn't
the sort of fellow you wanted to be out with anyway. The second question
is one I shall have to work out myself. But it is the first that I wanted
to talk to you about.
Last year there was no question of to slave or not to slave - it was
slave or work in a drugstore to get to university. This year, however, I'm
here. Irrevocably. And somehow I will stay here, for years and years. But
the question now is, is it worthwhile slaving for higher marks this year
at the expense of social development and general learning? Is it time for
the bookworm to join choirs and read ordinary non-textbook books and write
for the Queen's Journal and have good talks with the floor 3 girls and take
walks and go to foreign films and listen to concerts and talk to enormous
numbers of people rather than studying while the sun shines? Or is the period
of isolation not over until one has done very well at university, collected
honours which are uncomfortable though exhilerating? Is there enough time
to become a whole person after the degree is in hand? Is there ever enough
time? True, I love to study. But what I am wondering about is the extra
drudging that seems necessary to get really top marks. Basically the struggle
is between reluctance to do less than my best in something that is valuable
to me and reluctance to starve the other selves for the academic self. I
know that I will have to formulate a policy on this, and because I know
that my successes are important to you and that you have high hopes for
me, I would like to know what you think of the question from the more objective
vantage point that your distance in time and experience gives you.
After the great long discussion Olivia was feeling as tho she had to
do something or burst, so we went for a walk. Scuffed through piles
of leaves on the lawn, six inches deep. Whistled. Ran madly down University
Avenue. Stood and stared at the orange sun netted in all the black branches
of bare trees. Laughed at nothing. Climbed the funny stunted little tree
in front of Ban Righ. [1977]
And then Bob called to ask me out to a movie downtown. It was a comedy,
idiotic but a good release for studying tensions. Milkshakes afterwards
and a long slow walk home in the powdery night mist that comes to Kingston
from the lake. I like Bob because we have such a comfortable buddy relationship
- no beating off passes and no tension.
At 12:30 when I got home, all the other girls of the floor were just
coming in too, and sitting around on the floor talking about their dates.
The sister-feeling on this floor is great! When someone lands a special
date or re-lands a fellow who has been trying to prove his independence,
the whole floor is happy for her, and not superficially either. And when
someone has had a row with Mr Right or has no date for Saturday, the entire
floor schemes at cheering her up. There is honest caring here: it
is wonderful. So we munched someone's candy and talked until two or so.
Then Marlene, Cathy, Marg and I moved into one of the rooms. We munched
somebody's cookies and talked until four. You see what I mean by a discussing
mood.
23 Wednesday
A rather interesting evening last night. (Oo where am I today? Any idjot
would be smart enough to avoid saying "evening last night.") I
sat beside Tom this morning, or rather he sat beside me in
philosophy lectures and bumped into my elbow several times - that may be
why I'm a bit garbled ... just kidding! Or perhaps it is because I read
the political section of Time magazine during lunch - a new resolution,
to become Informed and Conversationally Brilliant by reading Time cover
- to sports - to US politics - to cinema - to music - to readers write -
to education - to foreign affairs - medicine, art, education, religion,
business, books - to cover. Also resolved: to lose ten pounds by eating
only half of everything rather than all of it. And this circuitously brings
us back to what happened last night.
At nearly midnight our floor looked up hungrily from its books and thought
"pizza." Consequently a phone order was dispatched, money (hélas!
- that is French for what you think it is) was collected, and several large
flat boxes delivered, warm to the touch, and we gathered around our telephone
area, the Ban Righ Three social centre (significantly!), with carving knives
in fist. They were enormous things, round, flat, fairly thick. Fancy varieties
have mushrooms and green pepper and sausage and olives on top, but ours
modestly sported only the standard tomatoes and cheese - the tomato paste
suffocated by a rubbery surface of melted cheese, both on the sphere of
half-baked dough: now, before you begin to think philosophically of the
"generation of madmen who not only eat, but enjoy, this fantastic
Italian invention" be informed that it is fairly good tasting. She
said with reservations.
At last our sultry false summer has been blown away by a suitable-to-October
cold wind, exhilerating but noisy: it sets all the windows on the floor
chattering at night.
How does this sound to you? The November 9 weekend is called Toronto
Weekend, as the Gaels are playing the U of T team there that Saturday. It
is traditional for 99% of Queen's to move to Toronto for this event. I think
I shall conform and go too. Not that I am in the very most minute way interested
in football à la university hoopla, but I would like to know whether
the city really is more than an underground CNR depot, and Olivia has invited
me to stay with her. Transportation will be about six dollars, and I must
do some shopping for winter anyway. (So she justifies what seems to be an
adventure. And it is after exams.)
Rumor has it that the kitchen puts saltpetre in our milk, but this doesn't
seem to have the effect it is supposed to have, ie bovinizing us. The men's
residences discovered what was happening to their milk and after a great
row over it have been drinking nothing but carton milk.
Friday October 25
I have just come in from a very interesting psychology class where we
worried about whether the mind is an entity or a concept. Mr Campbell was
bemused about the fact that we are worried about it. He says "I know
you've thought for a long time that you have one, and I'm sure that you've
become rather attached to it. But you can't think of it as really being
there. It is a concept you have to explain your cognizant behavioral processes,
just as molecules are a concept to explain the behaviour of matter. But
nobody has ever seen a molecule and nobody has ever seen a mind. It isn't
really there: it is only the idea we use to explain ourselves." So
there was a vigorous battle.
After dinner yesterday it struck me suddenly that if there was a letter
from you yesterday there might be a package as well. And when I checked
the list they post of people whose packages are at the desk, my name was
there. I sat on the stair landing to open it, not wanting to wait until
I'd climbed back upstairs. It is good to get packages from home! Everything
arrived in good shape. The cookies were good - quite smashed up, but Mother-baked
and special. They were finished by last night!
And both the blouse and the jacket are an exact fit, don't know how they
could have turned out so well without fittings. I'm wearing them both today
and have received several compliments. "Thanks, my mother made them!"
-
Friday night. I wish you could see Kingston. All afternoon I roamed about
by the lake with Mr Sloane's elderly father and baby Eve and Robin, baby-sitting
presumably, while Mrs Sloane was away at a Home and School function. So
I baby-sat from two until about nine-thirty = five dollars toward Christmas
in New York. That is ten dollars so far.
But why talk of money - when I could be telling you about the mad beautiful
afternoon. There is a long sidewalk along the lakeshore with a wooded boulevard
between it and road. This afternoon there was a high sun that made the day
seem more like August than end-October. (The cold wind has gone again, and
we are having continual summer; is there no winter here at all? But they
tell me that it is cold later on. In the meantime, nothing but mid-August
heat. Not even a breeze! And the nights are tepid!) The lake was
partly misted over, but blue rather than grey (unusual for Lake Ontario)
and a big freight boat going by left a scribble of chalky black smoke above
it. The gulls (they are a very intense white on the water) were excited
today too, and would dive entirely under the water after fish. The strip
of park along the walk was full of students with their books - down at one
end three boys and two guitars were singing "The Lion Sleeps Tonight,"
an exciting sound. Old Mr Sloane was reminiscing about his thousands of
miles at sea. "I know Capetown better than I do Kingston, and Bombay
too," he claims. He served on a mine sweeper during the first world
war, and worked on merchant vessels as well. His other child, Dr Sloane's
elder sister, now has a very popular pub in London.
Later, when the children were in bed I played a few records on their
incredible stereo set - some German classics and a recording of Elizabethan
folksongs called "The Raggle-taggle Gypsies."
I realized just this afternoon what I miss most about this residence
life: solitude. Strange that I should remember last winter in Sexsmith as
one of the best times in my life when it was also one of the most alone
times. Loneliness adds a distinctive sharpness to everyday experiences that
seems blunted by too much human companionship, especially when it is a rather
casual type of companionship.
You are planning to stucco the outside of the house? - Oh did I ever
tell you happened one morning in French class? We were talking about the
size of French farms - they are really very small - and to compare their
size with those of Canadian farms. Mr Lundee asked several of the students
to give the acreage of Canadian farms. Knowing that I am from the prairies
(he is from Saskatchewan), he asked me for the acreage of the western prairie
farms - I couldn't resist! "We have er six quarter sections."
So the class figured it out in acres and it was altogether very impressive.
Would that have been called bragging? I rawther think so.
Kingston houses are wonderful! Whereas Edmonton houses are either old
or new, all either modern or rather similarly old-fashioned, Kingston has
every style imaginable, truly individual and imaginative. I ache to sit
on the sidewalk and sketch them all for you.
Mrs Sloane drove me home in their Sprite. Paul will know what I'm talking
about, but for your benefit, Mom and Judy, I'll explain. A Sprite is a very
low, very classy sports car. Theirs is a white convertible with red leather
upholstery. For a summer's evening such as this one was it is ideal.
All up and down the street, now, drunk or 'happy,' Artsmen and Engineers
are singing and tootling horns. The Medsmen are too busy.
Sunday 27
The exams are panting at my heels so you will have to hear about today's
adventure via Rudy's letter. I want to write you all separate notes but
that will have to wait.
Monday, October 28
This morning's good beginning was a letter from Grandma - I'll enclose
it for you. It is always grand to hear from her! Besides that, the philosophy
test was a fairly good one and perhaps I will do better in it than in the
first two quizzes: the first was a thorough shocker because I got a C!
That confession off my chest, I can tell you about the thinking that
has followed last week's discussion on whether to study for marks this year
or for general. The conclusion is: I am going to study for marks. There
are several fairly subtle considerations that I had been neglecting.
1. It has been proven statistically that those whose college marks are
good, generally do better professionally. This is not because of the marks,
I suppose, but rather because of the type of character that is developed
by knowing what you want and going after it with dedication. The type of
person I want to be is not a social success or a slacker - therefore a few
more years of enforced labour.
2. No one with mediocre marks is going to get the German exchange scholarship!
3. It is too frustrating generally to be shoddy about general work and
then have to cram for examinations.
4. The social aspects of campus life tend toward mass-socializing and
general rat-racism. I don't want anything to do with it! Much of the dating
hangs together on the recreation (har) of necking with fellows you don't
even like. I'd still rather read a book on Friday night, Neal Fimrite! Also
I find the friends you happen to make more or less accidentally are more
satisfactory than the ones you make an effort to 'snag.' The Mike I went
sailing with yesterday is a perfect example (not a student, but a graduate
who works here).
So I would say that the turmoil of first term has paid off in several
rather sturdy principles and resolutions. Nice to have one's mind made up.
- I don't know how interesting this adolescent introspection is to you,
but I am assuming that you might like to know a little of the inside story
of college life as well. The questions I've been wrestling with are fairly
general, and you could accept them as an example, I think, of any Josephine
Freshman's philosophizing. I don't know how many are going to come to my
semi-isolationist conclusions! But if the rambling seems rather dull to
you and you would rather have me talk about more interestinger things please
say so - and since it is you who are living the college life through these
letters please send me a poll of what you want to hear about.
Tuesday 29
So what is good about Tuesday? Well, about this particular Tuesday, several
things: an English essay completed, a visit to the art gallery, and baby-sitting
for the Beckers. One at a time? You can tell by the double-spacing on this
thing that I had been typing my essay. I'm hugely proud of it because it
is all tidily typed and has - that mark of professionalism - FOOTNOTES!
My first university essay. Funny, the topic at first seemed impossible,
but the night before it was due inspiration made a late appearance, and
all day today the 'thing' struggled into existence. And the flush of this
so-called inspiration brought with it some half-fun, half-serious far-out
abstract poetry, which I have called "Stop, Faces" and which,
after it goes through a month or two of incubation, I shall submit to the
Queen's Journal for - quite possibly, rejection.
And something you would have liked, Paul, was my visit to the art gallery
[the Agnes Etherington]. It is right next door to Ban Righ (but no other
girl on the floor has visited it yet) and it seems the utmost in apathy
to ignore it. Featured was a retrospective exhibit of Andre Bieler, a Canadian
painter who has an international reputation and who headed Queen's art department.
Some of the pictures are very good too. One that I liked was called Classic
Landscape. What was unusual about it was that in the light and shadow
of the landscape the square, sturdy figure of a man was suggested, implying
all sorts of things about classic landscapes!
Baby-sitting for the Beckers is rather different from sitting for Sloanes,
because although Dr Becker is also on the faculty he hasn't reached anything
like the head of a department yet and his income is nowhere near the sports
car level of Dr Sloane's. It is a neat, spare small house with original
paintings by Dr Becker and his brother, many paper-back classics and many
well-worn records, German coffee cake almost like yours Mom; Mrs Becker's
nursing magazines and textbooks; three little girls. They are from Saskatchewan.
Why do faculty people always overpay?
Please write about many details of what happens chez les Epps (shay lay
zep). In particular, please keep me up-to-date on what happens to the house:
I would like to be able to keep some picture of it in my mind. And all the
rest, you know, funny things Rudy says or Father's quips or Paul's ups and
downs or Judy's eternal sensibility ouch, Judy, don't: don't, ouch! And
Mother's introspections and worries and bits of lightheartedness. And the
affection that I don't seem to need to ask for - thank you all. The tinsel
on this place has not yet worn off, nor is it likely to, and I am forever
and ever very fortunate. And to have so many good things to remember too!
Cup runneth over, but how does one make it run over profitably for people
whose cup doesn't?
Wednesday 30
Have you ever seen the CUCND pin? (Sketch in margin.) I'm wearing one
- and since I'm 'pinned' you might like to know what I's pinned to. Well,
my elusive Thomas S Hathaway this morning in philosophy class asked me to
contribute to his club. Nuts. But the club is a good one: CUCND stands for
Combined Universities Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament. I'll enclose their
'pitch sheet'. Evidently the Queen's branch is very nearly broke, and so
are selling pins to raise enough to send a few of the fellows, Tom included,
hitchhiking to their Montreal convention. As Thomas was involved my humanitarian
interests were immediately aroused and I bought one; toujours gai, they
overpaid me last night anyway!
Seriously, even without the attractive people who belong to it, CUCND
is interesting and I would like to join if it weren't for the time involved.
Maybe next year.
But there are so many things here that are so terrifically joinworthy!
Bowling, drama club, French club, German club, camera club, Journal and
yearbook, Student Christian Movement, debating -
Later - Tonight Karen K and I had our first stints at usheretting for
the Film Society. Tonight was featured a French film, in French, with no
English subtitles. But movies are all very much the same and this one was
easy to follow. More interesting, though, were the people who went to it.
Beats, high-up faculty members, Kingston VIPs, campus VIPs, faces and pipes
and beehive hairdos. The Sloanes, Dr Campbell from psychology.
The campus is beautiful at night, now with a skimming of cloud across
the moon, dormitory windows alight behind the ivy, couples and loners walking
in the park or sitting on the steps of Ban Righ saying goodnight, stark
branches, rasping leaves, echoing footsteps, and always the knowledge that
it is Queen's, one of the best and most highly regarded universities in
Canada, and special because it is my university. And it is, now. The first
month was a limbo of half-heaven, half-hell, where-do-we-really-fit-in.
But it is nearly November and Queen's is our university.
part 3
- raw forming volume 1: september 1963 - april 1964
- work & days: a lifetime journal project
|