!!!!!*****WORKING DRAFT*****!!!!!
Conversation was easy with Jeanne. I started with that college staple, “Know what you’re majoring in?”
With what I would come to know as her characteristic self-assurance, she said, “I’m going to be a doctor, so I guess it’s got to be biology, right?”
“A doctor? What kind?”
“Probably a pediatrician. I really like working with kids, watching them grow, helping them. But I’m also thinking about psychiatry.”
“Medical school? Aren’t you anxious it’s hard to get into? And what about being a women there?”
“My father knows a little bit about admissions, he says things are changing. Like at his school in St. Louis, there were only five women admitted two years ago, they’re over ten now, and it keeps rising. He says, “I’d rather you become a doctor, than marry one.’ It’s funny, I know, turning the cliche around. It does feel like we’ve got more of a chance now, don’t you think? What about you?”
Inwardly, I was jealous she was aiming so high, and a little in awe she did not seem perturbed that almost everyone in medical school would be male.
“I like psychology, that’ll probably be my major.”
“Well, why aren’t you thinking about medical school, too, about psychiatry?”
That was a tough question. Despite my valedictory status at high school, my stellar test scores, all the support I’d received from teachers for academic success, no one had ever suggested, “Sarah, you should be a doctor.” When I joined the “Health Careers Club” at Avondale, sophomore year, all I heard about were the opportunities in nursing. Then I met Michael. Somehow, when I learned of his ambition to be a psychiatrist, I didn’t want to be competing with him, or people as smart as him, in college or medical school. I saw “Psychologist” as a more humanistic path to follow, one which opened up the breadth of the human mind and spirit. Medicine required a narrow science track, limited to only what could be observed and counted, measured and treated with drugs. But I didn’t know how to tell her all that, so I just said, “Funny, that’s what my boyfriend wants to do, be a psychiatrist.”
We were heading towards the Square, the Coop, almost at Mass. Ave. Under one of the elm trees, Jeanne, turning to face me, pulled up short and demanded, “What? What do you mean, ‘boyfriend’?”
It might have been the warmth of the afternoon sun, but I could feel my forehead start to sweat. I thought, “That’s what an aristocrat would say, ‘sweat’. ‘Perspiration’, that’s a peasant talking.” I gave a nervous giggle, and stepped into the shade. “Uh, yeah, he’s a sophomore at W now. He’s coming up Columbus day weekend.”
“Why? Why do you want to be tied down with someone, now, when you’re starting college. Do you think you’ll really have time for that?” When I didn’t answer right away, she went on, “What’s he like?”
Words started tumbling out. “He swims. He’s always moving around, can’t sit still. Doesn’t like people, but get him out of his shell, and be turns on a charm switch. Then, when he starts talking, he won’t shut up. He knows everything, or at least thinks he does. He’s like me in that way, but we’re really not the same at all…”
She interrupted, “What’s the best part of being with him?”
“He’s funny. He writes poems. He doesn’t push me. Mostly, I just feel calm with him, like I don’t have to be somebody I’m not. I feel like the real me, I guess.”
No-nonsense, she asserted, “Well, don’t let him walk over you. Don’t let him get in the way of where you want to go, who you want to be. There was a boy last year, in high school, I guess maybe he was my boyfriend for a while. We went to the prom. We were both a little out of it, socially, it was our one chance to feel normal, going to that dance. I never felt close to him, though, didn’t feel anything magic or sparkly going on, like other girls seem to talk about. And then he started acting like he owned me, telling me what to wear, I should grow my hair, I didn’t know how to drive, stuff like that.” She looked at me expectantly.
“Mike’s not like that, I don’t think. He knows exactly where he’s going, what he wants to do most of the time. But he listens to me, like I’m the one in charge, sometimes.”
“Like?”
“Well, like, I showed him about the New Yorker. He thought it was just the cartoons, but after reading it a few times at my house, he went out and got a subscription, to go along with the Sports Illustrated he gets every week. And plays. And movies. His family is so midwest, his mother came from Iowa, his dad Montana. Not big city people at all. So I get to teach him all these things he hasn’t really been exposed to. I feel like the smart one then, the sophisticated girl.”
“Sounds like you might be too good for him.”
“I don’t think so. He’s the first guy – the first person – I’ve ever known who could hold his own with me. He was on the debate team, it’s impossible to win an argument with him. Best you can hope for is a grudging draw. And, he writes. He’s so good with words, talking and writing.”
By this time, we’d been walking down a crowded Mass. Ave. a while, almost to the Common. Hundreds of people, many of them young, were heading in all directions, disgorged every few minutes from the “T” station underground a few blocks ahead. Across the street we saw the Coop, and headed over. We both had our lists for the classes we planned on taking, and gravitated towards the psych section. We’d be in Psych 101 together. As we pawed through the stacks, a taller raven haired girl joined us. Seeing the lists in our hands, she asked, “You two in psych as well?”
I nodded, so she went on, “Hi! I’m Marcia, I guess we’re all freshman?”
She seemed just as nervous as I felt. In what sounded like my mother’s voice, I introduced myself. “Janie. Janie Stein. I – we” – indicating Jeanne – “ we’re both in Cabot, and taking psych 101.”
“Me too!” Her smile drained all fear and awkwardness from our encounter. She had a little bit of Boston in her words, not like the flat mid-western speech I was used to. “I’m up on the fifth floor. It’s a long climb, but I like the exercise.” Lean and graceful, Marcia moved easily between us and grabbed a thick textbook, holding it up triumphantly. “Found it! Here, one for each of you.”
Leaving the Coop together, our little band aimed south, past the law school, curved east with the Ave, and found ourselves at the edge of Harvard proper, at Brooks House. Walking past the red-brick walls, I asked, “Where’s all the ivy, then?”
Jeanne took me literally, explaining they had to tear much of it off, it was eating at the stone, making it crumble. Marcia laughed, and pointed ahead.
“There’s the Yard. Come on, I want to see Widener.”
We sent the next 30 minutes exploring our academic home for the next four years, pointing out the various building where we would be taking classes, the Houses where all the Harvard men lived, the massive library where all the knowledge in the world might be stored.
Exiting to the south, we found ourselves back on Massachusetts Avenue, near the Square. Spying a small theatre I raced across the street to examine the posters for upcoming movies.
Once Marcia and Jeanne arrived, I pointed at it, and asked, “‘Invasion of the Body Snatchers.’ What’s that?”
“I think it’s one of those sci-fi things from the ‘50s. When’s it going to be here?” Marcia said.
“Looks like the week of October 12-18. Columbus Day is a holiday, isn’t it. Want to go see it? We could probably use a break, some laughs, by then, I bet.” Jeanne said this. Well, maybe there’s more to her than just a serious side, I thought.
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