Emma Zayer

Last weekend I went to Charlottesville, Va. to visit my former roommate Jess and her two adorable cats (...to whom I am fairly allergic, but a puffy eye or two was worth it to pet the sweet things and spend the night). It was a blast -- we baked cookies from scratch, dined and strolled around an outdoor mall with live music Saturday night, had a wine/cheese/grapes and cookie-eating party while watching "Bobby," window-shopped and tried on clothes at the regular mall on Sunday afternoon. Plus we talked a lot, of course, and there's something to be said for being able to just hang around and say what's really on your mind and not get bored chatting with a friend.

Something refreshing yet a little bit odd over the past few weeks has been seeing good friends with whom most of my recent contact has been via the Internet. In this age of Google Chat and AIM (Facebook is so passe, yawn) it's so easy to keep in touch with friends who I can't see as frequently as I'd like because of distance. Even people like Victoria, another former roommate who works in the District and lives in northern Virginia. Sure I expect to see her fairly regularly - celebrating her birthday this week was fantastic fun! - but we can't hang out in person several nights a week like we did when we lived in the same apartment and took classes on the same campus.

Visiting these friends kind of reminds me of the movie "1776," when John and Abigail Adams are shown talking through letters (the camera cuts to them in different geographical places speaking the text like a conversation) but then movie-magic brings them together at their Massachusetts farm for a few fleeting moments before each returns to his/her current reality. I was reminded of that part because my travels have felt a bit similar -- after all this time writing I suddenly appeared in the flesh, just to vanish about as quickly as I arrived. And though I showed up knowing a wealth of information about what's going on in my friends' lives from online discussions, it's so different to actually talk about the issues in real life.

You can only imagine facial expressions and intonation when you're communicating through computer-screen text. In real life it's great to see and hear how someone says something, to get the whole sensory package, to pick up subtlety in how a topic is being addressed. Sometimes I even forget how nice that all is.

Getting back to the matter at hand...Jess also took me to visit the University of Virginia, where she is in her first year as a law student. We toured the handsome law school and she told me about campus life: the respect students have for the honor code, the lack of obnoxious, cut-throat competition (everyone is all but guaranteed a job after graduation, and people don't waste time proving their intelligence to one another since there's the sense that you must be smart if you got in - it is the 10th ranked law school in the country ), and how nice people are. The environment is friendly. Her academic section bonds by going out together twice a week, and she goes out with other people a third night. Almost everyone participates in the school softball league, no experience necessary, good sportsmanship an unwritten rule. When her third cat died early in the semester, someone lent her reading notes the next day in case she was cold-called by a professor. She's active in a whole slew of campus groups. People work hard, play hard, and don't steal the athletic equipment left unlocked for anyone to use on the quad.

Basically, it sounds like what we hoped our undergrad experience would be but mostly didn't live up to.

Walking down the open mall at night, it was a bit strange to reflect on being done with undergrad life. Like, Jess worked so hard to get into law school - she's naturally gifted with a sharp, analytical mind that will make her a great lawyer, but lots of studying didn't hurt! - and it's a little hard to believe that instead of being on our dorm sofa studying for the LSAT she's actually attending the prestigious law school at which she truly deserves to be. :) When you're in college it sometimes feels like you'll be caught up in that microcosm forever -- the homework, the friends, the drama. It hasn't totally hit me yet that it's over. It has in the sense that I wake up in the morning and know I'm going to work; I leave in the afternoon and have total freedom from the increasingly distant memory of homework. For right now it's making me very happy.

I do hope to go back to school, probably within the next couple of years. Seeing Jess made me think more about my own future academic pursuits and about figuring out exactly what path I want to take. It's so exciting to have your whole life before you and a multitude of possibilities! I'm glad I waited until after graduation to start thinking about grad school...it's a very personal decision, obviously, but I feel now like I have the time and space I need to make a clear decision. And I'm in no hurry.

Though based on what Jess said about UVA Law, maybe I should bump the possibility of law school up higher on my potential grad options list. I mean, really, who thought law school could be a fun place to make some friends?!