Silver crowns and golden phoenixes

On celebrating and ceremony

St. John’s College (Santa Fe campus)…definitely not the “basketball” university

Hello friend,

I attended St. John’s College—not the “basketball” university but “The Great Books” school—as an undergraduate, and to this day, I continue to feel such a deep connection that this spring, I decided to audit a graduate preceptorial on Moby Dick . The class is small—only eight of us plus the professor—and the discussion constantly challenges me to a deeper understanding of Melville’s masterpiece. I was so immersed in class this past week that I didn’t notice the growing ruckus outside the building until the shouts and laughter made it difficult to hear my classmates. The professor simply nodded and said, “It’s Senior Prank.”

Ahhhh, yes! I had completely forgotten about this long tradition, but as soon as he mentioned it I was transported back to my undergraduate days, when towards the end of the spring semester, seniors disrupt the undergraduate evening seminars. I remembered the elation of being pulled out of those classes, the much needed reprieve from the intense schoolwork for a solid 24 hours (or more) of parties. As a young person, it was liberating to collectively release my pent up energy along with everyone else. I can still feel myself on the throbbing dance floor with my besties scream-singing, “THIS IS THE END OF THE WORLD AS WE KNOW IT, AND WE FEEL FIIIIIIINE!” (Mercifully, I attended St. John’s in the mid/late 1980s, so any alleged debauchery lives solely in our memories, rather than in perpetuity on Instagram.)