Caryln Sampson from Rebuilding Hope! Sexual Assault Center of Pierce County (SACPC) came to visit my fraternity, Beta Theta Pi, at our chapter meeting today. For those that don’t know, SACPC “offers support toward healing through advocacy and therapy for those affected by sexual assault and abuse” in the Pierce County area. Alongside supporting victims, SACPC also offers intensive trainings to police, medical professionals and other people interested in becoming advocates for victims. SACPC is Beta’s philanthropy and Carlyn is our primary contact with the organization.

Personally, I support SACPC, and sexual assault prevention in general, because I think that sexual assault is totally unacceptable (as any logical person should). Beta choosing SACPC as its philanthropy just aligns with my core values.

Carlyn came to introduce herself to us and lead a discussion on sexual assault and the role that SACPC plays in it. And holy shit it was refreshing.

In my experience, sexual assault prevention trainings and workshops tend to just make me feel terrible. Men are almost always portrayed as the perpetrators and women as victims. There is always this accusatory tone towards the male gender. As a male, this obviously doesn’t make me feel too good. While I am passionate about the topic, the feeling makes me apprehensive to participate in discussions. I’m made to feel that as a male, I have nothing to and should not contribute.

But Carlyn wasn’t like that. Carlyn was incredibly informative, spouting knowledge of every step of the sexual assault reporting process and the different resources that SACPC offers, just to name a few of the topics she discussed. She even mentioned the program she started last year that supported victims of sex trafficking in Pierce County.

Throughout her talk, the tone she took was evenhanded and just generally not accusatory at all. For once, I didn’t feel like a terrible person. Carlyn even mentioned that the idea of men becoming uncontrollable cavemen around women was an archaic and just ridiculous idea. She said that she wanted to help us fight that stigma against males (particularly fraternities) in conversations about sexual assault. All of our members agreed that they thought that the discussion was refreshing and just plain amazing.

Carlyn is expected to visit us again next semester and looking into the possibility of getting us at least part of the same training that SACPC offers to law enforcement and medical professionals and requires of their volunteers and staff.

I can’t wait!

Well it happened. It actually fucking happened. What started as a joke a few years ago resulted in one of the worst possible outcomes. This doesn’t even feel like reality.

We’re all feeling different things, anger, sadness, fear, uncertainty. But whatever you’re feeling, don’t forget to practice self-care. In times like now, the least we can do is maintain our well being.

The main thing is to not bury any of your feelings and thoughts. Burying and pushing them away will only cause them to bubble back up in the future. Don’t be afraid to express yourself in whatever way you feel comfortable. To some, that’s sharing their thoughts on Facebook. To others, that’s writing in their private journal. The list doesn’t end there. Working out, making art, playing video games, watching cat videos, cooking, there is no wrong thing to do. Just do anything that makes you feel better.

And please don’t forget to take care of your physical well-being. Eat food, drink water, get some fresh air. You’d be surprised at how much better you’ll feel after getting some air.

We’re all going to be coping with this in our own ways. One of the best things we can do for one another is respect each other’s coping strategies. Everyone deals with issues in their own way and we cannot create a toxic environment of harshness and criticism like this shit show has been for the last few years.

Now if you’ll excuse me, I’m going to go kill space terrorists in Call of Duty until I feel better.

I’m sorry if this seems incoherent, my brain is just fried after the past day.

I have PT and an exam tomorrow. Wait, did I do the homework? Yeah I did. Got most of the dance party posters put up today. Can’t forget to give the extra to the other houses when I visit their chapter meetings next Monday. Can’t forget to actually visit. FreakNight is this weekend! I can’t wait. But first I have work on Friday before I leave. And the exam tomorrow. Ugh. I need to find time to start figuring out my classes for next semester. I know I’m taking Geology and Physics, but what about my other classes? Classes. Wait. What classes do I have tomorrow? Crap. I need to get around to that IFC Application…

Life is hectic right now. It has been for the last few months. Greek Life, Rugby, Work and Academics all keep me busy and always overlap with one another. I’m stressed, tired and really lacking in sleep. I just want it all to stop sometimes.

But, I’m having the time of my life. I’m making friends. I’m making connections all over campus. I’m eating very SUBpar food. I’m gaining valuable leadership experience. I’m learning all these new things. I’m making memories. I’m having fun.

Sure, I’d rather being laying in bed watching Netflix, but where’s the fun in that?

It’s been a little while since Orientation, but my mind keeps on drifting back to that time. It was… incredible to say the least. I mean, I can easily say being a Perspectives Leader was one of the greatest experiences of my life.

For those of you that don’t know, the University of Puget Sound has an intense 9/10 day (depending on who you ask) orientation program. Yeah. We’re crazy. Whatever. Three of those days are dedicated to Passages, which is a camping trip in the Olympic National Park. Another three days is for Perspectives, which is for learning more about Tacoma and how to get around/involved. The rest of the days are for various other orientation activities. Every year, the university hires upperclassmen to come back to campus early and lead Passages or Perspectives and pays them the princely sum of $100. Don’t worry, the experience was totally worth only being paid $100.

I arrived on campus on August 13th (exactly 3 months after I left campus for the summer in May!) and spent the day moving into my room. That night, I was so excited for training beginning the next day I could barely sleep! I didn’t know what to expect and couldn’t wait to meet the other leaders.

The next few days were long and damn hard. We spent anywhere between 10 and 14 hours together, training, learning and discussing. I always went to sleep completely drained. Sometimes, I dozed off during presentations because I was just so burned out. But I would do everything again in a heartbeat.

In those few days, I bonded so much with all of the other leaders. We laughed together, cheered together, chanted together and even cried together. We all got to learn so much about one another through more activities or discussions than I can count. They became more than just friends. They became family.

Ashley and Ben were impressed with my Nalgene balancing skills

And then came move-in day. Training was over. Time to face the first-years. My day started at 6:30AM and I didn’t go to sleep until almost 1AM. It was a reeeeeeeeeeally long day. But it was so much fun!

The best part of the day was Convocation. All of the new students and parents were gathered in Baker Stadium to listen to speeches from the Dean of Students Mike Segawa, New University President Isiaah Crawford and other speakers. I’m gonna be honest, as great as those speeches were, they weren’t the best part.

The best part of the best part of the day was being in the section of the bleachers with all of the other campus student leaders. Perspectives, Passages, ResLife, CICE, we were all there. We were all screaming our heads off, coming up with chants, doing weird things and generally acting crazy. We were having the time of our lives.

Lots of orange -ahem- salmon

My voice was so sore by the end of the day. But it was totally worth it. Then I realized that I was freaking exhausted and Orientation hadn’t even technically started yet.

Also, sometime around 9/10PM-ish, I yelled “ALL MY LIFE I WANNA BE LOGGER” at the first-years in Anderson/Langdon Hall. No one replied. It was a sad time. Moving on.

Orientation was crazy. Almost every day, there was something going on. Meetings, skit rehearsals (more on that later), groups to talk to, volunteer activities, debriefs, updates, registrations and tons of other things to do. But like training, it was so much fun.

One of my groups, with my co-lead Ashley

Ryan needs to get better at selfies…

One of my favorite parts of Orientation was the Campus Life Skit. The CLS is a series of skits, songs and dance numbers to help inform new students about all aspects of campus life, from university services to partying safely. All the Perspectives leaders had parts to play. I had roles in multiple skits, which were: Tour Guide, Drunk Partygoer (in two different skits) and Drunk Naked Boy. I think I see a common theme among some of these roles. Whatever. And as I keep saying with just about everything, IT WAS SO MUCH FUN.

Yes, I am in an orange morphsuit

After our second showing of the CLS (we had two showings for the two different orientation sessions), we had one of our final activities. We did a name board activity. Basically, we all took turns writing notes on each other’s boards, which ranged from little messages to short essays. These boards would become our keepsakes of Perspectives. A physical memory of our time as leaders. Together.

That night, I read all the messages that everyone wrote on my board. Because my roommate was asleep, I had to use the light peeking between my window blinds to read. As I read, I was filled with just so much happiness. The messages were so sweet, being filled with praise and just good old love. Then I was filled with a ton of regret. Everyone had written such amazing messages on my board while I had written what I considered as comparatively superficial messages on theirs. So I spent all night laying in bed, thinking about how terrible a person I am. Okay maybe I’m over dramatizing things. It was more like two hours.

And then the next day was the final day of orientation. The first event planned for the day was Matriculation, a ceremony that signaled the official beginning of college for the new students. Given that this was a semi-formal event, all the leaders were dressed up, so while the speeches were happening, we were taking awesome pictures. My favorite was of when we were lined up on the side of Commencement Walk with Mike Segawa talking to the first years in the background.

Best Picture ever

After Matriculation, we had our final debrief. The very last one. The one that, when finished, would signal the end of the our time as Perspectives Leaders for the year.

It was an activity. Our last activity. We all sat in a circle with one person holding a ball of yarn. That person pointed out another person and threw the yarn to them. Then they just talked about them. Complimented them, praised them, talked about a funny memory. Anything. Then that person would pass it to another and another and so forth. Sometimes, the yarn would travel across the circle, other times, just a few people away. We were crying, but we didn’t care, we had cried in front of each other before. This continued until the yarn reached every single person in the circle. The end result was a network of yarn. It showed that each and every one of us was connected. We were more than just a group of leaders, more than a team, we were a family.

Once the activity was over, there was a hesitation. No one stood up. Standing up meant that we accepted that it was over. And many of us just weren’t ready to accept that fact. After a minute, someone stood up and it was over.

Like I said at the beginning of this post, being a Perspectives Leader was one of the greatest experiences of my life. It was life changing. After reading this post, I hope that you can see why.

If you have the chance, apply to be an Orientation Leader! I promise you, you’ll have the time of your life.

This is for all of the Perspectives Leaders reading this right now: Ya’ll were LIT. I love you guys.

All around me, there are rooms slowly being emptied as everyone moves out for the summer. Right now, I’m sitting on my bed in my empty room. My roommate checked out an hour ago and my checkout time is in about 20 minutes. Save for my backpack, nothing in here is mine anymore.

It’s difficult to convey what I want to say. I don’t even know where to start. I could talk about my roommate and how he basically gave me a single by getting a girlfriend early last semester. Or I could write about the struggles of living in the furthest possible room from the guy’s bathroom. Maybe I could mention always hearing the ding of the elevator at all hours of the day. Or all of the memories I made here. Just so many memories.

I don’t know. There’s just too much to say…… or maybe I don’t need to say that much. Yeah, I don’t need to say much.

All I need to say is that I loved living in this room.

Goodbye, T/P 306.

Last week, I went to the last chapter meeting of the year with Beta Theta Pi. Alongside wrapping up Fraternity business for the year, we had our graduating members will items down to younger members to keep them in the fraternity and impart some wisdom to the chapter.

It was a long ceremony, but totally worth it. Everyone willed great things and had amazing stories to share with the chapter. But personally, one person stood out: Dwolfe

Daniel “Dwolfe” Wolfert is the ideal human being. He’s hilarious, a good singer and has just too much sass and snark for most people. He is awesome and Puget Sound is losing an amazing individual by letting him graduate this Saturday. He’s been an incredible contributor to Beta this last year, pouring his blood, sweat and tears into the chapter despite not being asked to.

What he had to say to the chapter almost had me at tears. He declared his love for the chapter. Dwolfe essentially said that all the hard work he put in this year was representative of his love for us. He even referenced some lyrics from the song he wrote and released this year, “The Horizon is Ours.” (By the way, it is an AMAZING song, check it out!)

Through the dark, I can see the dawn I am running to.

He said that we were the dawn he was running to. Beta was the light at the end of the tunnel for him. That’s how much we meant to him.

Dwolfe, I’ve only known you for a semester, but the experiences I’ve had with you will last a lifetime. Wherever you end up in life, make a RUCKUS.

Disclaimer: This post does not necessarily reflect the views or opinions of the other What We Do bloggers, the University of Puget Sound or any of it’s representatives.

Puget Sound claims to be an open and accepting campus.

But is it really?

Yes, the school is constantly working to be as inclusive as humanly possible for people of all races, genders, sexual orientations and many other identifiers. And I genuinely respect that. I’ve never seen the effort that the school puts into inclusion in any other sort of institution. I can’t deny how admirable it is to strive to include and accept everyone.

But I can’t help but see some hypocrisy and feel a bit of cynicism.

I work for Student Programs in ASUPS. We are responsible for bringing performers onto campus for everyone to enjoy. Well, the programmers do, I just do sound and lights for said performers.

Anyway, hanging in our office is a framed poster from the 80s or 90s of a lecture in the Fieldhouse from James Watt. James Watt served as Secretary of the Interior under Ronald Reagan. He is infamous for being one of Reagan’s most controversial secretaries. An extreme conservative, Watt was described as “anti-environmentalist” and infamously banned The Beach Boys from playing a concert at the National Mall because they “attracted the wrong element.”

“The Courage to Be Conservative”

So why do I bring this poster up? While I may not know how the event went (I mean a riot could’ve broke out and the school had to remodel the Fieldhouse, I dunno), but the fact that Watt came here says a lot. An extreme conservative came to probably one of the most liberal colleges on the West Coast.

Someone like that coming to UPS would not fly today. There’d probably be a protest….there’d definitely be a protest. The protesters might try to (and probably would) bar people from entering the venue. In general, the response would not be good.

Why?

Because he has a different ideology? Because Watt doesn’t support what you support? Because he has a different opinion?

So what am I trying to get at? It’s hypocritical that the Puget Sound community brands itself as open and accepting. Most opinions that don’t follow the majority’s are crushed.

Google defines “Liberal” as “open to new behavior or opinions and willing to discard traditional values” and “Conservative” as “holding to traditional attitudes and values and cautious about change or innovation, typically in relation to politics or religion.” Is Puget Sound a liberal arts college? Or is it a conservative arts college?

I am not a conservative. I consider myself liberal. But a friend of mine got to ranting and raving recently about this topic and it just stuck. The idea bounced around in my head constantly. I had to get it out, I had to write about it. I’m sorry if I offended anyone.

Oh crap. I’m starting to have doubts about going here. This isn’t good.

Don’t get me wrong, UPS is a great place. I love the small liberal arts environment. The professors and people here are amazing. The small size is just small enough for me to know a lot of people but large enough so that I’m always meeting new people. It’s also pretty awesome that my room is like a 2 minute walk from the SUB.

But, I realized something recently. I want to pursue a career in the digital arts. I want to do Graphic Design. And UPS doesn’t offer anything remotely close to either of those. Maybe I should have gone somewhere else.

What caused this revelation? A little while ago, I started designing a Geofilter for Snapchat for my fraternity. I finished a draft and sent it to a friend of mine who’s a sophomore at the University of Southern California studying Graphic Design. She gave me a ton of really good suggestions, most of which I ended up implementing in the final design.

Then we got to catching up, because we hadn’t spoken in months. She asked me what I was majoring in and I said Geology. She was surprised because of the circumstances that we met in. We met last summer at a technology summer camp that we both taught at. I taught Game Design and Engineering while she taught Digital Photography and Photoshop (Don’t be too impressed, it was a lot less glamorous than it sounds).

She told me to just keep my mind open. Majors, classes, activities, interests, they could all change in an instant. Life will never go as planned and I shouldn’t just limit myself so early on.

And I couldn’t agree with her more. I mean, this year alone, I decided to switch from Environmental Policy and Decision Making to Geology and joined Rugby, my first team sport ever alongside dozens of other changes. Who’s to say there won’t be more change in my future? As the saying goes, “The only thing that is constant is change”.

So maybe Geology isn’t for me. I mean, it’s an interesting topic that I’d love to learn more about, but my real passion lies in technology and media. But I can’t study that here.

Thankfully, there is a bit of a silver lining. I can apply to be the Director of Marketing and Outreach or a Graphic Designer for ASUPS. Both will allow me to pursue my interests in graphic design while still studying Geology. So maybe things aren’t as bad as I made them out to be at first.

On my desk, there is a box with two small glass jars, a bunch of envelopes and a collection of other things. This is my box of memorabilia. I’m a really sentimental person, so I’ve kept as many cards, tickets, notes and other small tokens as possible to hold onto as I go through life. I actually have another box full of stuff at home, but I left it behind because I didn’t want to risk losing everything at once.

I keep this box because they all represent different aspects of my life, both past and present. I simply don’t want to forget them.

Here are some of the things in the box:

• This is the ticket to the first rave (and concert) I ever went to. I remember bouncing with excitement in class, I just couldn’t wait to see my favorite artists at the time. And it was amazing. I just couldn’t stop smiling through the entire performance. Afterwards, I had some of the best Thai food ever at 2AM at some late night Thai place in downtown San Francisco. I won’t ever forget this night.

• I got this “coupon” last summer at my summer job. My boss started to give out boxes with random prizes in them at the end of the work week to end the weekend right and reward us for our hard work. The prizes ranged from cash, extra break time (this was a summer camp, so any second away from the kids were a godsend) and a free lunch delivery from my boss. I never cashed this in and there isn’t an expiration date… I wonder…

• These wristbands are from these spirit competitions that my high school put on every semester. These competitions were a battle of a classes, seeing who could win the most games and perform the best skits and dances. They are honestly some of the best memories of my life.

• I went to Bumbershoot for the first time after the first week of classes last Fall. It was the first festival I ever went to and it was such a fun time. I got to see a dance competition, listen to some artists I never had heard before and meet some interesting people while I stood in line. The highlight of this was getting to see Zedd, one of my favorite artists right now.

• Last summer, I got into a car accident. Seeing as work was a 45 minute drive away, I couldn’t ask my parents to take me every morning. So I started to take the train to and from work. It was my first time taking public transit by myself. While I never saw or met anyone interesting because I was usually napping, it was still a nice time.

• Finally, here are my bids from Rush Week. That week was a really fun time and if I could have, I would have picked both Fraternities.

So there’s my list of junk/sentimental stuff. What are yours? What meaning do they hold for you?