Author:

Setbacks

Attack
in the water.
Reached the shoals by backstroke.
As my nerves settled I respired
Sunbathed.

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Kicking Upwards

Dads is a TV show on Fox about two young men who are forced through presumably wacky circumstances to live with their fathers, providing us with, if nothing else, some much-needed screen time for the middle class white man. Fifteen episodes of a nineteen episode season have been broadcast so far, and I have watched one, called “Funny Girl.”

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A Letter from the Icy Club

Do not listen to the rumors. In fact, starting right now, do not listen to anyone. No, not your closest friends. No, not even your mom. Definitely not your mom. Everyone is out to sabotage you. Paranoia is the only way to survive. I might be a saboteur (I’m not). But I might be (again, I’m not). Trust no one (except me).

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I Got a Peanut Allergy for My 19th Birthday

Two nights before my nineteenth birthday, I was studying for my last final exam, which was supposed to take place the following evening, spooning peanut butter into my mouth. Suddenly my tongue started to tingle and swell, my chest and neck began to itch, and my throat started to close. I soon found myself at the University Medical Center of Princeton at Plainsboro (PMC) with an epi-pen in my arm.

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Hello, My Name Is ______.

I was seventeen. A senior second semester saturated with drugs, alcohol and bad decisions written off as “youth” had ended in a hospital bed on prom night, and, subsequently, in daily, forced AA meetings. I’d thought I was on top of the world: going to an Ivy League school, surrounded by friends, graduating top of my class.

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Truths or Myths

In McCosh courtyard on a sunny October afternoon, Princeton students milled about between classes and my friend J., a junior, stood facing her Orange Key tour group. We smiled and waved at each other over the heads of the 30 or so prospective students and their parents eagerly listening to her speak. As I walked by, I caught a snippet of her presentation: “In general,” she said, “Princeton students aren’t really concerned with GPA.”

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Naked

Monday evening at ten of seven, I finish my dinner at Rocky dining hall, walk down Witherspoon Street to the Arts Council of Princeton, and make my way to the theater on the second floor. Minutes later I stand in the center of the room on a podium, naked, with the eyes of a dozen middle-aged strangers trained on me.

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Waiting for Woody

I entered Alexander Hall, heart pounding, clutching a small spiral notebook and an orange ticket. The narrow, rounded hallway bordering the theater was filled with a labyrinth of lines. I frantically weaved through and approached an usher to ask her where I could wait in order to sit in orchestra seats.

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The Decline of Marshall Mathers

To my parents’ horror, I discovered Eminem at age twelve when my uncle gave me a copy of Encore for my birthday. I was enchanted; I loved the tenderness of ‘Mockingbird’ and the humor of ‘Puke,’ and the unbridled rage and violence that riddled the album were more visceral and real than any emotions I had ever heard in music.

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Frugality

I’ve missed out on a lot of things due to lack of money. As bad as that sounds, I often forget about it. But there are times I am reminded. This will be about those moments I am reminded, not in a melancholy sort of way, not a boo-hoo story about being the pauper of the town, but instead as an account of how I curiously grew into a frugal lifestyle; how I couldn’t afford things, and how that resulted in me not wanting them.

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Of Matt(yboys) & Moon(thels)

Is it Matt or Matthew?”

Nearly all my life, I have faced this question. More than a courtesy, it is a challenge, a demand: “Identify yourself.”

In my childhood, I was lost and unsure. Who am I? Am I that guy who carelessly shortens his name, soiling the greatest gift, after life, his parents have given him? Or am I that guy who insists on being called by his proper name, like some pompous Alexander or Maximilian?

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PrinceWatch

A man may take to drink,” wrote George Orwell, “because he feels himself to be a failure, and then fail all the more completely because he drinks. It is rather the same thing that is happening to the English language. It becomes ugly and inaccurate because our thoughts are foolish, but the slovenliness of our language makes it easier for us to have foolish thoughts.” Unfortunately, the Daily Princeton is like the man who rushes the growler a few too many times.

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