Roses Are Read

February 14, 2014

The Sun in His Pocket

Silvio Berlusconi still believes in himself. His doctors say that he is “almost immortal.” His story is not over.

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J’ai Deux Amours

My parents put in uncommon efforts to raise my brother and me completely bilingual. Our mother (a Frenchwoman from Normandy) spoke only French to us, ever, our father (a New Yorker by way of Romania and Tunisia) only English. To build a wall of separation within us between French and English, they pretended not to understand when we addressed them in the wrong language.

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Reminiscence

As we approach the Sunrise Senior Living Home in Farmington Hills, Michigan, my grandmother explains that it houses two separate programs. The primary one is for the elderly who cannot fully care for themselves. The second, called “Reminiscence,” is for those who also have severe memory problems. That’s where my grandfather has lived for the past six months.

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Akua Banful

I have always thought that knowing how old you are is an important part of who you are. Your age lets you know what kinds of things you should be doing, and what is expected of you by wider society. My birthday has always been an unshakeable fact, as it is for most people I know.

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In Memory of Philip Seymour Hoffman

It happens more often than perhaps it should: a celebrity, be it rock star, movie icon, or stud athlete, is upheld on a pedestal for many years during his or her career, only to come crashing down at some shocking revelation that leaves fans disappointed and disenchanted. Sunday, February 4th left me with a similar feeling, when it was proclaimed over various social media outlets that Oscar-winning actor Philip Seymour Hoffman was found dead in his New York apartment with a needle in his arm and significant amounts of heroin in the vicinity.

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Girl Talk

Ever since the giddy, popcorn and T. Swift-fueled “Truth” games of seventh grade slumber parties, those two words have become a default response to countless puzzled male faces. From Sex and the City to Gossip Girl, generations of chick flicks and girl-power soap operas reinforce the idea that no crush, no kiss, and no hook up, no matter how “casual” or “on the D-L,” is to be withheld from a girl’s close circle.

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Feeling a Spark

I spent my summer writing bad poetry and reading novels. Self-indulgent, I suppose, and I felt twinges of guilt for not following the ambitious career paths of my fellow classmates, who were off saving poor children in Kenya or studying philosophy in Greece. But after a rather stressful year, it was a relief to sit in my room, in my bed, with my books.

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Reconciling Art and Artist

When I visited the Woody Allen papers before winter break, the allegations against Mr. Allen of sexual abuse had not yet resurfaced. Those accusations, presented by his daughter Dylan Farrow in the New York Times on February 1, have reignited an age-old debate about the relationship between an artist’s personal life and the content of his artwork.

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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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Philomena as Documentary

Every year I try to watch the films nominated for the Best Picture award at the Oscars. Last week, I saw one of these, Philomena, starring Judy Dench and Steve Coogan and directed by Stephen Frears. The film is about Philomena Lee (Dench), an old Irish woman who is searching for the son that the Catholic Church forced her to give into adoption fifty years prior.

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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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Verbatim

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Overheard in JRN 240

Professor John McPhee: When I received my first 5000-word assignment, I was literally floored. I laid down on a floor.

Overheard in Whitman Dining Hall

St. A’s sophomore: Every time I hear a Triangle member loudly compliment another Triangle member, I’m ready to be raptured.

Overheard in Pyne

Theta expatriate: He said he couldn’t hang out because he had to study for his job at Bubba Gump Shrimp Company.

Overheard in Frist cafeteria

Non-black male: You should take an AAS class!
Black female: My life is an AAS class.

Overheard at Ivy

Ivy junior: How could someone who has a job at Morgan Stanley be such a fucking idiot?!

Overheard on realtalkprinceton.tumblr.com

Anonymous current student to anxious male prefrosh virgin: So it seems like, based off of my very sketchy calculations, you have around a 6% chance of getting laid, but given that most girls have a type and there is no saying if you fit that type, I’d bring that percentage down even lower to around 3%.

Overheard on New Year’s Eve

Drunk junior girl: I know enough Spanish to tell my maid that she put my clothes in the wrong drawer.

Overheard in Wu

Overeager Alt Freshman: So, I was looking at the A’s website and I found their hidden link and pressed it. I’m so ready for this.

Overheard in Terrace

Bro 1: Them late meal sandwiches got that gluten free bread, ya feel me?
Bro 2: Oh, son, I feel that.

Overheard in Blair

PDP member: I refuse to friend the freshmen debaters. They must friend me. Otherwise it messes up the power dynamic.

Overheard in COM class

Professor: This is a literature course. We don’t really care about things like the truth.

Overheard in review session in Frick

Grad student, on digression: I learned that if you are holding hands, electron clouds are just repelling, and your nerves are just reacting to that force. So I guess that means... I’ve never touched anyone. Also I’m married to a physicist so there is no romance in my life.

Overheard in Blair

St. A’s sophomore: I could honestly divide Ivy into people I would fuck or kill.

Overheard in Terrace

Senior Terran: I’m not inviting you to live on my commune when I’m older.

Overheard in Frist

White boy: Maybe we could get tickets to the African thing.
White girl: Disiac?