A year is a long time: enough to call a place home, enough to strip away the bright facade of newness. I’ve spent my year abroad at this university, unstuck in time. My friends at home have lived a thousand different lives in the interim, and I suppose so have I. But this place is different. It’s somewhere that’s nearly impossible to explain. My friends ask me about how it compares to Brown University, and I find myself at a loss. The differences are manifold; they’re cosmically different, worlds apart. How can I express how I feel about Oxford? How can I capture this rapturous feeling? I cannot hope to explain my world here. And yet, I must try. I love this place, I hate this place, I can’t bear to leave it behind. I don’t think it will ever truly leave me.
I write to tell you all what this place means to me. To tell you what it has been to take a year abroad.
Michaelmas
Oxford still seemed romantic, a sort of richly brocaded city of dreaming; it was all twisting spires and ancient promises. The city was new, freshly minted in my mind. Things felt heavier: the air, the weight of age, the frantic, feverish rhythm of life. That was particularly significant, the speed at which everything seemed to go. Two months is not a long time. The rate of coursework, essays, and even social activities seemed breakneck. I found myself settling into my modules, grinding out two essays every single week. I would go to the Radcliffe Camera and bask under the elegant arches and soft incandescent light. Work felt special when it was beneath the watchful eye of some marble statue. I rowed in the mornings, and swam on Saturdays. Days were spent dutifully working, nights were consumed by revelry.
There was something on every single evening. Whether it was formals (such an alien concept, even to students in the UK, I’m sure), college BOPs, club nights, socials, or debate nights, I was meeting new people at a rate which rivalled my own first year of university. Formal dinners were particularly dazzling – dressing up for a three-course meal in a vaulted hall evoked some sort of Public school fantasy – and it’s no surprise I went to as many as I could afford. I involved myself in societies which seemed novel and interesting. I made friends in student politics, and watched with mild amusement as intrigues unfolded on a scale unlike any I’d seen before. It felt very…Oxford. It was somewhat alluring, the draw of the glitz and glamour of an entirely different social world.
But my disillusionment with student politics came early into the term. One night, sequestered in a college common room, beneath dim lights, I found myself at a hushed afters. The group was discussing one of my friends, saying terrible things. I knew then what I know now: I wanted no part of that world. I resolved to extricate myself.
Like any new thing, Michaelmas was bright, exciting, and romantic. Underneath the shine, I found that some truths were better left buried. The journey out of darkness was not easy or linear, but it was worth it.
Hilary
Hilary began as it ended, with a sort of incorrigible grey. There was a lightness to it, at some point in the middle, when things fell into place. When the rhythms of life here began to feel as normal as breathing. I wrote so much that term: articles for a student paper, modules on Mesopotamia and Ethnobotany, and pages and pages in my journal. I also took up ice skating. There was something freeing about gliding across that glittering rink. It smiled at me, kissed my cheeks with cool breath, and pushed my feet across frozen ground. I found peace in my solo skates, joy in skating with others. Collapsing into bed, face flushed from the cold, I could not have been happier.
By this point, the glamour of student politics had thoroughly worn off. It seemed more like a tired old thing, full of fatigued people. Yet still, friends found themselves deeper entrenched in the machinery of it. I pulled further and further away as they ran elections and relayed intrigues.
Working on the student paper was my saving grace, with the Schwarzman becoming an unlikely refuge. We spent long hours below that sun-soaked ceiling, passing the day in leisurely conversation. We discussed the paper, pitched articles, and wrote silly headlines that could never be published. Little work was done, even when dusk came and went. The watchful oculus considered us carefully, as we raced about on rolling chairs under the moonlight. We would stay into the early morning hours, dancing, singing, running around that hollowed-out space. The darkness was warm.
Nights at the Schwarzman melted into afters at one room or another. Twilight spent in fervent conversation, marked by tea or cheese and crackers. I felt so full in these liminal moments. Pink parties, game cafes, and homemade DnD campaigns made my time at college all the brighter. Although the end of Hilary was marked by a particularly nasty bout of pneumonia, I felt satisfied with all I’d done in my grey little term.
Sometimes, in that mid-year lull, the only thing to do is to keep pressing forward. There is a light at the end of the tunnel. The articles and essays I wrote that term are still some of my favourites.
Trinity
May night was long and dark, a treacherous road twisting round the riverbend. We walked in cold twilight. Moonbeams glanced across my cheek – a quiet beacon in the near black. The neon glow of varsity faded into dawn, slowly. When the sun finally turned Magdalen Tower blushing red, the choir heralded the start of spring. May morning shone just a bit too brightly, full of clamorous noise and clatter. Dancing and merry bells followed me all the way into my belated slumber.
Oxford was beginning to shimmer beneath the brilliant sunshine. It made everything feel just a bit more hopeful. I was determined to spend the term trying an entirely new set of activities. I shed the politics which made Hilary drag endlessly, and leaned into my renewed joy for writing. I joined two magazines and a different student paper. These turned out to be such sources of light: full of incredible, creative people, and even more incredible work. Writing articles, performing pieces, editing work, it was all so fulfilling. I looked forward every week to our lay-ins, or planning meetings for events.
Trinity was a time of great celebration. I attended countless birthdays, including my own. My friends made me such thoughtful cakes; I was laughing long into the night. It was so nice to be with the people who made Oxford special. I turned 21 under the multicoloured lights at the Brasenose Ball. It felt magical, to be able to mark the occasion in such a fairytale manner. I will always remember the purple glow and the soft music in the background as I checked my watch, and hugged my friend tight when the hour hand slid to midnight.
Ultimately, it was the small moments that made Trinity particularly special: whether it was simply studying with finalists, or watching Eurovision for the first time on my friend’s bed (we ate too many of her snacks and took our bets entirely too seriously).
I must have done absolutely no revision the second the sun came out. Maybe it was the warmth of the afternoon light on my face at Port Meadow, or the cool depths of Hinksey Lake, but those days passed in such a calm haze. The picture of idyllic summertime.
Sometimes, letting go is just a chance for a new beginning.
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Oxford has been so many things. I’ve sought out every hidden place and tried every new activity that I could reasonably fit around my coursework. I’ve met so many important people who have impacted my life in countless ways. It took time to find my place here. There was a significant period of trial and error, but I’ve somehow made it to where I am happiest. I do not regret the experiences I tried which were not quite right for me. I learned from them, they were meaningful, and made for fantastic stories.
When I return to Brown in the autumn, I will carry all of these experiences with me. I will hold them close to my heart, and I will try, and fail, and try again to explain how much they mean to me. If you are embarking on a year abroad, whether for your third year of Modern Languages, or to Oxford just like me, prepare to try everything. Prepare to change, to experience as many new things as you possibly can. You will return different, but you will be better for it.
A year is a long time to be away from home.
