Can I trust anyone yet?

October 22, 2002 by David Blackman

I don't know whom to trust yet. I can't trust the people in my dorm. They've been trying to kill me with saltines and water all week long. Can't trust my clock; it's trying to drive me insane. Who, or what, am I supposed to trust?

I should be able to trust my clocks. They're inanimate objects. But I can't. On the first day of school, I synchronized my alarm clock with my roommate's, and now we're both about seven minutes fast. But I'm afraid to change it back, because I'm now convinced that I can leave my room at 8:55 a.m., go to the bathroom, and bike to the other side of the Main Quad by 9:00 a.m.. For a while, before I realized I was seven minutes ahead of the rest of campus, I kept getting really annoyed at my teachers and my classmates, because they were always late to class.

Does anyone else have upstairs neighbors who use their windows as a garbage chute? I'm not sure if I can trust my upstairs neighbors, as they seem to be trying to kill me. I love them dearly, and they have yet to dispose of anything other than various states of water out the window, but it's still really disconcerting when I'm sitting in my room, and it looks like the heavens are opening above me.

While my upstairs neighbors are trying to bean me in the head with ice cubes, some of my other dormmates are trying to choke me to death with crackers. I was sitting in the dining hall the other day, when one of the Otero girls postulated that it was impossible to eat five saltine crackers in a minute. This didn't seem like such a problem to me, so I rose to the challenge.

Before I noticed she was gone, there was a stack of five crackers on my tray. By this point, both Oteran tables were watching, and my RA was looking for an official timer. I asked if this was the type of behavior he was supposed to be discouraging. He said no.

I couldn't do it. I tried eating two at a time, but they just wouldn't go down (part of the rules involved not drinking anything). By the third and fourth cracker, I had a giant ball of reprocessed starch that wasn't going anywhere. I didn't think I'd make it at all, but I got the last one down 15 seconds late (The trick, I'm told, is to secretly build up a store of saliva before the competition starts).

The moral of all this? Don't trust your dormmates; they're secretly trying to kill you.

But if you can't trust your dormmates, whom can you trust? Who are my real friends? (And have they all got the bends?) It's only a month into school; I don't think we have real friends yet (unless you brought them from home), but the intimacy of dorm life gives us that special and dangerous bond. We're willing to reveal so much, but should we? Do you ever get wrapped up in telling a story and suddenly wonder if you're telling it to the wrong person?

Regardless, my dormmates are the people I have to trust, because I've voluntarily marooned myself thousands of miles from home, and these people have been randomly selected to be my support group. My dormmates are the first to know when I'm having trouble with my column, even if they don't want to be, and I'm the second person they ask to edit their papers (first, if my dorm's writing instructor isn't around).

Basically, your roommate is the only one who knows if you're trying to be a new person, because they see you when you let your guard down. When you stop being someone new and slip into old, comfortable habits. It's those new, phony personalities that make it hard to figure out who to trust.

Did anyone else expect to show up at college a different person? And then were you really surprised to find out you weren't much different from the person you were four months ago, when you graduated from high school? I know I was. I was really surprised when I got to my first party, and I was the same guy who was too self-conscious to dance. Same guy, different clothes.

It's not like I want to be the geek on the sidelines, nursing a Coke and hoping someone will drag him onto the dance floor. But I don't know any other way to be. Is this who I want to be? I don't think so, since it didn't get me where I wanted to be in high school. But I don't know how to be anyone else. And even if I tried, wouldn't it be the phoniest thing in the world? Who do I want to be? And does that persona involve drinking?

It'll all work out. The fog is clearing, and normal, complete people are emerging. It's good to see. I don't think I'm going to go get smashed and be the life of a party tomorrow night, and not just because it'll be Wednesday night, but because that's not me. Maybe I'll have a little beer and do a little dancing next time; maybe I won't. Maybe I'll stop trying so hard and just let it happen naturally. If Stanford wants me to party, it'll give me a sign; if Stanford wants me to study, it'll give me a sign (that B- / C+ on my CS assignment was almost enough to convince me). Maybe, if you see me at a party (and no, I'm not as scary-looking as that mug shot might have led you to believe), maybe drag me onto the dance floor. I'll thank you later.

David Blackman is an overworked freshman. When he's not getting interrogated by the county sheriff, he enjoys remembering what summer was like. He can be reached at blackmad@stanford.edu.

David Blackman is an overworked freshman. When he's not getting interrogated by the county sheriff, he enjoys remembering what summer was like. He can be reached at blackmad@stanford.edu.