Thursday, June 01, 2006

Then and Now


R. started out her Smith reunion at the hospital for stress-related issues, and maybe strep. Still, she powered through the cocktail parties and introduced herself to everyone she knew or didn’t. The vibe for the 15th was decidedly subdued. Overworked or under-entertained moms showed up for a break without the kids. Many came from places like Darien and Greenwich. One person came up to my friend K., who had a nametag with her Brooklyn address on it and exclaimed, “Brooklyn! I’m in New Jersey!” She wondered how to respond to that. R. wanted to know where the other art majors had gone. They sure weren’t in abundance at this reunion.

We, that is me, my husband L., K. and her husband M. and baby F., were late. As we got caught in Brooklyn-Danbury-Northampton perfect storm of evil holiday traffic, we were a good six hours longer than expected. I called R., already submerged in Smith activities, for updates. “Good purses.” She said. “Lots of bling.” “Better hair.” She was there with her mom’s class of '66. Her grandmother, a Smith alum, also made an appearance and the three generations enjoyed boxed lunches on the lawn before the eldest was driven back to her Connecticut home.

At Gloria Steinem’s 15-year Smith reunion, she delivered the commencement address to the class of ‘71. At our 15th the feminist movement was a bit AWOL. Gloria, where are you when we need you? We’d come back with the smallest non-representative percentage that enjoys a lifestyle of the rich and homebound. This is not how I thought my classmates would turn out. But there some of them were, telling me about their nannies and their charity work. Class of '91, meet class of '51.

At the parade of the classes on Ivy Day (faux Ivy Day, really, since this is a tradition that leads up to graduation, and for the classes ending in five, there is no graduation. That has come and gone the week before.) The women wear white, and parades by class year up to the quad where graduation takes place. We walk in order, the oldest class to the youngest, with signs and class-colored sashes, flanked by the graduating class on the sidelines making a garland of roses. They then bring up the rear of the long line of alums. The loudest, youngest, most excited women you’ve ever seen. And it’s their turn to take on the mantle of alums. It sounds weird and woman-schoolish, but I swear, if you experienced it yourself, you'd be jealous your school didn't have such a tradition of its own. After getting over the exhortation to wear white shoes (sneakers are OK), you just can’t help but be moved when the two remaining members of the class of ’31 are wheeled on to the route. They looked good, too, in their perfectly bobbed hair and sunny smiles.

For the off-graduating years, it’s no less moving, but certainly less exuberant. Each time we’ve gone through Ivy Day, we forget a few things about being back at Smith. One is that activities start early in the morning. Breakfast is at 7:30. Since we stayed in Morris House, a rather thread-bare rambling dorm with a shared dining room with neighboring Tyler, this meant shuffling over to our respective rooms to make sure we were all awake. (We were.) That we had something white to wear. (We did.) And that we were prepared to take in a large, heavy breakfast before shuffling over to the parade ground. (We were resigned to this fate.)

When we finally filed into the main field where we sat to hear Carol Christ, president of the school, give her special alumnae speech, I had a weird moment, looking at all these women in white and thinking – this is a dream. Will this really last too far into this century – the women agreeing to wear white, agreeing to support a women’s college and women’s education. I couldn’t figure it out – is it quaint and archaic, or radical and rebellious?

Well, it’s both. My doubts were somewhat allayed when a stunning young graduating class member who had benefited from alumnae funds spoke of her journey from Ghana to Smith, snow and physics. A Smith scholarship at her side all the way. Inspiring and that was the point. Maybe she’ll be the next Barak Obama. Maybe we'll fork over more gift money to the school than ever before. Let's get all the women of Ghana to Smith! Let's create an army of Smith physicists! Still, her speech said so much more than Carol Christ’s jingoistic listing of every Fulbright and prize a Smithie had received this year. Even if it does say something about the school. It doesn’t say everything.

Here’s a stat that should worry anyone thinking about going to college or sending someone else: $42,000. That’s how much one year of a Smith education runs these days.

Here’s another: 90%. That’s the number of students who can’t afford to pay for a Smith education. Here’s something else that doesn't add up. As I looked around at the small showing of our class reunion, where women were in the midst of major transitions in their lives – children, staying at home, balancing work and family, divorcing, single and urban, no one had figured out quite the right formula. One friend of mine felt disappointed by the tone. “There was no political discussion of women’s issues!” Smith without the politics? We may as well have been at Holyoke. We're not on our way to Stepford, but we're not out of the woods, either.

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