Author Archives: Hillary Reinsberg

College Life: A Letter To My Freshman Year Self

College Life: A Letter To My Freshman Year Self

A friend recently told me that as an incoming college freshman, she thought that “college was going to be all eating Indian food in the dorms.” What does this mean? Frankly, I’m not really sure, but it speaks to the fact that when we come into college, we don’t really have a clue what to expect. As we begin to look back, chicken tikka didn’t have much to do with our experience – but as we started to think about our one-time expectations, we recognized how off-base we had been about so many things four years ago. More »

College Crusades: When Does It Start Getting Old?

College Crusades: When Does It Start Getting Old?

The following is a fairly accurate rundown of most nights I spend going out on campus in college:

1. Beverages of questionable quality are poured into red cups in our living room.
2. After twenty minutes, we leave and walk one block away – making sure to take the shortcut route that allows us to both arrive faster and also pass by the house of close guy friends, whereby we can survey if they have yet left their house. More »

College Life: Facing Job Rejections

College Life: Facing Job Rejections

hroughout college, we’ve all dealt with rejection. What was it? Things went sour after the first date? You didn’t get into your sorority or acapella group of choice? High school might even have been worse – the cool girls ostracized you, perhaps, and then you didn’t get into your top colleges of choice.

But among all of those, the most biting of rejections has to be the job rejection. A different beast entirely, job rejections are a major blow to the ego and they also make that unspoken – graduation – even harder to face. More »

College Life: How to Tackle Annoying Questions About Your Post-Grad Future

College Life: How to Tackle Annoying Questions About Your Post-Grad Future

My ears are ringing with questions. Just call it the institutional inquisition.

Graduation is six weeks away. I don’t usually broadcast the inner workings of my every move to the whole wide world, but questions are flying at me from all angles about where I’m going and what I’m doing come graduation, and so on.

So what do I do? Well, whenever acquaintances approach looking inquisitive, I simply block out whatever they say, wait until they cock their head awaiting my response, put my hand in their face and say, “Talk to the hand!” More »

Collegiate Crusades: It’s Always The Last Something

Collegiate Crusades: It's Always The Last Something

The past week of my life has been replete with “last”s. I returned from my last college Spring Break adventure; I got drunk on a patch of grass wearing all green with two hundred of my closest friends for presumably the last time and one final time; I paid my …..

With all this taking about finishing, you’d think graduation was tomorrow. Actually, it’s not for two months. But with the uncertainty the lies ahead, and the next-step taking that will likely ensue, nostalgia is king among my friends who will soon hold BA and BS degrees in one thing or another. More »

College Life: The Five Boring Questions You Need To Stop Asking

College Life: The Five Boring Questions You Need To Stop Asking

Yesterday, I went to try a new coffee place started by a couple young graduates of my school. Obviously in a rush (albeit in good spirits), I ordered my drink, got a little annoyed they didn’t have skim milk, and replied to a text message. “So, you a student here? What’re ya studying? What year are you?” I replied with succinct, a succinct “yes,” followed by a declaration of my major, and finally, with a breath of air, I let out, “I’m a senior.” And then it came predictably, “What are you going to do next year?” More »

College Confessions: I Hate Getting Dressed With Friends

College Confessions: I Hate Getting Dressed With Friends

“Does this look cute?!”

Over the past four years, the word “cute” has come to be among my most reviled. “Cute top!” “I love those shorts – soooo cute.” “Oh, those are cute.”

Cute is simply a ridiculous word, and I’ve become perpetually bothered by it because it reminds me of one of my most hated pastimes: getting dressed for an evening out in the company of friends. More »

College Life: Eating Alone Is Not As Bad As I Thought!

College Life: Eating Alone Is Not As Bad As I Thought!

The majority of the last four years of my college experience have been spent in the throes of companionship with others. From living with six girls, to pregames, to house parties, to studying in groups in the library, to just about everything except sleeping (and that’s been done un-alone too) – I have been surrounded by people. For god’s sake, we even go to the bathroom together.

Until I decided to spend a semester in Germany. My German was mediocre at best, and I knew no one aside from an acquaintance living at the other side of the city. In college I floated freely around, finding myself occasionally alone in my single dorm room where I could knock begrudgingly on a door on my hall – and be supplied with some semblance of friends. In Germany, I was living alone with a 33-year-old, German-speaking physical education teacher who had a serious boyfriend and after our first dinner (required by the program that set us up), wanted little to nothing with me.

So I started doing things alone. More »

College Life: Sushi and Stereotypes, Self-Loving and Self Loathing

College Life: Sushi and Stereotypes, Self-Loving and Self Loathing

Over the past four days, I’ve received probably twelve emails pointing me to a “blog” called “Sushi With My Girls.” Add to that countless Facebook postings, GChat status messages and tweets also proclaiming, “Too true!” and “OMG – this so spot on!” The blog is actually not so much a blog, but really just a single post – a list – outlining the over-the-top stereotypical hobbies and traits of a certain kind of affluent, vain, party-hard girl from a wealthy suburb who is the product of a “UPenn, Cornell, Emory, Michigan, Wisconsin, Indiana, BU, Wash U, Syracuse, GW, Arizona, or Maryland” diploma. The post describes said girl’s preferences – sartorially (#6. Sweatpants with writing on the ass), romantically (#39. Slumming in college meant an extended period sleeping with a lacrosse player. But that is so DUNZO. Now it is strictly older guys who can afford the best sushi), gastronomically (#50. Spicy Tuna roll-no rice- (Calories, YUCK!), ginger salad and a vodka soda… I’m full!), and even professionally (#90. Private equity. Not sure what it is, but I so want to date a guy who does it!). More »

College Life: Five Underrated Things About College

College Life: Five Underrated Things About College

College is just awesome, right? Sure, yes, actually, it is pretty great. But why? Um, just ’cause?

A cinematic tradition started perhaps when Jon Belushi started screaming, “Toga! Toga! Toga!” and lived on through Van Wilder and others has brainwashed us to believe that college is, for not particularly well-explained reasons, simply awesome. After three and a half years of testing the waters, I’ll agree – many things about college are fairly terrific. Next year, I’ll probably even miss them. Though the “what are you grateful for” spirit of Thanksgiving and the holidays passed a few months ago, I’ve taken the time to brainstorm now about some of the things that make you say, “damn, I got it good.” More »

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