Dipping My Toes In

By Camryn Ward ‘25

Lake Waban 2022. Photograph by Yitzel Serna ‘26.

I’ve always imagined time as the sea. Calming yet restless, gentle yet powerful, something that you can never get ahold of. Always pushing forward, always moving, but most of all, inescapable. I felt the weight of time press on to me this past summer, frequently finding myself counting down the days until I could finally return to school and get back to planning my future. Those days time would blur and pass by me, but never fast enough. By the time summer was over, I came across this poem:

“The Orange”

By Wendy Cope

At lunchtime I bought a huge orange—

The size of it made us all laugh.

I peeled it and shared it with Robert and Dave—

They got quarters and I had a half.

And that orange, it made me so happy,

As ordinary things often do

Just lately. The shopping. A walk in the park.

This is peace and contentment. It’s new.

The rest of the day was quite easy.

I did all the jobs on my list

And enjoyed them and had some time over.

I love you. I’m glad I exist.

A poem about allowing yourself to soak up the present. It dawned on me that I had already let my summer pass me by. If time was the sea, I was a lonely onlooker, watching the tide. Occasionally turning my head, looking down, and walking away; the present was a stranger to me. It's easy to watch the crashing waves from afar, instead of submerging yourself and letting their chaos guide you. Or even being in still water. Arms stretched out, floating, ears under water so that all you can hear is your own breath. 

Or maybe time is more like watching the rain from the quietness of a room, afraid of getting wet, waiting for the sun to come back out. I always get goosebumps when I hear the rain; it's like my body is standing at attention. Hyper aware of the presence of water, aching to go out. To feel the droplets on my skin, bathe in it, breathe it in, not afraid if the sun doesn’t return. 

This year, I’m making a point to follow this poem, and try to submerge myself in the present moment. Not just letting time pass by while counting the days until the unguaranteed future in which I am finally content, but allowing myself to find contentment in everyday things. Of course, that is easier said than done at a place like Wellesley: a school full of high achievers who pride themselves on internships, orgs, and work opportunities outside of school; where the future is the ruler of the present. I find myself on a campus surrounded by nature that so few people take time to bask in, a beautiful library where no one looks at the books, green lawns with chairs full of students with their laptops open and heads down. 

Occasionally, I look back and wonder if I’ve been adhering to my goals, or if I’ve just convinced myself that I am, all the while drowning in my responsibilities. I recently got my answer on a particularly sunny fall afternoon. Walking back from my last class of the day, I planned to go inside and do the rest of my work before attending a career panel in a few hours. However, knowing that the weather was fleeting, I decided instead to head over to Tower Court lawn and bake in the sun. I ended up running into a friend, and then another friend soon after; while we didn’t end up sharing an orange, we did marvel over the orange-flavored frosting on the Tower cupcakes. Later, I took the long way to my career panel, letting the beauty of Lake Waban wash away the ever-constant future in the back of my mind. 

The lake has become a fixture in my mind as of late; I’ve come to appreciate its steady place in my days. It is so vast it’s almost inescapable. There are no churning waves, just the glassy surface of the calm and inviting water. I always walk by it, but now I never look away. Time slows down, and whatever blur that had surrounded me clears. Last year, I didn’t get to visit the lake as often as I would have liked to. But who knows, maybe this year I’ll be brave enough to dip my toes in. 

Camryn Ward ‘25 (cw105) has made unlikely companions with the swans on Green Beach as of late. From the October 2022 issue.