Volume 16 Issue 2
Erik Beserra
Lockdowniversary

A year ago I stared at the numbers rising on the New York Times website. Every day I found myself feeling more inept as 10,000 became 20,000 became 40,000 became 80,000. I stared at the numbers like a moth at lights. Inept and discouraged. I still feel inept. I now have a tab with the New York Times vaccine distribution map. It is weird staring at this good news. Some part of me doesn’t feel hopeful since this is just what needs to be done. We failed and are now picking up the pieces.

Lockdowniversary
Volume 15 Issue 3
Lauren Mondroski
Dying to Get Outside? A Grave History of Hiking ...

This was before the establishment of large public parks, meaning that if you were a Victorian-era urban American, you most likely spent your time outdoors strolling and picnicking with family, friends, and lovers, all amidst the dead.

Dying to Get Outside? A Grave History of Hiking and Cemeteries
Volume 15 Issue 2
Allison Wallace
A list of good: a good list to make

· Arriving
· The first song you listen to through headphones
· When a good bakery has good tea (the complete experience)
· The crisp, blue outlines of the hills here in Western Oregon

A list of good: a good list to make
Volume 15 Issue 2
Nerissa Wright
Seek Discomfort

Portland is a peculiar white haven, and I come from a melting pot that smells like urine year-round. Both are good, but very different.

Seek Discomfort
Volume 14 Issue 1
Lauren Mondroski
Spoiler Alert: There Is No Coming of Age

Released on August 25, 2020, Haley Blais’ Below the Salt is an album I wish I had during my first year of college. Coincidentally, that’s when I first started listening to Blais, a Vancouver-based singer-songwriter and vlogger whose wacky sense of humor and DIY bedroom-pop bangers resonated with me, a freshman living on her own for the very first time and trying to make sense of the world and herself. That unsure first-year is a senior now, but no less unsure, and I think that’s the point of Blais’ debut album: her label writes, “Below the Salt is a coming of age story that recognizes that there is no real ‘coming of age.’”

Spoiler Alert: There Is No Coming of Age

Volume 7 Issue 6

A letter to My Compañerxs

I’m writing you this letter to ask a favor. I know I have a lot to thank you for already, since you’ve given me so much to reflect about. I don’t know if it’s unreasonable or not to ask for even more help as if I were saying: “what difference is one more favor going to make after you’ve already given up so much?” I don’t think it’s too unreasonable though, because I am asking as your classmate, and as your equal. We are all students, now part of an academic world. This sets us apart from say the world of workers, government, business, etc. Even though some of us play a part in multiple worlds, we do all share a place at Reed. We are the community of students, within the community of Reed, within the community of academia, within the U.S.A., within the world. Being part of this academic community is a great privilege, whether we got here by sheer luck (myself), or through effort, or maybe both. In the end, it really doesn’t matter how we got here. What matters is that we’re here together, for better or worse. 

From Fetish Ball to KinkFest: Venturing Beyond the Reed Community

From Fetish Ball to KinkFest: Venturing Beyond the Reed Community

As a freshman coming to Reed I was fascinated and excited by Fetish Club. I went to their BDSM 101 Paideia class and had a mystical experience: tying and being tied, struggling to escape, being jerked around, and being caressed, too. That was their last Paideia class to date, because the previous signators of Fetish Club graduated, and the kinky events faded away with them. My curiosity didn’t die out so easily, however, and last weekend I decided to venture beyond the Reed community to KinkFest, a festival held in the expo center on the edge of town.

To Stay or To Go?

“IS TAKING A LEAVE ONLY FOR RICH STUDENTS?” the anonymous posters in the GCC hallway screamed in all caps. While the initial reaction to the news of the changing refund policy has quieted in the last several months, many students are still disconcerted and uncertain about how the changes will affect future students who take mid-semester leaves from the college. Why is the policy changing? And more fundamentally, why do Reedies take leaves in such high numbers in the first place?