It does get better, though.

I was fairly low for the rest of the day. Had the unthinkable actually happened? Was I drowning in my inadequacy? Was I destined to be what I had heretofore abhorred- an average student? These thoughts plagued me as I roamed the endless rows of dinner tables blanketing the campus. I searched for my parents, whom I had left to ignominously commence my college career, but glanced no lavender blouse or familiarly bald head. Listless, I surrendered to the aroma of lasagna and began my meal alone, at an empty table. My parents did eventually show up, and I was buoyed slightly by the closing covenant service. I went to bed too tired to stew in my disappointment.

Sleeping in helped somewhat, and breakfast did, too. Even more encouraging was the breakout session in which we discussed the strengths test we took and how the results will affect our college experience. Of course, my strengths - strategic, input, intellection, learner, acheiver - are all cognitive; I'm apparently a giant brain with no feeling appendages. This discouraged me a bit, but I love my primary one, strategic, so much that it didn't bother me too much. In a lengthy explanation on the personality test's website, I found that strategic people are often looked upon as critical, but this is just because they quickly discard inefficient or ineffective ideas. What I see as efficiency, others see as rudeness.

My StrengthsQuest Results

People strong in the Strategic theme create alternative ways to proceed. Faced with any given scenario, they can quickly spot the relevant patterns and issues.
People strong in the Input theme have a craving to know more. Often they like to collect and archive all kinds of information.
People strong in the Intellection theme are characterized by their intellectual activity. They are introspective and appreciate intellectual discussions.
People strong in the Learner theme have a great desire to learn and want to continuously improve. In particular, the process of learning, rather than the outcome, excites them.
People strong in the Achiever theme have a great deal of stamina and work hard. They take great satisfaction from being busy and productive.

After lunch, we reconvened to discuss the book we were supposed to read over the summer, The Color of Water by James McBride. Feeling in my element, I volunteered to report back to the group my team's answers to the discussion questions. I felt my presentation was acceptable, but maybe a little dull. Certainly adequate, though. It seemed that was what I was shaping up to be. The group dismissed and I stood in the hall trying to get cell phone service, an almost impossible feat on this campus, to check my voicemail.

"Excuse me." I looked up to see the professor who had led the discussion. He asked me my name and major. When I told him literature, he looked satisfied."I was really impressed with your answers. You presented very well."

He asked me then if I was taking Freshman Comp, and I babbled about the placement exam and my trepidation. I managed a lame "But I'm sure you'll be seeing a lot of me" and left elated. Just like that, my entire outlook had changed. Who cared if I failed the test? A literature professor singled me out after a mundane reading discussion and complimented me on my articulation and insight! What more did I need than the approbation of an expert in my field?

Apparently, not much. That little comment sustained and animated me through the soccer game we were required to attend (we won 3-0! Loma Loma Loma!) and the silly activities I forced myself to participate in. By the time we headed to chapel, I was tired but willing to sit through anything they threw at us.

What I caught there was radically unlike anything I had expected. The chapel speaker, a senior here, talked deliberately in an unremitting dead-pan, lampooning much of what we had already experienced and much of what is to come. He mocked the covenant ceremony and the living standards; he ridiculed the rabidly conversion-hungry collector of Christian curios he was when he started at the school. But he did it all to make a point straight out of Acts: a Christian community is a wonderful thing, but it can also be awful. Ananias and Sapphira illustrate this vividly. It's so easy to fall into the whirlwind of ministry, to always strive to be the "better" Christian, and to ultimately act like a completely different person. We as freshmen have four years in which to grow, and only by taking the process sincerely, without falsehood or pretention, in God's timing, will we continue upwardly throughout our time here. Above all, he assured us that we are all "okay." That none of us are here accidentally, that we can all make it and make it well.

When the speaker gave an altar call encouraging us to come forward, and my roommate led the flood of respondents, I knew she was probably the greatest roommate I could have. I'd certainly had signs of this beforehand. Easy-going, affable, neat as a pin, bright and sunny even, perhaps especially, in the early hours of the morning, willing to try anything, unafraid of new people or places, an excellent student- I haven't found fault with her yet. She's a Psych major from here in Point Loma. She shares with me the qualities that matter, and differs with me on the perfect complements to my quirks. I hope she likes me as much as I like her. I'm trying to muster all the congeniality my giant unfeeling brain can access.