My Favorite Classroom
Every day at noon the dining hall comes alive. People bring color to the room, and a symphony of banging pots, crunching apples, hushed conversations and heated discussions gives the space a voice. As I walk towards the source of the mouth-watering aromas, I am not approaching the school cafeteria, but rather, my favorite classroom.
I wonder about two things: what’s on the menu and which topics will fuel today’s discussion. I sit around a table with an eclectic group, who are united through a call to explore interesting conversation. No teenage-girl gossip at this table (-maybe just a little). Through these lunchtime dialogues I have realized that gaining new perspectives is often just as profound, if not more so, than acquiring new knowledge.
As the cafeteria gradually recedes into its dormant state, it signals the end of yet another lunch. I am always reluctant to leave, my appetite satiated, but my mind more hungry for the next day’s food for thought.
------ This is one of my favorite things I've written. I wrote it late at night for college admissions essays. The thing about that process is that you never get feedback. I'll never know if someone on the other end liked what I had to say (or even read it). Maybe they liked it, but rejected me. Maybe they hated it, but admitted me.
My favorite classroom contained my favorite part of high school - my best friends (the kind who stuck through you through your awkward years, when you were mean and didn't deserve them, and when you were betrayed).
I'm in grad school now. I used to wish I went to a different school for undergrad or studied something else - but hell, I wouldn't have met my uni best friend. And even if I didn't win one lottery, the odds of getting into "insert-brand-name school" were only 1/10 000, my best friend is one in 7.4 billion.
x. kl
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Toronto, ON