First Years in 2000: In an interview with three members of the class 2004, I learned that first year bonds are just as import today. Sarah Dougan (Doobie), Sarah Fucci, and Rachel Kahn all lived in Mead Hall their first year and made immediate friends with 10 or so other women they lived with. These women did practically everything together. The three of them laughed hysterically as they remembered all the games they played, music they listened to, and movies they watched. They shared stories about piling all the mattresses into one room for a giant slumber party, having crazy group study sessions during finals and playing practical jokes on each other as well as their stuffed animals. Everyday their whole group would return to the dorm for lunch and dinner. Dining Services played a very social role in their lives that first year. While Doobie, Sarah and Rachel were not on work study everyone else in their clique was. Working in the dining hall was just as community oriented as their big group dinners. In fact, all three of the women confessed to excitedly volunteering to take shifts in the dining hall just to get paid to say “hi” to everyone as they came in for dinner. First semester of their first year was spent socializing with only the people with whom they lived.

Second Semester: Doobie, Sarah and Rachel claim to have branched out a little beyond the dorm second semester of their first year. In the fall, Sarah had joined the Rugby Team and by the spring she had convinced Doobie and Rachel to join her. But, when they all got snowed in together and school was cancelled they could not have been happier. They spent what turned out to be a four day weekend all huddled together with most of the other first years in the dorm watching movies and sipping hot cocoa under blankets in the Mead common room.

Sophomore Room Choosing: The first years of Mead pulled really good lottery numbers when it came to choosing dorms. They still couldn’t all live together like they had first year, but they managed to split up between the Rockies and Pearsons Everyone was satisfied.

Reflections: Undoubtedly these women’s social lives were shaped by where they lived. This group of what was sometimes thirteen women relied completely upon their dorm mates for all forms of friendship, entertainment and social life. They used eating and working in the dining hall, school work and practically any other excuse, as a means of coming together.