|
ROUND 3: HOUSE TOUR DAY
Our dress parameters for round 3 were the same as round 1, more or less casual, but excluding all ripped jeans, things you would wear for a night out, etc. I don’t quite remember but I believe I went with some sort of nice tank top and cardigan combination which was pretty much the norm. At this point I had mildly certain that I wouldn’t be going back to Glinda today, but given that the house I thought I would have left was my favorite I wasn’t super upset about this. Of all the days of recruitment this one seems to be the faintest in my memory for some reason. I made certain I had time for a full breakfast today and still made it to meet up with my group on time. Instead of having some groups outside, like mine had been, everyone moved inside of the large lecture hall they had been using for recruitment. The drop in girls was apparent: on Thursday they had needed to spread the PNMs across two such buildings to accommodate all of us and now we all fit comfortably into one [albeit very large] room. Before handing out schedules the Panhellenic President got on the microphone and gave a very strict reminder that skipping a party or showing up late without an excuse would result in being dropped from the recruitment process altogether. The way she spoke made it clear that this had been an issue the day before and that girls had claimed ignorance. I found this surprising since my rho gammas had made that fact very clear, but who knows. Once she finished Darkwing once again pulled out the little plastic baggy of doom. I was shocked to see that my schedule was just about identical to the day before:
Auntie Em
Glinda
I hadn’t been cut…I still had two….YESSSSS. Two houses I liked out of a possible five seemed like a good deal to me. We still had a few minutes before we needed to head out to our parties so we stayed sitting in the lecture hall for a bit. I had made a point to avoid tent talk or even overhearing other people’s thoughts thus far and had been more or less successful. Sitting there though it was impossible not to overhear other people speaking. Most girls still had full schedules, though they were certainly not as thrilled with theirs as much as I was with mine. Two girls behind meet me started talking and one complained bitterly, “Ugh I can’t believe that I HAVE to back to Auntie Em, I was like, purposely a bitch to them yesterday.” I heard other comments along the same line for at least 3 other houses soon after. Each time it was full on internal struggle not to turn around and say something. When I imagined doing so in my head I alternated between “…Really? Like…seriously?”, “Go die you ungrateful brat,” and something much nicer that reminded them that not everyone was so fortunate to have a full schedule and those houses might be someone else’s favorite. But I wasn’t here to argue with anyone else. So, in an altogether uncommon fashion for me, I kept my mouth shut. [I forgot to mention it earlier, but my favorite of all complaints that I heard throughout the week was after Auntie Em on the first night, “They were all just so NICE to each other. I mean how boring is that?” Seriously. I can’t make this stuff up.]
AUNTIE EM: I was thrilled to finally get to see this house beyond the first few rooms. I saw far less familiar faces today and when I got called in a pair I didn’t recognize the girl at all. The other girl and I complemented each other well enough. She seemed to be about as introverted as I was, but was obviously genuinely interested in the things our rusher said and asked intelligent questions. We shared the conversation more or less equally. Our rusher seemed a little anxious, I imagine about trying to everything that mattered in the house [bare in mind even with dropouts there was still an ungodly number of girls at each event and moving through the little hallways was a challenge], but I still really liked her. She seemed like someone I could hang out with or a potential mentor in some ways. I fell in love with the physical house. It was beautiful, unlike anything I’d ever seen. I don’t want to go into details and give it away to those of you familiar with UO Greek Life, but take my word for it when I was say that this house was positively lovely. Towards the end I met the housemother who asked what my name was and smiled. She seemed very sweet. I left just as in love with this chapter as ever.
GLINDA: I’d made the mistake of downing a whole class of water over the course of the last party and I really really needed to pee. But I felt awkward asking to use the restroom and I didn’t want to slow my rusher down. Because sometimes fate and luck do nice things I got picked up with the same girl again. Our rusher was a sophomore recruiting for the first time and her nerves were totally apparent. While I had seemed to click more with the rusher at Auntie Em than the other PNM, the inverse was true here, though just barely each time. Like I said, if there ever was a good PNM double rush pair this was it. Again I don’t want to go into specific details about the house itself but it was really nice. To me it seemed like the opposite of Auntie Em’s house. I liked it, though it was the definite silver medalist of the day. As we walked by bedrooms I was surprised more than once to recognize the name of someone I had gone to middle school with or someone I had worked with. I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: it’s a small world after all [no song-in-head syndrome intended]. I had been so intent on drinking the Auntie Em Koolaid that I had to stop myself and take a minute to imagine what being a member here would be like. There were definitely attributes about this chapter that I preferred over Auntie Em, but of course there were also things I liked less. Long ago and far away when joining a sorority was a reality I’d be facing in a year rather than a few days I’d first imagined myself as a Glinda. I loved this organization on the national level and the philanthropy work they did. The chapter had certainly done some amazing things on campus, but could I see myself here? My rusher was nice enough but the connection wasn’t there. I reminded myself though that no matter how much faith I had in the system, at the end of the day recruitment amounted to spending maybe 3 hours at a house before making a decision. Strong bonds take longer than that. I contemplated as we walked and left with the mindset that if I ended up here I would find a way immerse myself in it and connect, but it was still a firm second choice.
I walked back to the lecture hall alone once more. I marked the only two houses I could on my form and went home to an uneventful day of homework. A week into college and recruitment was already wreaking havoc with my schoolwork. I talked to my mother later that night and it proved to be an interesting conversation. She had been sharing my story with the people she worked with and found that one woman had been a member of Auntie Em at a California school and one man had been a houseboy for both Auntie Em and Glinda in his time at UO, and had only glowing things to say about both chapters. If you didn’t get it before: Small. Small. World. The last thing she reminded me of before hanging up was that when I had originally looked up UO chapters out of curiosity Glinda and Auntie Em had been the first two I brought up. I honestly can’t entirely remember why. Partially based on the way houses looked, my parents recommendation of Glinda, my close connection with Auntie Em’s philanthropy. I went to bed reflecting on how ironic life can be. I had come full circle without even knowing it…
|