Coloring the Grey: The Importance of Finding your Folk

I stroll along serenely, with my eyes, my shoes,

my rage, forgetting everything,

I walk by, going through office buildings and orthopedic shops,

and courtyards with washing hanging from the line:

underwear, towels and shirts from which slow

dirty tears are falling.

-Walking Around

Pablo Neruda, 1935

The last of the leaves have fallen from the beautiful blazing trees that line campus sidewalks, I remember thinking on my walk home maybe a week ago. It seemed to me that the leaves held the last of the summer color, the final reminder that winter is not—as it seems now—completely pervasive, inescapable. Then came the snow, delicately parching everything white. I’m afraid another autumn has come and all but gone, stealing with it the novelty of the semester. Now the landscapes are gray. 

The colorlessness of the terrain seems to be contagious, leaching from the sidewalks to the lawns, creeping into the bare shrubs and transforming pedestrians beyond recognition. Gray are the students I see on campus, camouflaged into the concrete jungle of academic centers and Dinkytown storefronts. Gray are their eyes, heavy with the burden of sleepless nights stretched into school days. I look around at my fellow students: expressions are unreadable but eye-bags say it all. 

It’s at this point in the semester, when the general mood crumbles from stress and the weather, that community becomes more important than ever. My walk home plunges me into paths among anxious students; if I didn’t surface in the warm, soft glow cast by my porch light, I would be left disheartened and shivering. Instead, I feel beckoned in to shed my coat and commiserate with my roommates about the fresh chill in the air—and I am so grateful. If you allow yourself to be surrounded only by indifferent bodies you risk becoming one yourself. 

This year, Golden Magazine is eager to use our rebrand to better serve as a community hub that makes your walks in the cold worthwhile. Our biggest focus is connecting passionate people with the creative community in and around campus. The Journal of Positive Psychology published a study in 2007 that named interpersonal relationships as the biggest indicator of personal satisfaction. Whether you choose to pursue it with us or elsewhere on campus, we’re just here to remind you that finding time within a frenetic schedule to surround yourself with the people who bring you joy will turn your scenery back—from gray to Golden.