in the first place

you never forget your first

all roads lead to

by Emilie Guan

The first time I’m behind the wheel, it’s midnight and freezing, and my father is explaining which pedal is for gas and which is for the brakes. We’re parked on the side of the road right outside our neighborhood, and the traffic lights cast our features in red relief—or in my case, a burnt film of fear. The wheel is damp beneath my hands. Now, before you pull onto the road, you’re going to press the lever down to signal left, my father explains. I ease up on the brake like it’ll spring back up with clean jaws, so that the speedometer ticks up from zero to a whole two kilometers per hour. I look in the side mirror to see an empty road yawning behind us. No movement except the car’s nervous humming. And then we’re on the road. 

Through the warp of the windshield, we pass my old school and the grocery store where we get our imported Philadelphia cream cheese and all the crossroads I’ve only ever seen from the backseat. My entire life I’ve been watching American shows and movies where the teenage main character finally learns to drive. It’s always about freedom, escaping onto I-95, and watching their small hometown strip away like a mottled, molting exoskeleton. I can finally understand a little, even though we’re just driving in circles and someone could probably outrun us at my current speed. The road is open and calling. Maybe even enough to override my fear of colliding with the bulleted body of another metal machine.

But what I remember most from my first time driving is my father in the passenger seat. After I make a right turn (remembering to signal) without taking a chunk out of the curb, I look over to see him smiling. You’re going to be a great driver, he says. The streetlights look like fallen columns of stars. My father hums a familiar song.

floored.

by Kathy Gonzalez 

I first offered him my desk chair, then the little ottoman with the oft-forgotten storage space, and finally my bed. But for some reason, he always chose the floor. I thought it was a one-off—that he was being polite or saving space in case someone else came over. But then as sophomore year progressed and I learned that politeness was never his goal, it became clear that his quirk was actually a preference: my best friend is a floor dweller. 

As next-door neighbors in a dorm we were tricking ourselves into loving, we would leave our doors ajar and enter one another’s room with little to no concern for what the other was doing. We had unintentionally crafted a lovely little routine: walk in, sit (or lay) on the floor, talk about the latest minor inconvenience or existential crisis, pause for (and disregard) feedback, exchange Tweets or TikToks, overstay our welcomes. It’s the closest I’ve ever gotten to living with a sibling.

The floor dwelling remained strong as ever throughout our junior year. The distance was tough seeing as we were one whole floor apart, but we were committed to our debriefs. Nearly every night, he would come home and engage in awkward small talk with my suitemates before laying on my shaggy rug and telling me about his day—about how his lab is falling apart, how he has a tummy ache but is being really brave about it, how not having a friend group is sad but oddly freeing. While we would rehash conversations and dwell on things we had no control over, at least we could do it together.

Nowadays, as we pretend we’re ready to be adults in a few months’ time, our routine has slightly evolved. We’ve traded in the impromptu check-ins for “can i visit” texts and jimmying the door to his building with my ID. We’ve also warmed up to the idea of using furniture—namely, his cloud-like couch that has served as my bed a number of times. As one wall became one floor became three blocks away, we’ve gradually accepted that the floor dwelling is no longer an act of spontaneity, but one of love. I know he’ll laugh at me for saying that the real floor dwelling is the friends we made along the way… but that truly is the case. And with a future filled with uncertainty and limitless possibilities, it’s reassuring to know that there will always be a floor for us to dwell on.

444 girls

by Elijah Puente 

Like the ‘444’ inked on my right arm, the memory of my first time getting a tattoo will always stick with me. During Thanksgiving Break 2023, my two cousins and I planned to get matching tattoos (definitely not inspired by a TikTok). Rather than making an appointment at a well-researched shop, we waited until about 5 p.m. to call around and find any reasonably priced tattoo shop with availability. That led us to an infamous shop in the heart of Gary, IN, known for being Indiana’s first legal tattoo shop, producing quality work, and housing live tigers. However, we didn’t experience this level of quality ourselves. We approached the tattoo shop hoping the questionable man standing outside was another customer, but we were quickly asked, “Are you the 444 girls?” He confirmed that I, a man, also wanted this tattoo and then asked us to Venmo him $60. My oldest cousin went first. After seeing her abstract tattoo, I quickly decided I would not be placing mine in a visible place. As my other cousin took her turn, the shop’s piercer told us stories of piercings she’s botched and recounted a man asking people to take turns “reeling him in” after receiving a fish hook piercing through the head of his penis. Thankfully our tattoo artist had great sterile technique. He went to the back often to “wash his hands,” but returned with hands bone-dry and the smell of alcohol on his breath. He was even gracious enough to check and see if we noticed him dropping a needle on the floor before deciding whether to still use it. I couldn’t tell you why after seeing all of this I proceeded to let him tattoo me. Thankfully, my tattoo came out relatively good (just don’t get too close), but I don’t think I can say the same for my cousins.

first time competing (again)

by Jessica Lee

This weekend, I participated in my first intercollegiate figure skating competition. Now, to clarify, this was definitely not my first time ever competing. In fact, it was my first time returning to the competitive stage since the 2016 U.S. National Championships—an event I had assumed marked the end of my competitive career forever.

Walking into MIT’s Johnson Athletic Center for the event stirred up more emotions than I would have expected. I knew that this competition was low-stakes for the team, as our main goal was simply to have fun, but the smell of hairspray wafting through the halls and the sight of fallen Swarovski crystals all over the arena floor brought back some strong memories. Memories of a past I inhabited about a decade ago, when my life used to revolve around events like this. This competition, however, was different. Rather than competing as myself, against a myriad of cutthroat competitors, I was here as a member of a team, surrounded only by supportive students, all excited for a weekend away from their studies. This competition lacked the intensity and adrenaline that I vividly remember coursing through the air during the biggest events of my career. Instead, I felt nothing but joy radiating from all the teams around us. That was definitely a first for me.

Ultimately, our team came in 9th place—a result that might have devastated 14-year-old me, at the height of my competitive career. But despite the placement, I found myself leaving the arena feeling elated and energized. There was a certain beauty in being able to revisit something so integral from my past, but as a completely different person. It felt genuinely remarkable getting to experience something for the first time, all over again, in a brand new way.

first but not least

by Tabitha Lynn 

The first time I stepped onto Brown’s campus, it was deserted. My junior and senior years of high school were swept away by Covid, and I applied to colleges practically blind to what they were really like. My family planned a one-day road trip to see colleges all along the Northeast. No hotels, no rest, just one day starting at 6 a.m. in Maryland and ending in the same place 16 hours later. Brown was the last stop on our trip; we walked through the abandoned Main Green, stopped by Ten One’s grand opening on Thayer, and ordered Vivi’s popcorn chicken for the way out. There wasn’t a student in sight, and yet, I had a sense that I wanted this place to be my home. Four years later, my best memories inhabit every niche of this campus. It is strange to reminisce about the first time that I was here—how innocent, how unaware I was of all that awaited me here in the years to come. It seems that this semester, everything—even the firsts—is a last. Last first day of school. Last first warm day. Last first prod. I am determined to experience my lasts this semester the same way I did my firsts: with wonder and appreciation for all that has happened and all that is ahead. 

firsts and lasts

by Klara Davidson-Schmich 

My girlfriend and I have been over the chronology of our relationship a million times, to little consensus. “Tell me again,” I’ll ask: when you first knew you liked me, when you first knew you loved me, what your first impressions were. We’ve gone over the instance of our first meeting so many times that the retelling of it is just as much a part of my memory of it as the night itself. 

In Lost Children Archive, Valeria Luiselli writes: “New families, like young nations after violent wars of independence or social revolutions, perhaps need to anchor their beginnings in a symbolic moment and nail that instant in time. That night was our foundation, it was the night where our chaos became a cosmos.” She also describes the idea of linguistic archaeology, that the conversations we have and the stories we tell build the world we share.

People like narrative signifiers, clean openings, and neatly tied-up ends. We like when our movies end with credits, when our books start with prologues. We are obsessed with first kisses, first crushes, first loves, first times. In relationships, we go on first dates, celebrate anniversaries, do everything we can to delineate moments of importance.

Even now, two years later, my girlfriend and I go back and forth on dates, giving our own version of events until we settle on a story we both tentatively agree on. If I mess up the previously accepted timeline, she will jump in, adamant: “You didn’t even like me then!”