Snow!

Snow! My attention quickly broke away from the professor in front of me as I heard whispers of the weather I had been looking forward to since beginning my journey to New Haven. I looked out the window to see millions of snowflakes swirling beyond the warmth of the classroom. As soon as class ended, I sprinted outside to find that the snow was actually sticking to the ground- covering everything around the SOM courtyard in a peaceful, white calm.

I’m not sure all of my classmates feel the same way about the sudden onset of winter, but I have been looking forward to the day when I could call myself a real East Coast resident. I grew up in Davis, California where most of my time was occupied by chlorine-laden mornings in the pool and sun-filled afternoon again... at the pool. I continued to play water polo in college and after four years at Stanford University I hung up my suit, cap, and goggles and began spending as much time in the mountains as possible. Snow was more of a weekend adventure than an everyday occurrence.

On my cross country road trip to New Haven this summer, I put in significant miles exploring the inner mountain West, lived out of my car, and mentally prepared for the next adventure to come: graduate school. One particularly cold and rainy night in the Sawtooths- yes, Idaho has some pretty epic thunder storms in the summer, I began to think about my first East Coast winter. Honestly, I was actually looking forward to putting on too many layers and stomping through the snow to get to morning class. I thought about driving up to Vermont to go cross country skiing on the weekend, or maybe even snowshoeing right in my backyard up East Rock. The possibilities seemed endless! Of course, I was also thinking about how good a cup of warm soup would taste for lunch on that first day of snowfall in New Haven. A lot has changed since I moved to Connecticut, but I am fairly confident that I will remember this day for a long time. As my professor's voice drew my attention back to the present value formula on the board, I shared a smile with a fellow California native in my cohort. Yes, we are indeed East Coast residents! Now to go find that cup of soup.