2B
Magazine Editor:
Ian DIllingham
Deputy Editor:
Natalie Gadbois
Design Editor:
Jake Wellins
Photo Editor:
Luna Anna Archey
Illustrator:
Megan Mulholland
Maggie Miller
Editor in Chief:
Jennifer Calfas
Managing Editor:
Lev Facher
Copy Editors:
Hannah Bates
Laura Schinagle
Emma Sutherland
THE statement
Wednesday, October 28, 2015 // The Statement
COVER BY LUNA ANNA ARCHEY
“
All you need is a blonde, beer, and a love story
or a broken heart.” He explained country
songs as we perched on bar stools. He revealed
the meaning of a Yeti 110 iced down and silver bul-
lets.
When I took a 6-week internship in the middle
of the country, I had no idea that my summer would
include all these things.
I was more terrified to make the journey to
Topeka, Kansas than the adventure I made to India
my first half of the summer. When imagining India,
I was apprehensive, but assured that I would be
occupied with work, cultural experiences, and the
company of two other University students.
An internship at The Capital-Journal was a
looming shadow of what might possibly be my life
for the next few years: working at a dying publica-
tion in a city where I didn’t know a soul.
***
With an uncharacteristic confidence, he asked
the girl in cheap boots and a purple backless dress
swirling around the dance floor of the country
saloon to dance. With a confidence uncharacteris-
tic of myself I told his friend to invite me to Denny’s
with them after closing time.
Afterward, with a forgetfulness completely
characteristic of myself, I locked my keys in my
car at 4 a.m., and with the kindness and chivalry
completely characteristic of him, he walked me the
three and a half miles to his truck and drove me to
my doorstep.
Fast forward two weeks. A night in the bed of his
truck stargazing; the warm concrete of the Kansas
City Chiefs arena parking lot; attempting to teach
him the two-step I myself still hadn’t perfected; a
blues concert. I found myself curled up next to him
as we drove home from Kansas City. The light of
his radio displayed the Ed Sheeran CD playing, and
I hopelessly attempted to convince him I was a bad
idea.
I had failed at three long distance relation-
ships before they had barely even started, and one
of them was only a fifteen-minute drive away. I
didn’t know how to tell him that with three states
between us, these summer nights would remain a
distant — if warm — memory. Commitment was a
pleasant thought, especially as our conversations
stretched hours, but my better judgment and self-
doubt crippled the audacity I typically jump at life
with. This proposition was a completely different
kind of adventure, a long, treacherous, and at times
almost certainly a lonely one.
Even though I grew up in a farm town of 5,000,
I was never a part of country culture. I lived in the
country but my adventures included books and
sports, not guns and trucks. I have fought so hard
to escape it. Despite most of me making it out of
my hick hometown, of all places, I now find at least
a portion of my heart-claiming stake in another
small town in eastern Kansas.
When I first made the fourteen-hour drive, I
never could have expected I would be sitting here
in late September, spending hours playing with
the presets of cheap travel sites. Fighting to find
a ticket. Frustrated that during my afternoon run
everyone doesn’t cheerily greet me, that not every
cashier engages me in conversation. Frustrated
that new people don’t ask where my “exotic” accent
is from. Frustrated that the crowded dance floor
of Rick’s has replaced the polished hardwood and
rhythmic clockwise rotation of bejeweled cow-
boy boots of Wild Horse. Frustrated that of all the
places I could be missing, it’s Topeka, Kansas. And
most of all, frustrated that I can’t jump in my car
with the windows rolled down, pick Brett Eldredge
from any of the multitude of stations playing coun-
try, and drive down the road to the fraternity park-
ing lot where his 1982 Ford pick-up truck is parked.
My newfound tolerance of country music
by Luna Archey, Magazine Photo Editor
ILLUSTRATION BY LUNA ANNA ARCHEY
Let’s get personal.
Every writer I’ve spoken to has said
the same thing: writing about yourself
seems easy, until you sit down to do
it. How can you possibly consolidate
your deepest emotions and regrets
into several hundred words? How
can you reveal your intimate self to a
faceless audience?
Writing a Personal Statement takes
courage and self-awareness. In these
pages you will find seven stories of
love, of loss, of heartbreak, of anger.
Seven stories from those who dared
to pour their hearts out onto the page;
who took the leap and wrote about
themselves. But as you can imagine,
when people sit down to write about
themselves, it rarely becomes about
them. We peer into their lives and
find our own beloved mothers,
conflicted hometowns, favorite
movies and formative teachers.
These stories matter to all of us.
— Natalie Gadbois
Deputy Magazine Editor