I am the biggest English nerd at Yale,

even bigger by a whole hour than the freshman with the inch thick specs and the Thomas Friedman book carved up by fifty color-coated label tags. I got to registration three hours early and it was only me and Jane Austen sitting outside the registration room. Ran over from Yale College registration in Stiles dining hall that sleepyheaded, pajama=panting sophmores stumbled into and out of back to their beds. But not me. Because English sections are a life and death matter. Last year I'd made the classic freshman mistake of showing up exactly at noon, on time, was stuck on a line out the door and got the crap section with a T.A. Fought and hoped and wished way into Wes Davis and the best collection of classmates I've ever English had. Wasn't leaving it up to luck this year. And now I'm in the one English 125, Major English Poets section of nine of a supposedly freshman seminar closed to freshman. Upperclassmen only for Annabel Patterson and a class of early English birds. Terribly, terribly excited. Class with a classy professor and a room full of people for whom English is everything. Classes start tomorrow and I'm a bit hyped up and nervy and happy.

I'm auditionning for Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead. Don't laugh. I can't think calmly of Friday 1:40 pm. An earthquake of the stomach might split me in two mid-monolouge, but then I'll be dialouge. And the shaking keeps me steady. I should know.