What do you like to do for fun? It’s a question posed in every job application, first-day-of-school survey, and everything in between. It’s deceptively tricky: it seems like something you could answer off the top of your head, but it really requires a lot of thought. This is my attempt to answer that question.

Now I should probably introduce myself. Hi! I’m Madi Winfield. I’m a sophomore, and I love musicals. And puns. I’m also the Daily Web Editor of the Dart with Audrey Carroll. I’m so excited to be on the Dart staff and to write this blog!

Speaking of the blog, let’s get back to it. In this blog, I’ll be sharing my experiences. There is nothing too big or too small for me to talk about. And I have a lot of opinions about things, so I’ll work in some of my insights into the world as well. I’ll put these up every other week because I honestly don’t have the time for anything more. 🙂

The scene: It’s last Friday afternoon. We’re gathered in the corner of the publications room during newspaper class talking about Rockhurst homecoming. But we’re not discussing dresses or restaurants or corsages. We’re talking about the inherent misogyny in the homecoming process. It’s kind of ridiculous how what should be a fun and relaxing dance with friends and significant others has transformed into the pinnacle of teenage angst. Is he going to ask me? I have to look cute all the time in case he surprises me and asks me. My friend got asked in such a cute way! I want to be asked in a cute way, too. If it’s not creative, it’s not worth it. I need to post this on all forms of social media that have ever existed!

Some of it is understandable – I mean, romance is a substantial feature of high school, and we need someone from Rockhurst to even get into the dance – but there is far too much emphasis placed on the dating aspect of dances and not enough on the friendship aspect.

So I tried to rectify that in my own small way by going dress shopping with my friends last Saturday. Sophomores Alex Frisch and Marin Brown are in the same homecoming group as I am (because I set them up with dates at the football game the night before), so we decided to spend some time together without boys and find some dresses at Oak Park Mall. The Browns have a foreign exchange student from Japan, sophomore Ayumi Oda; she came as well to find a dress for Teresian.

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So we shopped. And shopped. And shopped some more.

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We had some fun, too.

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I hadn’t spent much time with Alex or Marin outside of school this year, and I was really excited to get to know Ayumi better. It was super fun to hang out with friends in the context of our first homecoming without worrying about social constraints or how to behave in front of a guy. Even with the date-centered attitude around high school dances, it’s still entirely possible to get rid of the stress and just relax.

So that’s my first post. Thanks so much for reading! 🙂 One thing I want to correct, though: I have no jokes or puns in this post. It just doesn’t feel right. I’ll leave you with a two-part nerd joke: “Heisenberg and Schrödinger are driving down the road when they’re pulled over by a policeman. The cop says, ‘Do you know how fast you were going?’ Heisenberg replies, ‘No, but I can tell you exactly where I was!’

“The cop thinks this is somewhat odd behavior, so he goes to the back and checks their trunk. And in it he finds a dead cat! He walks back to the front of the car and asks, ‘There’s a dead cat in your trunk! Did you know there’s a dead cat in your trunk?!’ Schrödinger says, ‘Well, we do now!’”