the place are you? [lifestyle] – Submit-Journal

TW: gun violence, college capturing

“Be careful, it will be extremely hot. Let the vegetables sit a while so they cook fully,” the server cautioned as he turned up the recent plate between me and my accomplice, Ansis.

“I can’t believe you’ve never had hot pot!” Ansis exclaimed. “I guess it’s usually not very vegan-friendly, is it?”

The pot of water started to boil as we plunged numerous greens into it. Mushrooms, bok choy, tofu, a hole-filled root vegetable I’d by no means seen earlier than: lotus root.

We arrived at Lamei Hot Pot in Downtown Providence simply earlier than the dinner rush on a quiet, chilly Saturday. It was 4:21 p.m. on December 13, 2025. The solar had simply dozed off within the distance. Ansis and I had been celebrating the near-completion of my first semester at Brown. All of my assignments had been practically executed, and I had no in-person exams—the posh of learning the humanities. The solely persisting job was a frightening 10-page paper on Arthur Schopenhauer, the notorious pessimist thinker of the early nineteenth century identified for his matted hair and bleak notion on life. Schopenhauer argued that human existence is countless struggling and that tragedy is inescapable. Inside the partitions of the centuries-old George Corliss home, the lectures on philosophical concept felt too nice a distance to conceptualize. Now, the concept haunts the wrought-iron gates that encompass the campus. No longer distant concept, however one thing embedded in growing old stone and grand buildings.

In the restaurant, the greens had solely simply begun to melt when my telephone rattled. After months of spam telephone calls, I had put in an app that blocked unfamiliar numbers and funneled them to an automatic screener to find out whether or not the caller was pal or foe. The name transcript displayed on my display: “Please state your name and reason for calling, and I will see if the person you have dialed is available,” the routinely generated voice of my telephone guardedly introduced. “This is Brown University. There is an active shooter near Barus and Holley Engineering…”

A jolt of electrical energy pierced by way of my coronary heart. “There’s a shooter at Brown!” I gasped, my throat catching onto the shock of my very own phrases.

“It’s probably not on campus—I bet it’s nearby, and they’re just being cautious,” Ansis, a coolheaded man who all the time errs on the aspect of warning and motive, reassured gently.  “It’s probably similar to that Citizen app where they have to share anything dangerous in the area—most likely it’s a domestic dispute near campus, but not actually on campus.” Usually, I believed him. This time, it felt completely different.

My telephone continued to tremble as official texts flooded in, confirming what I feared. They provided step-by-step steering on remaining hidden, and what these within the space ought to do. It cautioned: Run, conceal, and as a final resort…combat. My group chats exploded. “Where is everyone?” “Like this message so we know you’re safe.” “I’m hiding in the bathroom right now…I saw what happened…”

“I just saw the news, where are you? Are you safe?!” My good pal Steph, from 2,500 miles away, reached out in alarm. “I see your location isn’t on campus, but please answer this right away,” one other message poured in.

In a frenzy, Ansis and I rushed to pay the invoice and charged to the exit. The different patrons continued to clink glasses and savor their steaming bowls, oblivious to the violence a pair miles up the street. Ansis grasped my hand and pulled me in shut, getting ready for the blistering outdoor. A local Michigander, he despised the chilly, and sped for the automobile. My cheeks flushed to a darkish cherry, however I couldn’t register the temperature. I may solely consider what information was to come back.

Inside the automobile, my group texts continued to ping. “It sounds like nine people have been shot. Two have been confirmed dead.” My abdomen writhed in a pointy twist, churning the greens in my abdomen the wrong way up. Two college students had been confirmed useless on a campus that boasts compassion, curiosity, and care. Violence is antithetical to Brown. It’s a spot of refuge. Home to a group grounded in openness and empathy. I couldn’t come to phrases with it. Two college students participating in a research overview session wouldn’t really feel the embrace of their household once more. They wouldn’t see their aspirations fulfilled or parade by way of the Van Wickle Gates on Graduation Day. The occasions of December 13 will go away a mark that may by no means heal, a jagged finish to a journey that, for me, had solely simply begun.

I had arrived in Providence 4 months prior, virtually to the day, to start my time at Brown as one of many eight nontraditional college students chosen to the RUE program. I traveled from the Westernmost level within the contiguous United States to what felt just like the Easternmost tip, to slightly metropolis I first heard of in Gossip Girl.

During orientation, RUE college students and conventional transfers had been molded into one singular unit: TRUE. Despite the prolonged calendar of actions, I solely attended the required educational occasions. Activities like “Pilates on the green” or “cookie decorating” felt aimed toward a sort of scholar that I, a decade older than the gaggle of incoming transfers, didn’t embody. My free time was spent dissolved into the slouchy sofa of my desolate off-campus house. The partitions had been lined in a cool, dreary grey that echoed the grim fall skies. I browsed MCM, philosophy, and gender research programs whereas foraging on-line for native natural produce that wouldn’t enrich the coffers of Lord Bezos.

As lessons started, I felt an abrupt and consuming need to shrink. Back residence, nobody would have ever accused me of self-conscious habits, however on this Ivy League campus, I out of the blue needed to vanish completely. A physique too tattooed to mix in with the technology born on the flip of the century, and opinions too seasoned to be mistaken for Gen Z. My six-foot limbs had been smooshed into petite desk chairs, knees clashing with the underside of the flimsy classroom equipment, like a mother or father at a student-teacher convention for his or her kindergartener. When I spoke, I pleaded with my sonorous voice to relent because it overwhelmed lecture halls, college students craning their necks to catch a glimpse of the bizarre dialogue echoing from behind them. With each phrase I uttered, it felt clear that I used to be completely different from them.

On campus, I shied away from the scholar social calendar and rushed to the RUE lounge for shelter between lessons. I by no means dared to set foot contained in the eating halls. The communal areas didn’t really feel like mine. Something about them felt off-limits, as if a yard responsibility would lurch from the constructing, shove me outdoors, and yell: “You’re not supposed to be here.”

In one class, I sat catty-corner at a desk with a younger gender research scholar. I tried to drum up small discuss. We’re each tattooed and maintain a fascination with the hypocrisy of Candace Owens’s anti-feminist rhetoric, however after I would cross her within the corridor, she’d divert her eyes and provide a meekish howdy. Perhaps she was usually shy. Yet, I couldn’t discern whether or not this habits stemmed from social anxiousness or a real disinterest in me. Beyond our shared pursuit of educational greatness, what may we probably have in widespread?

The feeling by no means waned, although my isolation was sporadically alleviated by the companionship of different nontraditional college students—athletes, musicians, and moms fulfilling childhood desires. Some simply on the cusp of their mid-20s; others nearing mid-life. Together, we recounted anecdotes of sensible life, like paying taxes or studying to textual content by way of T9 on a flip telephone. We talked of our alienation, and the way youthful college students relegated us to the label of “unc,” no matter meaning. We made a bunch chat to snicker off the discomfort.

But after I was off campus and alone, I succumbed to volleying justifications forwards and backwards in my thoughts, determined to clarify why my path was so unorthodox. I’d rehearse strains: I could not learn till I used to be 20! or There are not any computer systems the place I come from! But the reply was less complicated: College simply hadn’t been a part of my life till now. At 18, I couldn’t be contained by brick-and-mortar partitions; I chased experiences, discomfort, and desires. Stages, runways, and competitors arenas. I got here to Brown to place these adventures onto paper.

The fall semester handed in a rush, and on the morning of Saturday, December 13, as my last assignments neared completion, I stood in my kitchen absentmindedly swiping butter over burnt toast when a tinge of disappointment crossed my chest. Though I used to be a scholar at probably the most prestigious universities on the earth, I couldn’t shake the sensation that I had failed. As I bit into stiff sourdough, I questioned how a lot camaraderie I had missed by concealing myself in my small off-campus house. I considered the collective exhaustion of midnight essays constructed within the Rockefeller Library. The shared cups of espresso sipped within the Underground. The rigorous research classes with classmates, commiserating beneath excessive stress and boundless aspirations. I yearned for the sort of group solid within the pursuit of greatness. On the morning of Saturday, December 13, 2025, I had wished to be on campus with my friends. It feels so silly now.

That night time, Ansis flew out on a red-eye for an immovable work journey. He traveled usually, and I normally welcomed a couple of evenings of alone time to binge previous chick flicks or gorge on overpriced takeout. But that night time, I used to be determined for his consolation. I common my childhood blanket painted with buckskin horses right into a makeshift physique double, clutching onto it and wishing it had been him. With eyes rimmed crimson and uncooked, I drifted out and in of sleep to the wail of sirens and the thrum of helicopters. I awoke to Providence’s first snow of the winter and an sudden knock at my entrance door. I by no means had visitors. No one knew the place I lived, and with the shooter nonetheless at giant, each information anchor in Rhode Island cautioned audiences to maintain their doorways locked and stay indoors. Dressed in pajamas, with frazzled hair emulating Schopenhauer himself, I stared down my entrance door deal with. Another knock. I didn’t know the correct course of for deal with a possible prison at my door. I considered the textual content despatched from the University. Run. Hide. Fight. I clenched my fists collectively, forgetting the primary two steps, and slowly opened the door, bracing myself for no matter was on the opposite aspect. Delivery driver. Wrong door. Package for my neighbor. I went again to sleep.

Just a few days later, I compelled myself off of the slouchy sofa, ran a brush by way of my unkempt hair, and made my approach to campus. I approached the Van Wickle Gates that I gleefully marched by way of solely months earlier than throughout Convocation—now closed, somber, and petalled with bouquets and plush Bruno bears. On the sidewalk, information cameras imposed on each out there area, reporters probing for a viable morbid spectacle in a city-wide competitors for scores. There once more, I averted the lens, bowed my head, and hid behind low cost, darkish sun shades. Even in mourning, I questioned if my presence was admissible. Was I allowed to cross by way of the body of a information channel documenting scholar grief? Turning away from the cameras, I trudged throughout the campus. A light-weight layer of snow draped the bronze Bruno. Every griever strolling the sidewalks was slumped and silent. The air was unmoving—clenched in a shallow breath till a helicopter tore by, or a siren blared within the distance. I made my approach to Barus and Holley. A person propped up a full-scale picket cross in entrance of the constructing alongside dozens of bouquets of flowers. There had been cameras. Reporters. Students. Professors. Locals. All bearing silent witness. There, I noticed a well-recognized face. My nook desk accomplice—weeping and wrapped in an embrace. She appeared over at me, nodded her head, and flickered a small howdy. I provided a delicate bow of my chin in return and held again swells of tears.

Schopenhauer, in all of his gloom and chaotic bitterness, does imagine that even in all of life’s devastating and unexplainable tragedies, we should proceed on. And we should do that rooted in compassion for one another, acknowledging that struggling doesn’t look after age, gender, or background. It doesn’t respect campus perimeters or delineate between diploma holders. No one is resistant to the horrors of the residing. Tonight, as I write the ultimate edits on this piece, my telephone is as soon as once more illuminated with information alerts. Four individuals have been shot at a neighborhood highschool hockey recreation, simply over a mile from my residence. Two have been confirmed useless. A helicopter bellows by. Ansis is out of city—I’m residence alone. I lock the doorways and attain for my blanket painted with buckskin horses.