post-
Letter from the Editor Dear Readers, I recently texted my friend about my deep yearning to travel to The Ice Cream Barn. Her response: “YOU SHOULD GO WHAT’S STOPPING YOU?!” It’s a fantastic question for which I really struggled to conjure an excuse. I do have a car on campus, and I do love ice cream, and I am not really sure what else I need to add to the equation to get to my desired answer. Still, I’m paralyzed by this overwhelming sense of April dread. It’s only in this fleeting moment between the dead of winter and the lackadaisical summer haze that I’m filled with equal feelings of wanting
Spring 2024 Weekend
to do absolutely nothing and also wanting to do everything under the sun. On Monday, I gave into the pull of the Main Green and split my attention between football, Canva, and chitter-chatter with my closest friends and all the adjacent folks that crossed our path. This central hub of campus has cast some kind of magic spell that’s keeping me around, existing within the Brown ecosystem, and loving every second of it. In a few days, if this spell has not reached you yet, I invite you to let it overtake you and guide you on adventures around the niches of campus that you haven’t visited in a while. After you’ve finished your exploration, come to the Main Green and celebrate the festivities. And if you need a little help to get in the spirit, post- has got you covered. We’re coming to you this week with an extra special edition, full of memories, games, and anticipation for the weekend. As you are curating your concert fits, check out Tabitha, Klara, and Alissa’s piece about the beauty and community of sharing clothes, a wonderful alternative if you haven’t had the chance to go shopping yet. To get you excited for the main event, we have Kathy’s reflection on Weston Estate and the funny moments when music meets you at just the right time. And what’s Spring Weekend without the times shared between your friends? Check out Elijah’s poem on the party before the Party! In moments of respite between all the excitement, we’ve also got some great games for you to puzzle over with your community. Coming in live for the first time, post- is debuting our first Connections board. Share it far and wide and see if you can figure out the links between the words. As a challenge for the brave amongst you, we are also sharing a Spring Weekend Bingo Board full of fun, harrowing, and inevitable events for you to check off the weekend list. Finally, as the weekend winds down and you grow wistful about the ticking clock, we share with you some memories from post- past with a previous Spring Weekend experience and a classic Top 10. To top it all off, you’ll learn to make all spring weekends special in Kimberly’s piece detailing a spring weekend now past that she shared puzzling with her friends. With my final editor’s note of the semester, I want to leave a few notes of thanks. Thank you to all the wonderful writers and incredible illustrators who have contributed this semester to make this magazine everything it is. Thank you to all our editors, head illustrators, and social media and layout teams for keeping us afloat week in and week out. A special thank you to all of the managing editors for helping make this special edition a reality with your wonderful pieces! And an extra special thank you to all our superb seniors on the editorial team for all the laughs and love you have given us: Eleanor, Jack, Addie,
notes on collisions
by Katheryne Gonzalez Illustrated by LULU CAVICCHI
I first heard “Pears” by Weston Estate the summer between senior year of high school and freshman year of college. No longer compelled to fill my schedule with volunteer shifts at the hospital or community college classes to pad my college applications, each day blended hazily into the next. This abundance of free time was initially liberating, but—me being obsessed with schedules and lists and all things structured—this lull in activity soon led to introspection that I was not equipped to handle at the time. Every book I’d read, every movie I’d seen, and every podcast I’d listened to depicted college as the place for reinvention and self-discovery. While I didn’t want to build my entire personality and lived experiences from scratch, I did worry that I would not be a perfect fit with the peers I would meet come September. In that liminal space between who I believed myself to be and who I desperately wanted to become, I turned to music for comfort. Since I had long been listening to the same artists and rotation of albums, I hoped expanding my music taste would be a catalyst for other changes in my life. So, I traded in my Apple Music subscription for a Spotify one and proceeded to make playlists like my life depended on it. I assigned myself artists and albums to listen to as if they were homework assignments. I religiously listened to suggested songs from my Discover Weekly playlist. I wanted to curate playlists for every possible mood and experience I could think of, from rainy days, to flights, to childhood nostalgia. It was through that process of constant discovery that I, on an early morning drive to the beach with my dad, first heard “Pears.” I hate to use the word serendipitous lightly, but that’s truly what it felt like to find it upon shuffling my suggested songs. Windows down, salty breeze flowing in, and the July sun overhead, the mellowness of the first few guitar chords perfectly captured the scene around us. I knew I had struck gold when my dad—a man who prefers music from his youth so strongly that I’ve curated a playlist titled “father approved” for when we’re together—turned the radio up and bobbed his head along. It didn’t matter that I didn’t personally relate to the lyrics, nor that my dad didn’t understand them. I thought of Collision Theory in chemistry, where molecules need to collide with sufficient energy and at a specific orientation in order to produce an effective collision. The song met us at that precise space, resonating with our ephemeral selves in that exact moment. And I’ve often found that the best music does just that. It surprises us and flips a certain switch in our brains that we can’t quite pinpoint. Whether it’s the poetic nature of the lyrics, the richness of the melodies, the textures in the production quality, or simply the context in which we hear it, the best songs transform us ever so slightly upon every listen. Looking back on that memory now, I am grateful for who I was that summer. I still collide with her every now and then—when I read in the morning light, in my footprints in the sand—a glance of where I’ve come from, soundtracked to our timeless tunes.
pregame
by Elijah Puente
how many shots can we fit in twenty minutes i’m not feeling it. potent poison pesters too long on my heart go down please i want to dance! there’s plenty of time to learn the lyrics we’ll soon sing sloppy we know one song. feeling friendly flirty fearless have we met before what’s your name? slurred speech giddy gait cannot wait your fit ate we are late!
02/25/22 — Vol 29, Issue 2
first love by Siena Capone
My first Spring Weekend, we all dressed… ambitiously, to say the least. Not enough clothes for the still-chilly April weather, but hoping desperately that dancing would make up the difference. The event had a near-mythical significance on campus, and since my favorite artist was performing, I piled my hopes high, anticipating the date that we would all gather on the Main Green and open our hearts to Mitski opening hers. The day of, the crush of the crowd was terrifying, but I felt the lightest I’d felt in ages—not even the tallest man could smother my joy while watching Mitski on stage. Because it really was all it had been cracked up to be. I’ll always remember, in the days after, how two muddy pairs of shoes sat outside each dorm room in my hall.
Kelsey, and Kimberly (our beloved post- ghost), good luck in your next chapter and keep a copy of post- with you wherever you go! Finally, one last thank you, for a text I
04/25/19 — Vol 23, Issue 23
received in response to my weak excuse not to go The Ice Cream Barn: “no is not an answer, we have too little time at brown.” Let the weekend suck you in and enjoy the time we’ve got left before we wrap up the semester. And if you find a minute to step away from it all, I hope you share that time with a copy of post-.
Springing into the weekend,
Joe Maffa Editor in Chief
Weekends (that aren’t Spring Weekend)
1. The Weeknd 2. Fyre Festival 2017 3. Vampire Weekend 4. Three-day weekends 5. Halloweekend 6. Weekend at Bernie’s 7. That weekend you spent in Las Vegas 8. Rebecca Black’s weekend 9. Your carefree childhood weekends of pure adolescent poppycock 10. “Friday, Saturday, Saturday to Sunday” - will.i.am., c. 2009