“7:38” blazes in hazy green lines from the grease-smeared oven clock. It’s time. The oven is off-limits, but the microwave’s all mine. My heart thumps hard against my chest as I press my face into its door, an eager eight-year-old with the urgent need to get in on the action. Inside, whatever concoction has sprung into my mind—too-thick potato slices attempting to fry in a bowl of Canola oil, chocolate chips melting for ganache, the doughy batter of...

Snowflakes pile on my windowsill as I sit in front of my laptop, shivering despite the blanket I’ve bundled myself in. “Poésie Francophone d’Afrique et des Antilles,” “Central Asia: Imperial Legacies, New Images,” “Rabbis for Historians.” Courses on subjects I always thought would be confined to the websites and books I read in my spare time, and ones I never even thought to consider, appear before my eyes as I scroll endlessly through the Columbia course listings. �...

My family loves stories. Throughout my childhood, my mothers wove vibrant tapestries, rich with their own childhood memories. One spent Saturday mornings playing baseball with her brothers, the other and her cousins taught a turkey to play soccer after the destruction caused by Guatemala’s 1976 earthquake. They recounted the stories of their parents, and of all the parents before them: long voyages, expulsions, finding home. That’s what history is: stories. When minutes become hours as I flip through heavy...

Thriving, passionate, ambitious. Driven. Fresh breath on a dew-filled morning. Resounding noise, excited chatter in a multitude of languages. Silence, when sought. Classrooms with more opinions than people. Eclectic, exhilarating, energizing. Hours immersed in a book on sun-drenched grass. Endless opportunity in and outside the gates. Raised hands. Times when thoughts are too urgent for raised hands. Challenging. Closing my eyes each night knowing more than I did the night before. Interactions with people I would have never met, despite...