“Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud … Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres.” This quote comes from 1 Corinthians 13:4-8 in the Bible. I appreciate this quote because it aligns with my beliefs, and it speaks to a way of thinking without directly mentioning a single origin of power. Of course, these words could be interpreted with a Christian frame of mind, with meaning that a non-believer would never see but they also don’t have to be fully laden with Christian theology to be appreciated as a moral compass. While some elements of the Bible confuse me, others, like this verse, guide me, give me direction and give me reason of being.
I grew up attending an all-girls Catholic school in Japan, visiting Shinto shrines for New Year's, Buddhist temples on New Year's Eve and praying to the ChristianGod at least four times every school day. This chaos of faiths meant both liberation and restraint. To me, back in Japan, faith was something that you did not commit to or choose but rather juggled as society called you to do so. Here, I’m learning yet another way of being -- so drastically different, so rich and meaningful.
This is the last week of columns. One of the problems and beauties of communicating through writing is that it requires the reader to be driven to read. I am grateful for the people who have read my column, for the people who mentioned that they did, for the people who shared it with others. My most earnest hope is that I reached someone who disagreed with me, someone who has never danced or who thought that Tufts' political dialogue is an accepting and inviting space for all perspectives. I hope that disaccord enabled someone to think in a new way, to glimpse a beautiful part of someone else’s life or the struggles that they never knew existed. This column, to me, is a series of dedications to the fashionistas and the women in computer science.
And to you. Because no matter how much you conform to mainstream Tufts or mainstream America, you can never be fully represented in every element of your being. I think that each person has a story untold or song sang quietly. We can be a mass characterized by certain adjectives but with people with an array of identities. There are so many exciting fields to explore -- even on our small campus -- that no one could scratch the surface of all of them. But we collectively do scratch, delve and make these fields our own. I hope to continue learning bits of what other Tufts community members are involved in. I hope to engage with humility and respect for others’ passions, views and backgrounds. I hope to live by the opening quote; I hope to truly love the people I pass by, the people whose entire lives I will probably never learn about but whose passions I may have the pleasure to learn and admire. Love hopes. So do I.
El Centro: Love
