Everybody Cries at Disney
January 17, 2020
Mr. Pelz captures “Manhattanhenge” on January 13 at 34th Street.
“Manhattanhenge,” a term coined by astrophysicist Neil deGrasse Tyson, is a semi-annual treat as the rising sun aligns neatly with Manhattan’s grid of cross streets. I caught it Monday at 7:25 a.m. as I crossed 34th Street on Fifth Avenue; by next week it will have gone, and we will have to wait until December for its return. (The setting sun will line up in May and July.) The “henge” comes from “Stonehenge” the iconic circle of stones perched on Salisbury Plain in the remote English countryside. Otherwise shrouded in mystery and speculation, Stonehenge reveals one tantalizing secret in its orientation: it is aligned to the summer and winter solstices, the moments in time when the sun appears in its northernmost and southernmost positions in the sky.
One more thing is clear: the builders of Stonehenge, who carted 25-ton pillars 150 miles from the Presili Mountains in Wales, embodied the characteristics of determination, resilience, and endurance—a combination we often refer to as grit. And one more: patience; if the position of one of the stones is off slightly, it will be a year before an adjustment can be tested. Those builders were able to wait.
We are not a culture that likes to wait. Companies like Amazon have conditioned us to expect immediate gratification. This leaves kids wholly unprepared for the college process. They spend countless hours crafting an application. Writing, revising, re-writing the essay. Reviewing and editing every entry; spelling their name correctly, capitalizing their address properly (don’t laugh; they don’t know how!); getting everything just right. Then they click “submit.” And nothing happens. They just have to wait.
Colleges and universities are conspirators. While marketed to students by appealing to their impatience, the early action (EA) and early decision (ED) processes are designed to ease institutional workflows by spreading application reading over a longer stretch of time. Offering an early decision option also allows schools to lock in much of their entering class so that they can use the regular decision process to target specific demographic holes. ED and EA are always in the best interest of the college and not always in the best interest of the applicant. Colleges are not impartial when they encourage early applications.
The college admissions process requires deep introspection and research. When looking at a school, boys need to put rankings aside and envision their lives on that campus. On this journey of self-discovery, students should wrestle with big questions: “Who am I?” “Who do I want to become?” “Where do I want to be in 10 years?” “How am I going to get there?” “What path do I want to follow?” “What would I like the path to look like?” In short - ruminate; don’t rush!
I marvel at the extent to which Disney and Universal Studios have monetized waiting! People standing gleefully in line for two hours to spend four and a half minutes on a ride is truly a sight to behold. The entertainment along the way makes patrons feel that the wait itself is part of the experience. Colleges don’t do that. However, the frenzy surrounding a theme park visit—not unlike that of the college application process—can be exhausting, for young and old, alike, which is why I always say: “everybody cries at Disney!” It is no surprise to me that families feel so lost and forlorn once the “submit” button has been pressed. “What should we do, now?” they ask. The answer, sadly, is: “wait.”