Partner columnist Emily Dohse tells RCs what they missed while they were at FIELD.
[stag_dropcap font_size=”50px” style=”normal”]W[/stag_dropcap]elcome back, RCs! Your partners missed you. Unless of course you’re a partner who got to travel the world with your student, in which case those partners probably didn’t miss anything at all, except the other partners they left behind.I’m sure you are all thrilled to be back in Boston, taking part in Blizzard 2015. I was actually pretty delighted that The Weather gave us such a show; being from Minnesota, where there is no such thing as a snow day. The fact that Boston shut down was BIG news and a novelty I have not been a part of since the great Minnesota ice storm of 1993. (Yeah, ICE STORM).
This Snowmaggedon was a walk in the park for me, so I loved seeing how the students new to snow handled the crisis – should they fill their bathtubs with extra water, or extra batteries, or both at once? Why aren’t those guys shoveling the campus sidewalks wearing snow pants?! It was great.
But back to the chunk of time when the RCs were gone and I roamed the city without friends. If you got a chance to walk around Harvard Square during the blizzard, then first of all, good for you for seizing the day. Second, you may have noticed that everything was closed and deserted, and even though you could see people walking around, you couldn’t hear them because of the wind and falling snow, so everything was eerily quiet. You may have felt like you were the only person in Cambridge/the world.
Being a partner with your student away on FIELD 2 is a lot like Harvard Square during blizzard conditions. It was lonely and my bed was cold. Do you know how hard it is to make friends without an outgoing HBS MBA by your side? It is NOT easy. Which is why I threw a partner party and forced other shy people to hang out with me.
I invited all the section partners whose emails I had, and prayed for the best. Would anyone show up? Would anyone know which partner I was? Do we need to have costumes? But for real would anyone show up?
I am proud to say that we had a very successful party with seven happy partners! (See the below photo for proof). We raged well into the night, and it made missing our students not so bad. I encourage every section’s partners to organize a party just for themselves, mainly because exclusivity is fun, but also because you will learn a lot about coping and navigating HBS from others like you, plus get to talk about things that aren’t acronym-related like FIN or BGIE.
After the party, while dolefully scrolling through all the students’ posts of beautiful far off lands and exotic food, I decided I would make them all jealous and post my partner party pic. History followed, because the photo got 37 likes, a record in my section’s GroupMe (thank you for making me feel so loved, D’s!).
Thankfully all good things come to an end, and the RCs came back from their adventures abroad. I can now talk to my student face to face, instead of FaceTime to FaceTime, and there’s something fun to do every night besides scare myself watching Dateline alone.
For this new resident to Boston, life in the city is much easier and much more enjoyable with my 93 HBS friends.
