Dear Readers,

Summer always puts me in a contemplative mood. I know it’s not the regular time for that. Chilly winters—with all that sitting and snow and mugs of cocoa—seems much more the time for quiet thinking. Or fall, and the melancholy that the changing leaves bring, might be better suited. But it’s always summer for me. 

Maybe it’s the bright sun, encouraging me to keep my head down and study the ground, that sets my mind spinning. Maybe it’s running into old friends back home and counting up the ways our paths have differed. Maybe it’s returning to campus and having my regular path diverted by some new construction project.

Luckily, our writers seem to agree with my contemplative mood. In Feature, our managing editors wonder about AI and the sources of their own imagination, and, in Narrative, we think about what we’re taking away from our summer adventures. Also in Narrative, Katya observes three different cities. For A&C, Lizzy processes homesickness while watching a concert. Yana takes advantage of a broken phone to catalogue campus in Lifestyle, and Fern catalogues her artist residency in post-pourri. Finally, enjoy your journey coming to a close with an Odyssey-themed crossword by AJ!

I’m cherishing my contemplation while I can, since I can already feel classes and extracurriculars creeping up behind me to take that time away. I hope you take this first issue of post- and find somewhere quiet and alone to read it.

Watching and waiting,
Elaina Bayard
Editor-In-Chief