How fall break is exactly like escaping prison

Sometimes Princeton feels like prison. They have strict rules on what we can or cannot do, they control what we eat, and they manipulate our brains everyday by forcing us to attend “classes.”

They even want us to wear the same colors. Black and orange. Which is what they wear in jail. Also, phonetically, “Princeton” sort of sounds like “prison?” Is that a stretch?

It’s also sort of like a totalitarian government. Or a zombie apocalypse. Or a cult. But we’re not here to tell you which analogy to use—for once, you can think for yourself! We just want to outline those comparisons until you feel a little uneasy about your college choice, then drop the subject and let you return to your black hole of problem sets and internship applications.

The only way to fully realize you’re being held in captivity is to learn about the outside world. So here are the ten best things about going home: things that make your fall break feel more like a prison break:

Seeing your dog

Squirrels are nice, but they’re no replacement for man’s best friend. Also, they’re not really that nice. But for some reason, they are the only living thing besides humans and plants that the Eisgruber Regime ever allows us to interact with. The Housing & Real Estate Services’ Dormitory & Annex Regulations state:

“Fish, in tanks that do not exceed ten gallons, may be kept in dormitories and annexes. Other pets are not allowed. If an unauthorized pet is discovered Fine Schedule #1 applies and the pet must be removed immediately. The room or suite will be re-inspected within seven days of the citation date. If the pet or evidence of the pet (food, cage, toys, etc.) is discovered, Fine Schedule #1 still applies along with the possibility of the termination of housing.”

This gratuitous persecution of cuddly critters is completely overboard, although it’s just one of many extremist regulations used to perpetuate the fascist coalition agenda of Housing and Fire Safety. How can they expect people to go months at a time in this pressure cooker without the release of adorable animal visitations? Taking parole from Orange Bubble incarceration to pet your dog feels exactly like how I imagine it must have felt to make it over the Berlin wall to visit your childhood friend in West Germany.

Driving

Like most things in life, driving is a tedious chore when you have to do it, then suddenly cool again when you never get to do it. Walking along the same four tote paths through the same four courtyards to the same four classes every week is mind-numbing, and the only escape is an equally zombie-like ride on the Dinky. If you can get your hands on a car once you get home, I highly recommend it. It’s liberating. It returns control to your life. It makes you forget that you have three problem sets due as soon as you get back to school and that you have no internship prospects and that you might never find love.

Water pressure

One of the most underrated parts of being home is that your hygiene is no longer at the mercy of dorm room bathrooms. You can stroll into the john on a Sunday morning without any fear of finding your sink or toilet filled with vomited Milwaukee’s Best. Kick off the shower shoes and treat yo self…to a shower with adequate water pressure.

Toilet paper

Along with private bathrooms generally comes a gift that none of us learned to appreciate before Princeton: two-ply toilet paper. We don’t need to go into details, but for obvious reasons single-ply TP is an easy way to ruin your day. It’s frankly unconscionable that a university whose endowment exceeds $20 billion can’t provide its students with basic necessities like this one. I’m no PR expert, but I would strongly advise the administration to hurry up and cover their ass on this.

Fast food

Wendy’s. BK. Micky D’s. White Castle. Panda Express. Taco Bell. KFC. In no particular order. There is no limit to the splendor of affordable, instantly-prepared delicacies this country has to offer you. They are sitting just outside the walls of Fitz-Randolph. They are so close, yet so far away. When you’re home, you don’t have to file into the Frist line with thirty drones who share your exact professional interests (Are we noticing the zombie theme here? Yes, good.), waiting for the server to hand you today’s newly disguised kool-aid. You can be an individual. You can think for yourself. You can eat chicken nuggets until all motivation to move or breathe has been blocked by saturated fats.

Sleep

It’s easy to forget that in your past life, you used to spend long, uninterrupted periods of time in a state of unconsciousness. There are some great articles online about Rapid Eye Movement if you’d like to learn more about the science behind the phenomenon. But in layman’s terms, sleep is good because it feels good. When you go home, you should try it.

Not talking about internships

One thing that’s cool about Princeton students is that they have impressive goals and work hard at achieving them. One thing that’s not cool about Princeton students is that sometimes they are literally incapable of discussing anything other than those goals. Interacting with normal people back home reminds you that there are more important things, or at least more things, than grades and jobs and salaries.

It reminds you Goldman Sachs doesn’t control everything the sun touches. Outside of Princeton, you’re allowed to talk about television or food or just nothing without feeling this bizarre pressure to be more productive with every waking second afforded to you. It’s refreshing. Do it so that you can get re-energized and be more productive in your job-seeking process. Or, maybe…somehow…just do it. Without needing a reason or a justification for it.

Home cooking

I’m not saying the Wilcox dining staff doesn’t make every cheesesteak with love—surely they do. It’s just they make it with a very generic kind of love, then split that love into 5,000 pieces and distribute invisibly tiny slivers of it to you without learning your first or last name. Sitting down at the table with your loved ones to eat an original meal that isn’t mass-produced every single day of every single semester is a beautiful thing. [Wait, but aren’t you the guy who just told me to try to hit seven different fast food chains before I get home?] Yes but this is different. Both are good. Just do them both.

Not being superficial

At Princeton, it’s impossible to not be seen by more than 100 people if you want to biologically survive the day. Your body requires sustenance, and you have to enter a dining hall or eating club to attain it. These are crowded place where you will be forced to carry out social interactions. For most people, this inherently means not being naked, and sometimes even wearing clothes you’re not embarrassed to be seen in. At home, you could spend seven straight days without seeing anybody except Kevin Spacey via Netflix. You can wear pajamas or nothing for 24 hours straight without costing any points off the social score you’ve methodically racked up and meticulously tracked during your time on campus.

Laundry

At arguably the most beautiful campus in the world, pretty much every single laundry room is a hideous embarrassment. They feel like saunas, they sound like mufflers, and they smell like the YMCA. You can’t put a price on not having to worry about whether someone threw your clothes out of the machine mid-cycle sopping because—well because they had to do their laundry, so why wouldn’t they? You’re anonymous to them. You’re no one.

You can, however, put a price on the threat of someone stealing all your clothes, and that’s the price of all your clothes. At home, you eradicate both of these dangers. It seems unconstitutional that being able to wash your clothes is a privilege and not a right, but this hasn’t exactly been an exposé on civil liberties in the Orange Bubble.

Oh, and one more thing: the star of the show Prison Break actually went to Princeton. If that’s not proof, I don’t know what is.