By Sharon Greene and Brian Watko
“Expect a muddy mess under the tent!” A grave understatement from the Spring Fling committee. Oh, silly email, you know not what you do. The Mud does not give; it only takes. You warn us to gird our feet, but what of our souls? Alas, no one will heed our warning. The Mud demands a sacrifice, and we must obey.
On an overcast Tyr’s Day, the harried and hollow-eyed Buildings and Grounds workers scrambled to erect this temple to the god of chaos that is the Spring Fling main-stage. Unblooded freshmen living on South Campus played witness to the construction, the relentless thud of pig-iron spikes being driven into the sopping ground serving as the prelude to their Rite of Spring.
Solemnly surveying the fruits of his labor, B&G worker Simon Litmus heaved an earth-shattering sigh and wiped the dirt from his hands. “Each year we tend to this special patch of grass,” he mused. “There is some fleeting beauty to the South Quad—truly a little Eden housed here at our own Bard College.” He doffed his patchwork cap and held it to his heart. “Is nothing sacred?” he lamented to no one but the sky.
Inconceivably, SPARC coordinator Lisa Lamont was accepting of The Mud’s imminent takeover. “I mean, it would be a lot worse if there weren’t a tent. It could rain. We’d be done for after that.”
Ferocious torrents are expected to accompany this year’s Spring Fling, a pall over the would-be glad tidings of the vernal festivities. The Spring Fling Committee asks students to dress in preparation for the wrath of Mud’s capricious mistress. “We know it’s going to look like a fucking Bosch painting out there,” said area coordinator Roderick Sobelle, dried soil clinging to his threadbare Carhartts.
Make sure you wear appropriate shoes.
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