It was 1.22am and I was talking to a friend of mine on IM while I was typing away at my JP at the same time. Then I got a barrage of IMs which said “Accept Message.” There were all types of names that had “tiger”, “aphrodisiac”, “wannabe intellectual” and “jacob savage’s little bitch” in them. I accepted all of them and before I knew it they were all asking me the same thing; please write an article about Elizabeth (a.k.a. Libby) Howard.

Then there was the soprano herself who IMed me to censor my actions, doing the late walk after the entourage had done her introduction. So forgive me if I leave out any dirty details. And then the joke turned ugly, my friend on the other line in IM blocked me when I stopped responding to her IMs and it started setting on me that I was destined to write this thing. I also realized that all those kids I see in Terrace like Rob Buerki, Jacob Gold, Savage would probably be trying to do the Nass-style of editing to cover up the fact that English is my second language. I definitely want to write an article about that trio one day.

My IM started flashing again. Back to Libby Howard. I started thinking about how I met this campus celebrity. Flashes of bicker eating clubs, kegs of beast, and the red glow of the Terrace tap room…

Freshman year. 115 1938 Hall Party that’s how. One of my roommates freshman year, invited her to a party in our room. Everyone left for the street, went off with the opposite sex, passed out or went off with some other post-party excuse and it was me and stranger girl in black dress left standing in the middle of the common area, separated for the moment only by my roommate. We spoke till dawn probably and I found out everything about her except for her name. This mysterious girl then vanished from my life for a long time, while I hung out in Wilson College library for the remainder of freshman year and she rubbed elbows with the Who’s Who of the Street.

Skip to sophomore year. I’m sharing a room with Bobby G in a suite (which has now gone substance free in Wilson) and Bobby G, the player sophomore, is macking on a particular girl who turns out to be none other than the roommate of the girl in the black dress, Libby Howard. You know that thing, when two youngsters get married, then the parents have to start hanging out together and talking about “how cute their kids look together”? Well I’ve been through that stuff – with Libby – and had to take her on numerous dates to play the good wingman while her room was occupied. Of course I remembered who she was from freshman year but she didn’t have the slightest clue about me and my freshman year identity. So most of sophomore year, Libby had to hang out with the Third World kid on Nassau Street, in Frist, at the Street – and how shameful must it have been – being seen around with remote country kid while all the cool senior and junior guys, all members of the most prestigious eating clubs, varsity athletics teams and fraternities in campus gave her weird looks for doing so. It wasn’t easy being Libby Howard at the time. Although, she did learn an important lesson; you have to make sacrifices for your roommates. Yes it was about taking one for the team.

Having to spend time with Libby, I started learning a bit about this charismatic, confident and no-third-word-to-describe-her character. I’m not making up these words from nowhere; let me give you an example to support my claim, like all good pieces of writing written by the one and only Jacob Savage do. Well first we entered Ferry House (her favorite restaurant) and she was given priority seating by the maitre d’ who she winked at. Next she ordered without waiting for me. And then she proceeded to talk, opening sentence being; “I am a chemical engineer, and I want to save the world!” The waitress pouring the champagne got so scared she spilt half the bottle on me. The world was not enough for Libby and she kept talking. She probably would have kept talking if…….if anything bad happened. “….so there’s discontinuity causing turbulence due to end effects” she ended. I nodded, pretending to understand and sympathize with her concerns over the world. I opened my mouth, I think for the first time that evening, and said “can I have the check.”

By now I had become a Libbyologist. Libby Howard in the past year had spared time to learn my name. When she finally did notice me at Lawn Parties, start of junior year, she gave me the Queen’s wave; the hand motion HRM Queen Elizabeth II makes when she parades in her chariot on special sovereign occasions; right arm making a right angle at the elbow and biceps parallel to the ground, only hand moving in a circular motion while fingers are cupped. Queen Elizabeth Howard was sitting next to The King, on their throne in TI, watching the riff-raff from far up. It probably wasn’t the first or the last time Libby was on the third floor of a bicker club.

One of those things happened again when I didn’t see Libby for a long long time; she was either on her throne or trying to save the world, until one day a friend of mine came up and said “How can you like that bitch.” I’m not sure if she was asking a rhetorical question or trying to make some other point about something I would never think about but means a lot to girls. Well I stood up for Libby and realized at that point that she wasn’t merely an acquaintance, but…….a friend, who happened to be a campus celebrity.

It was 1.22am and I was talking to a friend of mine on IM while I was typing away at my JP at the same time. Then I got a barrage of IMs which said “Accept Message.” There were all types of names that had “tiger”, “aphrodisiac”, “wannabe intellectual” and “jacob savage’s little bitch” in them. I accepted all of them and before I knew it they were all asking me the same thing; please write an article about Elizabeth (a.k.a. Libby) Howard.

Then there was the soprano herself who IMed me to censor my actions, doing the late walk after the entourage had done her introduction. So forgive me if I leave out any dirty details. And then the joke turned ugly, my friend on the other line in IM blocked me when I stopped responding to her IMs and it started setting on me that I was destined to write this thing. I also realized that all those kids I see in Terrace like Rob Buerki, Jacob Gold, Savage would probably be trying to do the Nass-style of editing to cover up the fact that English is my second language. I definitely want to write an article about that trio one day.

My IM started flashing again. Back to Libby Howard. I started thinking about how I met this campus celebrity. Flashes of bicker eating clubs, kegs of beast, and the red glow of the Terrace tap room…

Freshman year. 115 1938 Hall Party that’s how. One of my roommates freshman year, invited her to a party in our room. Everyone left for the street, went off with the opposite sex, passed out or went off with some other post-party excuse and it was me and stranger girl in black dress left standing in the middle of the common area, separated for the moment only by my roommate. We spoke till dawn probably and I found out everything about her except for her name. This mysterious girl then vanished from my life for a long time, while I hung out in Wilson College library for the remainder of freshman year and she rubbed elbows with the Who’s Who of the Street.

Skip to sophomore year. I’m sharing a room with Bobby G in a suite (which has now gone substance free in Wilson) and Bobby G, the player sophomore, is macking on a particular girl who turns out to be none other than the roommate of the girl in the black dress, Libby Howard. You know that thing, when two youngsters get married, then the parents have to start hanging out together and talking about “how cute their kids look together”? Well I’ve been through that stuff – with Libby – and had to take her on numerous dates to play the good wingman while her room was occupied. Of course I remembered who she was from freshman year but she didn’t have the slightest clue about me and my freshman year identity. So most of sophomore year, Libby had to hang out with the Third World kid on Nassau Street, in Frist, at the Street – and how shameful must it have been – being seen around with remote country kid while all the cool senior and junior guys, all members of the most prestigious eating clubs, varsity athletics teams and fraternities in campus gave her weird looks for doing so. It wasn’t easy being Libby Howard at the time. Although, she did learn an important lesson; you have to make sacrifices for your roommates. Yes it was about taking one for the team.

Having to spend time with Libby, I started learning a bit about this charismatic, confident and no-third-word-to-describe-her character. I’m not making up these words from nowhere; let me give you an example to support my claim, like all good pieces of writing written by the one and only Jacob Savage do. Well first we entered Ferry House (her favorite restaurant) and she was given priority seating by the maitre d’ who she winked at. Next she ordered without waiting for me. And then she proceeded to talk, opening sentence being; “I am a chemical engineer, and I want to save the world!” The waitress pouring the champagne got so scared she spilt half the bottle on me. The world was not enough for Libby and she kept talking. She probably would have kept talking if…….if anything bad happened. “….so there’s discontinuity causing turbulence due to end effects” she ended. I nodded, pretending to understand and sympathize with her concerns over the world. I opened my mouth, I think for the first time that evening, and said “can I have the check.”

By now I had become a Libbyologist. Libby Howard in the past year had spared time to learn my name. When she finally did notice me at Lawn Parties, start of junior year, she gave me the Queen’s wave; the hand motion HRM Queen Elizabeth II makes when she parades in her chariot on special sovereign occasions; right arm making a right angle at the elbow and biceps parallel to the ground, only hand moving in a circular motion while fingers are cupped. Queen Elizabeth Howard was sitting next to The King, on their throne in TI, watching the riff-raff from far up. It probably wasn’t the first or the last time Libby was on the third floor of a bicker club.

One of those things happened again when I didn’t see Libby for a long long time; she was either on her throne or trying to save the world, until one day a friend of mine came up and said “How can you like that bitch.” I’m not sure if she was asking a rhetorical question or trying to make some other point about something I would never think about but means a lot to girls. Well I stood up for Libby and realized at that point that she wasn’t merely an acquaintance, but…….a friend, who happened to be a campus celebrity.