by Tina Snieder, Class of 2018

Here in New York City, I live a life consisting of half adulthood and half college student. For one semester I am doing an off-campus program studying journalism at the King’s College, which includes a class in journalism foundations, entrepreneurial journalism, an internship and a semester-long Avodah of New York City. This semester is comparable to a free trial subscription of post-graduate life, where I have to buy and make all my own food, but some days I can still take afternoon naps.

I spent my first few weeks here as a tourist, taking pictures with the fearless girl statue, walking through Time Square, and so forth. However, I quickly transformed from being a tourist to being easily disgruntled by the crowds of tourists who stop in the middle of the street for the same picture every day. I have yet to learn that a large crowd pointing up at a building doesn’t mean anything special is happening. I am waiting very patiently for the day when I look at what the tourists are pointing at and see Iron Man flying above the New York Stock Exchange.

The most rewarding things I have discovered are the places that make the city feel like I at home here, instead of an eternal tourist. My favorite spots so far include the roller rink and sand bocce ball court on one the piers nearby, and the three-dollar cheeseburger joint I found after I got off at the wrong subway stop.

Living in the city and studying in this program is not an endless exciting adventure. I am learning a new subject I am largely unfamiliar with, and my internship at American Banker, a magazine and online publication, covers topics I mostly know nothing about. As a short illustration of my many blunders this semester, I once showed up to a meeting at the right floor of the wrong building.

Here seems an appropriate place for a tidy little paragraph about how my time at Providence has prepared me for success in the workforce. That is entirely untrue. But much to my thankfulness, my many wonderful Providence professors have imparted to me the wisdom of how to deal with failure and struggles. I have learned criticism is a kindness because it helps me improve, in comparison to a cruelty that detracts from my worth.

There are a lot of rough drafts to be written, a lot of milk that goes bad, and a lot of trains going the wrong direction that I have ridden for far too long.

To learn in the metropolis of New York City is both a difficult and a wonderful thing.