Do orange, yellow, and red leaves sprinkle the campus lawn? Do large, fluffy snowflakes start to fall as Christmas carols pour out of every open speaker? Well, the Christmas carol portion is true, but all I see are green leaves that are too stubborn to fall gracefully onto the also green grass. Plus half of the Chapman population has never seen a snowfall! All of us East Coast kids are pretty confused as this “season” comes around. The transition is so minimal. Yes, the scent of pumpkin has begun to fill every dorm, and the infamous pumpkin spice latte is being served at Starbucks, but where is this crisp fall air?! Sweating while walking two feet to the dining hall is definitely not the fall Vermonters are used to.
Also, all of the shiny cars can throw us for a loop, since Vermont’s dirt roads usually cause the cars to have a lovely dirt coating along the bottom, how luxurious! One of the biggest environmental changes has to be the trees. I know sounds a little strange, but there are palm trees along every street and around every corner. They never lose their distinct look, while the East Coast trees will decide to strip their leaves once a year. And not to mention the fact that the beaches aren’t made of a couple feet of rocks, and the sand slowly deteriorating leaving the tanning only to be done on the grass. As corny as it is to make a Disney movie reference, California really is “a whole new world”; an exciting one. Getting tanned by the warm sun, and then going back home over Christmas break and shocking all of your pale friends. We all chose that, to live a life of luxury, on the West Coast.