My Oxford Year

Charlie, too, seems iconically Oxford to me. I have no idea where he might hail from or, as my mother would say, who “his people are.” He likely just appeared as an infant in a basket of reeds at the Magdalen gates to be molded by Hugh and Eugenia, forged by the ghost of Oscar Wilde.

Maggie mentioned a father who clearly has something to do with banking and a mother who recently moved to France. She boarded somewhere Swiss-sounding for high school (or secondary school), mentioned doing theater in undergrad (though I can’t imagine timid, baby-voiced Maggie treading the boards), and is obsessed with Thomas Hardy.

Now, tucked under my covers, I leaf through the poetry anthology, hoping something jumps out at me. Davenport asked us to describe how a poem makes us feel, so I do a quick scan for the words “feel” or “feeling” or “emotion,” just as a starting point. My eye stops on Elizabeth Barrett Browning’s “A Man’s Requirements” and I begin to read.

Love me Sweet, with all thou art,

Feeling, thinking, seeing;

Love me in the lightest part,

Love me in full being.

It goes on to enumerate all the ways in which a man requires a woman to love him. Mentally, spiritually, eternally, completely, whatever. Then it takes a turn:

Thus, if thou wilt prove me, Dear,

Woman’s love no fable.

I will love thee—half a year—

As a man is able.

Damn, EBB. Telling it like it is, like it’s apparently always been, all the way back in 1846.

I have my poem. Even better that it basically describes the person who assigned the essay. Do with that what you will, Davenport.

Two hours later, I have five pages of double-spaced, twelve-point Times New Roman, elucidating everything this poem represents. I dig my notebook out of my bag, find the page where I wrote down Jamie Davenport’s e-mail address, and type it into a new message window. There are three more e-mails from my mother in my in-box. Later. I attach the assignment and then pause over what to write in the body of the e-mail. I settle for:

Prof. Davenport,

Attached, find the essay you requested.

Best,

Ella

I consider adding “from Ohio,” but I don’t want him to think we have an inside joke. As the whoosh sound carries my essay across town to wherever Jamie Davenport is, I turn my attention to my mother’s e-mails.

I saw Marni Hopkins in the store today and did you know that Bradley is doing graduate school at some place in Spain? Maybe you two

I preemptively delete it.

Next e-mail:

Hi honey why haven’t you called yet? Just check in when you have a moment. You know Marni was very impressed that you got into Oxford. She showed me a picture of Bradley. I think his ears

Delete.

Last e-mail:

Why does my computer do that color wheel spinning thing. What did you tell me to do the last time this happened?

I fire back immediately:

Restart it.

I sit back and stare at my computer. I could Skype her. It would be, what, five P.M. there? The e-mails came in an hour ago, I know she’s around. But I really don’t have anything to say.

Well, okay, I did get a bike, and found the Happy Cod, and I have a scout, and a Hugh the Porter, and I made friends, and I had a class, and there were scones. Not to mention a dream job.

But let’s not forget that I called my unbeknownst-to-me professor an asshole (to his face), won’t be studying with Styan, and have concluded that I’m not academically competitive here and will probably end up embarrassing not just myself, but also the Rhodes Foundation.

A lot has happened since my passport was stamped. I take a deep breath. It’s okay. I have redeemed myself with this essay. Everything will get back on track. I just don’t want to talk to my mother until it has.

I know her. Much better than she will ever know me.

My mother lives in a constant state of fearful anxiety. She thinks everything is falling apart, all the time, all at once, when there is nothing in her life that could possibly fall apart. She’s had the same job for twenty years, she doesn’t travel, she doesn’t date, the house is paid for, she has two carbon monoxide detectors, she goes to the doctor, like, three times a year, and she avoids any public place where someone might (“you never know, Ella, the world has gone crazy”) have a gun. Literally, unless a sinkhole opens up under her Volvo on her two-mile drive to work, nothing’s going to happen to her.

She wasn’t always like this. But it’s been so long that it feels like always.

I’m just tired.

I just miss my dad.

The ding of incoming e-mail distracts me from this rabbit hole of familial failing. I lean forward to look, sure it’s my mother saying she restarted the computer, but now the screen is looking at her funny—

My stomach flips when I see the sender: James Davenport.

Looking forward to reading. Have a good night.

Not “Surprised to see your work so soon”? Not “Very impressive, Ella from Ohio”?

He’s being professional. As he should be. Because he’s my professor now, not some mystery-eyed guy in a chip shop who looked at me as if I were the most delicious thing on the menu.

I’m not going to reply. What would I say? “You too? I hope you enjoy it? What are you doing tonight?”

I also won’t Google him. And while I have to maintain a professional Twitter account, I’m not on any other forms of social media. Not only do I find it too much of a time suck, but it also provides too many opportunities to embarrass myself in front of potential clients; if they never see you do anything wrong, you never have to apologize.

I look back at the e-mail, my eyes inexplicably drawn to it, as if, instead of two innocuous sentences, there were a naked, beefcake picture of the sender. He’d be Mr. September in the Hotties of Oxford calendar for sure. Welcome back to school, ladies. Jamie Davenport on a library ladder, rippling abs all oiled up, inevitably holding a book in front of his junk.

At least I can still make myself laugh.

THE NEXT FEW days fly by faster than I can account for them. I finally feel like I’m in the right time zone and I can understand the accent now. Although I would have been happy to misunderstand the drunk guy who walked past me last night, then turned to his mate and loudly slurred, “Oi, that’s a tasty bit.” I’ve also managed to sleep through Eugenia’s arrival three mornings in a row, and I’ve had my two other classes, but the professors didn’t assign any work.

No, only Mr. Jamie Davenport does that, apparently. Then never reads it. Apparently.

I spend my days cutting through the course’s suggested reading and fielding Gavin’s requests. His e-mails come in at all hours. He calls at least once a day.

In the late afternoons, Maggie and I get on our bikes and she shows me the city. Maggie comes from London (she mentions an area and then apologizes in a tone that has me suspecting it’s an embarrassingly posh neighborhood), but she did her undergrad at Magdalen, so she knows every corner of Oxford. She takes me through narrow, winding stone paths and special little places she’s discovered over her years here. Now she lives in Exeter College’s graduate housing complex, where she shares a kitchen and living area with four other students: two Chinese guys, a Rubenesque British girl who insists on only speaking Italian, and an older Middle Eastern woman who—as far as Maggie can tell—is never actually there. As a result, Maggie spends a lot of time with me.

At the end of our rides, we tend to join Charlie and Tom for dinner, so I’ve also been getting familiar with Oxford’s hit-or-miss cuisine. I’m ashamed to admit that I already miss American food. I’d exchange sexual favors with anyone who could direct me to a decent cheeseburger.