Jessica B: In my experience, CMC did a lot more handholding in the DC program than I was used to at Pomona. They were very worried about the stresses of the program, and that we might not be able to handle it. In the Capitol, they retained the services of a Physician and a Psychologist for the program students. They worried we might need to seek counseling at some point during our semester but that we would be afraid to seek it out. In order to remove the stigma, they invited the program psychologist and two program alumni to come to an evening session and talk to us about the program stresses.

Now, none of us were really having problems. So the psychologist and two alumni introduced themselves, and talked a little about things we might find stressful. None of us responded (none of us had problems). We sat silently for one of those minutes that feels like five, and then the psychologist started making more suggestions about problems we might be having. She said something like this:

For example, sometimes new roomates have little disagreements that they can't work out, like who showers first, people being too loud, who is going to clean the bathroom, who cl--

Jos bellowed out:

Someone has to clean the bathroom ?!?!?

All eyes turned to me [Jessica]. In truth, we had no bathroom cleaning problem. Jos was just trying to cut the tension. The psychologist didn't get it. She came up to me later and said, "Is everything okay with your bathroom? Is that really a problem?" In this great 'I understand your troubles' sort of voice. To make matters even funnier, I bumped into the two alumni who had been there, both within the week, and both of them asked me about my bathroom too. Oh Jos...