I am a Cubs fan and have been since before I was born. My suffering was decided for me years ago when my dad’s dad moved to Chicago in 1964 and for some reason decided to yoke his descendants to the constantly burning wagon of hopelessness that is Chicago Cubs.

It all started with a perfect evening. I took in the arresting scene of empty, fully lit buildings, content to be back on a campus that, despite a supposed passion for sustainability, leaves every damn light on at 10 p.m. for the sake of aesthetics.

For last year’s sex issue, I wrote about my first “real” date with “Dave,” a particularly smooth operator with a loaded duct-tape wallet. I specified “real” because, technically, my first sort-of date happened two years earlier.

Is it hard to be a Christian in Iran or North Korea or wherever else? Yes. Is it hard to be a Christian in the United States, a nation founded on (at least sort of) Christian ideals and concepts of expressive and religious freedom? No.

We as a society seem to be under the impression that a woman’s body is not her own, especially if the woman happens to be an attractive celebrity. If Jennifer Lawrence walks out in public wearing sweats and a bare face, her picture is everywhere. If Kirsten Dunst gains five pounds and decides to do something drastic like, I don’t know, wear a swimsuit, her picture is everywhere. If Hope Solo takes a private picture of herself meant for the eyes of a specific person, well, you can guess the rest.

While the legal system in place is almost certainly flawed, too much power in the hands of common people can create chaos. Everybody wants to become a hero, but a self-proclaimed protector of people can create victims as well.

Just last week, Fred Phelps—the infamous leader of the Westboro Baptist Church—finally kicked it after a long struggle with personal health issues and America’s heathens.

Facebook recently expanded its gender options to accommodate those who identify outside the gender binary, or those who identify as something other than simply “male” or “female.” As someone who happily identifies as female (and always has), this decision does not affect me in any way whatsoever. And I think this decision is wonderful.

I had my first “real” date when I was 15 with this guy we’ll call “Dave.” Dave and I had been flirting for a while in that awkward, high-school way. You know, ambiguous Facebook statuses and texts filled with winky faces.

Introversion is the paralyzing fear that everybody in the universe—except your mom, maybe—thinks you’re an idiot. I doubt that’s the actual definition, but as a terrified freshman who gets sweaty palms when asking for a pencil, it accurately sums up how I feel about starting college.