Kenan First-Year’s Perspective on Leaving Home

In the wake of university closures and the transition to online learning, millions of seniors have lost their final, precious moments in the place they’ve called home for the past four years. The systemic symptoms of this pandemic do not affect everyone equally, but one thing is certain: they affect everyone. Lana Gesinsky, a Trinity first-year and member of the Ethics, Leadership & Global Citizenship Focus Group here at Kenan, gives a voice to the countless new students who lost their home as soon as they had found it. 

I knew I loved Duke before we couldn’t return. But I was too “in it” to truly understand. When I received the email we wouldn’t be coming back to campus, I felt my heart had been ripped out of my body. I felt like I was losing a part of myself. I replayed all the moments I had and thought how I wouldn’t be able to hug my friends for potentially six months. All the goodbyes and people I didn’t get to tell how important they were to me. I had found myself at Duke. 

Read Lana’s Letter to the Chronicle