“The more things change, the more they stay the same.”

I don’t know who originated that saying, but it sounds awful suspicious to me. I don’t understand whether this little adage is supposed to be comforting or depressing. I can read it both ways.

It can illustrate that some things will always remain constant and inescapable. That’s kinda nice, I guess. It’s said that people hate change, so it’s good to know that some things will stand fast.

On the other hand, the idea that things will always be the same is rather unsettling. Maybe I just have an innate desire to be different and believe that everything I do is unique, but I think the idea that time marches on regardless of the anxious flailings of our little lives is silly and pretty sad.

Okay, so in the “grand scheme of things,” little changes that we make or that are made in us may be slightly insignificant. But really, does that warrant “The more things change, the more they stay the same?” It seems to me you could just as well say, “The more things change, the more they are different.”

Example: Since coming to college two years ago, I have somehow acquired almost a whole new wardrobe (jeans, shoes and yes, even underwear.) Aside from some durable T-shirts, I’ve exchanged most of my old stuff (which was conscientiously taken to Good Will) for new duds.

Yes, I admit that new clothes are quite insignificant in the grand scheme, but I’m trying to get at a general idea here. The clothes are just indicative of a trend.

Consider. Two years ago, I was immersed in the culture I’d occupied since childhood: my family’s house in the country, my little K-12 school only 15 miles down the road with people I’d known all my life. Although I still haven’t figured out who was the mysterious person who signed my senior memory book as “Mid,” I knew practically everyone in my high school.

Now I’m in the middle of a city (yes, city; when your definition of “town” is around 500 people, a populace 100 times its size earns the term “city”) on this huge, but lovely, campus with over 25,000 fellow students swarming about me. So that’s basically a change.

However, I find that some days I can’t walk five feet out of my hall without running into a friend, an acquaintance, or some member of the men’s basketball team. It’s like being home again.

Okay, so I suppose some themes in life are reoccurring. Example: Historically, I have had difficulty keeping my living space tidy. I think this stems largely from the hereditary tendency I have to save every non-perishable thing I own. But, after years of struggle, I thought I had reformed myself last year. I was even rearranging my spacious closet practically every week (really more out of boredom than in the interest of organization, but who’s counting).

Reformed myself, that is, until I began living with my current roommate (we’ll call her “Sara”), who takes messiness to almost artistic heights. (About a month ago, we discovered a glass of Coke that had been misplaced by my roommate. Since eluding her, the Coke had acquired a floating skin of mold several centimeters thick. Considering “Sara” is not a biology major, I was quite impressed with the culture she had grown.)

We’re planning our room layout for next year, allotting adequate space in low-traffic areas, so “Sara” can amass a “pile of crap” (as we affectionately refer to her various belongings) with a minimum amount of danger to our well-being.

Besides a bent toward disorder, I’ve also always had a slight inclination towards lateness. I think the reason for this shortcoming of mine is mostly regional. Ever since I can remember, the country church that my family went to has run on its own special clock known as “Woolson Time” (so-called after the name of the church). Woolson Time meant that you had to be roughly 10 minutes late for any scheduled event unless you wanted to sit around and wait with all the other early birds.

Whatever the reason for my chronic tardiness, I feel it may be getting a tad bit out of hand and is bound to catch up with me soon. Last semester, I went so far as to oversleep and (blush) miss almost half of a final. Apparently, in my early morning stupor, I had momentarily forgotten the wonderful tip for maintaining an acceptable GPA that I received my first semester at ISU from an upperclassmen: “Always go to all of your finals.”

I also still love movies like “Alice in Wonderland,” “Mary Poppins” and anything with Jim Henson’s Muppets. The bird woman song in “Mary Poppins” still makes me tear up and probably always will. (Although, to add a little perspective, I should report that I also cried once during an episode of “Star Trek: The Next Generation.” And it wasn’t one of the emotional ones about Captain Picard’s life but something about Geordi. Go figure.)

So which is it? The more things change, the more a) they stay the same, b) they’re different, or c) both a and b?

I don’t know, but I can tell you one thing for sure: Jim Henson sure was on to something. I’m not sure what, but he was. I’m going to leave you with lyrics, pearls of (ambiguous) wisdom if you will, sung by Scrooge in “The Muppet Christmas Carol” and Bert in “Mary Poppins,” respectively.

“Life is just a journey. Who knows when it ends.”

“Something is brewin’, about to begin. Can’t put m’ finger on what lies in store, but I feel what’s to happen has all happened before.”

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Juli Hisel is a sophomore in English from Richland.