Campus Character: Chris Wood '10

“I’m distrusting of everything around me, yet extremely perceptive,” said Chris Wood ‘10. “I’m a professed cynic.”

Surrounded by the trappings of an affluent East Coast culture where the number of BMWs seems to exceed the population of students on financial aid, Wood provides a much needed reality check for many Midd Kids.

“This place is Disneyland. I feel poor and ostracized, yet, in reality, I’m no different from 90 percent of the American population,” explained Wood. “If I have to be an outcast here, f*** it, so be it.”

Wood, who’s known for breaking more than just the typical Middlebury student stereotype, is also a football player with an incredible talent for creative writing.

“I’m not a trust fund baby and I have very little knowledge of white New England culture. I came to Middlebury from a shitty public school in south Jersey and wanted to be an econ major — making money was the bottom line,” reflected Wood. “I was a good writer in high school, but I was smarter than most of my teachers, so I felt the need to validate myself in college to see if my writing held up at a higher level. I walked into Hector Vila’s class first semester of my freshman year and he gave me a look like ‘what the hell are you doing here?’” Wood went on to explain, “As soon as I found literature, poetry and art, I moved away from the money and on to creativity instead.”

When presented with more awkward questions like “How do you view yourself within the Middlebury community?” and “Which stereotypes bother you the most?” Wood took the opportunity to just continue telling the story of how he got to Midd and the evolution of his interest in literature.

“Football recruiting was a major part of my senior year, but I was known as a high achiever throughout high school,” said Wood. “I came to Middlebury because it was an opportunity for a great education with a good financial aid package, but friends at school had never heard of it. They all just assumed I’d go to Harvard or Penn.”

Turning back to the topic of football, Wood explained “English in college has become what football was to me in high school — an outlet. Football was my only chance for honor and fighting with my brethren, but at Middlebury it’s for fun as opposed to what it was when I was younger.”

In an attempt to concisely convey the power of literature to me in the span of ten minutes in the Grille, Wood said “Real life doesn’t occur symbolically. It’s the job of the writer to derive its meaning. Literature requires a background in not only English, but in history, art and philosophy. All of these components create good writing.”

With the completion of his creative thesis, Wood must now turn his attention to life after Middlebury.

“I’m 100 percent terrified to go back where I came from. When I walk in my front door at home, ideas outside everyday domestic concerns are irrelevant. Down in south Jersey it’s a different world, but I am going to take an entire year off to just write,” said Wood. “If I fall on my face, that’s life. I will be forever haunted if I don’t attempt to be a writer. I’m nothing but a man in the world trying to make a way. I look at things very viscerally.”

Delving further into his decision to “go home and take a breath” after graduation, Wood admits that he’s in for “long periods of silent contemplation.” Knowing full well the risks he will be taking in order to pursue his passion, or as he puts it, “taking a huge risk by not getting on the ‘conveyor belt,’” Wood gears up for the next step in his life.

“I realize that, after four years at Middlebury, I am supposed to excel economically, to take on the challenge of the parental order, but once you catch a glimmer of what life can be through a passion, you’re never turning back,” warned Wood. “Writing to me is not an easy release. You doubt everything. You don’t know if God is real, or even if you’re real.”

For a guy who likes to mess with societal preconceptions by going to Barnes & Noble wearing a jersey and sitting down to read Faust for hours on end, Wood appears to break another Middlebury stereotype, one of adhering to social cliques.

“If you’re trippy as hell and have interesting ideas that you can talk about, I’m attracted to you. I’m pissed that I get lumped in with bros,” said Wood. “I don’t care who you are as long as you have things to say worth discussing.”

As the senior class prepares to leave our convoluted system of stereotypes and misnomers that is Middlebury College, Wood sees no real direction before him except for a chance to write. While many students head off to work tiresome hours on Wall Street or bury themselves in grad school studies in order to reach individual goals of monetary success, how many students can honestly say they have found a true passion? Chris Wood may not be hopping on that “conveyor belt,” but time will tell whose success in life will mean the most.