Smelly Onions Anonymous

The city of Chicago derives its moniker from the Algonquin word for “smelly onion”. Accordingly, the University of Chicago translates to the “University of Smelly Onion”. Although a somewhat unbecoming name for one of the world’s premier universities, no other educational institute could wear it with the nonchalance that UChicago does.

My first view of the UChicago campus came on the day before the 2015 Columbus Day open house. While my dad and I were driving around campus, we saw the men’s cross country team jogging down South Ellis Avenue, shirtless and sweating profusely. Just as the traffic light in front of our car turned red, the team decided, unfortunately, to take a brief respite directly in front of our freshly rented out Hyundai Accent. As the smell of exhausted-college-student perspiration wafted through our lowered car windows, I couldn’t help but eavesdrop in on the team’s conversation. “Yeah man, I’m telling you”, said one stocky and out of breath athlete, “the idea of increasing marginal utility is completely false. No matter what we do, we’ll always end up being unsatisfied.” “Okay, I get your point”, replied another lanky runner, “But I’m saying that there’s a difference between ending up unsatisfied and...