Timothy Dwight

I'll draw up a little scenario. There's a soccer game and you are an IM secretary. You have 12 people, but they're very weak. The other team only has seven, much better than yours. One more player for them and the game starts, you get creamed. Have you ever sat back and hoped for a forfeit, and then the other team's last player never shows and you walk off with 11 glorious Tyng Cup points?

I have. I have brought a dozen athletes to the IM fields in the hope that they would not play. I did this to get Tyng Cup points? Why? What the hell are Tyng Cup points? Here's what should have happened: we should have gone to the fields not to get the Tyng Cup points, but to have a game.

Here's another situation. Our college has an awful winter. We are losing games left and right. But our water polo team kicks ass, and we make it into a final which was worth no Tyng Cup points. And we won in dramatic fashion. It was the finest intramural moment in my two years doing this—it happened in the context of an abysmal season and we got no points for it.

So this is for next years' secretaries. There will, of course, be a Tyng Cup. But understand this: the Tyng Cup is a competition between secretaries, not between colleges. Other colleges will undoubtedly say that we are bitter and this is a losers' perspective. They won't be entirely wrong. You have to look up from the bottom to see what intramurals really are. They're about a bunch of guys or girls from your college coming together to make a team. As a secretary, you cheer for that team and you play with that team and you play against other teams, but you never play for yourself. That was a very hard lesson for me to learn, and it is something that I would like to pass on.

So to next year's IM secretaries in TD—some very special people that we all love very much—make sure it's fun, guys. Have fun with the teams that win, and stick with the teams that lose. Don't fight with anybody else, and never stress. It's IMs. Enjoy yourselves. And if you need help making calls, just get in touch.

(Compiled by three secretaries who both thank and wish their fellow secretaries all the best.)

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