Figuring out Declan Schweitzer

Upon first impression, Declan Schweitzer seems very much the part of a Eugene Lang junior; he wears blue canvas sneakers with wool socks, a flannel shirt and corduroys, looking perfectly scruffy in a backwards cap and army bag. He studies philosophy and relishes in the New School’s emphasis on Continental philosophy verses Analytical, (when asked to sum up continental theories in a sentence or two he simple says he can’t, “Wikipedia it.”)
At a glance Declan blends in well with the dime a dozen intellectual hipsters riding the elevators at Lang, clutching Moleskins and smelling of tobacco, but after sixty seconds of talking to him it is obvious he is not trying to be anything. He’s just being himself, whatever that means on any given day.
While growing up in Venice Beach and going to school in Santa Monica describes his pre-Lang life as typically, but no severely, Californian. He played water polo and went to concerts, “I didn’t surf but some of my friends did.” Declan began driving the day he turned 16, and experienced freedom and independence incomparable to anything else. He says of his car, a black Jetta with a stick shift, “It was my own space, not like my room in my parent’s house. I could trash it if I wanted to, and everything I needed was always there; my hiking boots and guitar, while with the car I could really do anything I wanted. I really do miss that car.”
Declan, whose name is of Celtic origin, “apparently after a saint that praised nudity.” Was named after Elivis Costello, whose birth name is Declan McManus. His life has always been musical, equating certain sounds to periods in his life. “Right now it’s kind of folky. Celtic and American traditional folk, second semester senior year it was reggae. Said Declan, “On my friend’s 18th birthday I drove him to the doctor for lower back pain and he left with a medicinal marijuana membership card. It was all about the reggae.”

When I asked why he had chosen to cross the country to go to college, trading one great American city for another, he explained that he had little intention of going to college in high school. “I was pretty rebellious and going to college seemed like a resignation and to follow the path of white affluence.” Said Declan. While in school he applied for work visas in Switzerland, Germany and England but found himself denied entrance because the countries were in no need for unspecialized labor. He then started to think of what a life without a college degree would mean in America, and decided that starting fresh in New York City might be exactly what he needed.
Declan is not shy to admit that he saw New York as a ‘’Mecca of hip coolness.’’ When I asked him straight up if he considered himself a hipster, a word that makes much of the New School community cringe, he said “Yes. I mean obviously. I live in Brooklyn and rock flannel and carry a rucksack. I am a hipster, but I do it right.” If I could give Declan and award for his honesty and sense of reality I totally would, he seems to genuinely embody the best features of our little hipster school; smart, inquisitive and open to new ideas. As I watched him interview Arielle I realized his laidback demeanor puts those around him at ease and he asks and answers questions not defensively or aggressively, but with a softness that shows he has no desire to judge anyone.
Not far from graduating, Declan is heading off the beaten bath yet again- though this time literally as he spends next semester hiking the Patagonian Mountain ranges of Chile. He hopes it will be worth while, “A wilderness retreat, a soul-searching, path-finding kind of experience.”
When asked what he really wants to do with his life Declan replies, “Now that’s a question I ask myself on a daily basis.” He says with assurance that he’s looking forward to being 50 years old and looking back on all that he’s accomplished. He says that he’ll have found something consistent but won’t ground him in one place, something ‘businessy but not.’ He’s confident and sure that this is what his future will hold. With a sly smile he adds, “It’s just the thirty year gap between then and now that I’ve got to figure out.”