If you see girls walking around campus and glittering in the sunlight, don’t worry, they are not vampires. They are sorority girls preparing frantically for Big-Little week: four days of crafting and buying gifts for a new member that will be adopted into the oddly compatible big-little relationship between an active member and a pledge. Many sorority girls swear that the “big little bond” is one of the strongest around, which inspires many of the women to go all out in spoiling their littles during one of the most exciting weeks of the pledging year.
A new member will never feel so loved as she does during this week, receiving constant attention from her big. Usually a pledge’s love is bought before even knowing who her big is. Personally, I have never considered anyone worthy of emptying my bank account. However, upon discovering the girl whom I considered to be a pretty cool, younger version of myself, it was a done deal. Bank account: empty.
As actives and future bigs, we remember the blissful times of our pledge process, receiving exorbitant amounts of gifts and waiting in anticipation for reveal night when you find out the girl behind the notes, candy, clothes and crafts. It’s like Christmas in September.
However, the whole process isn’t always a walk in the park. More often than not, the week can become tumultuous when actives begin fighting over the same little and robotically crafting sparkly, blinged-out items until the point of hysteria.
Hoping to continue the magical Big-Little week experience, actives plan out daily themes, regretfully pass down their favorite sorority shirts and frat tanks, usually acquired after a night of shacking, and make picture frames and endless other knick knacks. If you enter any sorority house during this time, it will most likely look like Ke$ha had a field day, with mountains of glitter scattered across the house.
This is no exaggeration. Mountains of glitter. So much glitter. Weekends will be sacrificed, partying will be replaced with crafting and preparing and sanity will be replaced with delirium. Maybe as a new member you cried of happiness upon the reveal of your big. But now, in a mad house where you can cut the tension with a knife, actives are crying for different reasons, not usually due to happiness and excitement, but rather frustration and exhaustion.
The magic of the previous semester dissipates as actives learn who their littles are. And with knowing comes a lot of work and sleepless nights, where every waking moment seems to be spent making sure everything goes according to plan.
In other words, Big-Little week to a sorority is equivalent to finals in academics — it is not an option, and sometimes, neither is sleep. However, all the agonizing preparation experienced in the previous week seems to be forgotten upon seeing your happy little on the night of reveal. So, if you are a struggling future big, just hang in there. And if you took twins, more power to you.
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