50

some reflections on my college homecoming

I just returned from my fifty-year college reunion at Brevard College. (Note: At the time I was there, Brevard was a two-year school. It is now a four-year school and is beginning to include some masters level degrees.) I was in the class of 1973. Yep, I am old. But I don’t feel that way.

While I have been to the college, town, and area many times over the last half-century, I have not gone but to one reunion. So, this was a big one for me.

In some ways, it was disappointing. Out of a class of around 170, about 25 showed up for one part or another. I spent time with my friend Rick and his wife, and saw my first ever college roommate, Thurman, for the first time in fifty years. I had hoped to see some of my other friends- Jean, Tom, Hal, Bob, Eric, Rick, Connie, Debra- but alas, they were not there. I knew a few of the people who did show up, though none were friends back in the day, nor now. A few came up and spoke to me and we told the major details of life- where we are living (Florence), what we did for a living (clergy), if we were retired (yes), and how many grandchildren we have (none). The school had made nametags for us with our photos from the yearbook, to help us remember who each person was. People would go up and look at your nametag, then your face, and say something. For me, the thing I heard the most was, “You still have a lot of hair!” My claim to fame. I would start to say, “Yeah, and I can occasionally drive at night, too!” But I usually just said something like, “Your smile has not changed. Life must have been good to you.”

One of the many reasons I went to Brevard College was that I was the only person I knew going there. I was ready to try to be someone other than who I had been in high school, and this would be my canvas.  Brevard- the faculty, staff, administration, students, and community- encouraged it. So, I began to travel my own path. That almost didn’t work out for me when “traveling my own path” meant coming home at Christmas and getting my grades with a 1.8 GPR. A lot lower than it was when I entered. I also had a letter from the Dean of Students saying if I did this again. I didn’t get to come back.

By the way, my mother was incredibly good about it. She looked at the grades and letter and said, “Mike if you want to go off for a year and waste a year of your life and all the money you have worked so hard to save for college, then come back here and be a lint-head, that’s okay with me. But you need to know, you’re not coming back HERE.” I got the message.

I returned to Brevard, made appointments with each of my professors, told them I didn’t know how to be a student, and every one of them helped me to learn how. Not just how to pass the courses, which I did, but how to be a lifelong learner. It was one of many second-chances I was given at Brevard.

As I said, we were all encouraged to travel our own paths. Mine did not include many people. I just seemed to walk a path that was less crowded. I don’t believe that everyone else was just following along with each other, but they did seem to have more companions along the way. Nevertheless, those in attendance, for the most part, tried to make conversation with me. One woman just could not place me. She really tried, asking if I were in music, or sports, or arts, etc. She really wanted to remember who I was. I told her not to feel bad, I was mostly in the background of things back then. However, a few people came up, looked at my name tag, then looked at my face, and walked away. They probably didn’t know me back then. Or maybe they did.

I fell in love a few times during those two years. I fell in love with the mountains- the views from the crests, the quietness of the wooded paths, the always-changing but always-the same light on them. I wanted to walk every path in that part of the Pisgahs, and I managed most of them. I fell in love with words- their power to move, to recall, to bring both tears and laughter, to give a vision of what could be. I fell in love with ideas- how the world might be better, how much good there was already in it, and what was important in life. And being 18 and 19, I fell in love with a beautiful woman. And being 18 and 19, proved I was a real jerk at it.

I noticed a few other things this time up there. Cathy and I walked through some of the stores in Brevard. Some of the art stores and outdoor outfitter stores. There were things that years ago I used to wish I could have but could not afford. Today, I could buy just about anything I wanted, but there was not much that I wanted. I noticed that in times past, when I would go up to the mountains I would want to do and see as much as possible. My thought was, I may never pass this way again. Now I do not feel that way. Instead, I wanted to do a few things and enjoy them deeply. William Least Heat Moon’s first book was Blue Highways, which he called a “wide map” of America (he traveled over the country on the smaller roads). His second book was PrairyErth, in which he walked over all the roads and lanes in Chase County, Kansas. He called the second one a “deep map.” I have moved to the deep map time of my life.

I noticed that I really missed the smell of fall in the mountains, the hopefulness of new college students (the ones working the alumni weekend were great ambassadors for BC), and the gratitude for all the things Brevard offered me.

Over the last fifty years I have sent maybe a dozen students to BC. They were students who, like me, had some potential but needed a place to travel their own paths. I hope they found theirs, and that when their time comes to go back, they, too, will be grateful.