Notes on graduation

Well, here I sit, the day after. I am no longer a student of Mount Union College; like so many before me, I am now an alum, and I don't really know how to take it. It was stranger yesterday, and while I was happy and excited to graduate and move on, deep within there was this subfeeling of sadness. The only way I could really describe it to people was to say that it feels like Mount Union has broken up with me, and I'm not ready for the relationship to end. I just want to walk outside, stand on the steps, and beg her to take me back.
"I still love you," I want to shout, "why does it have to end? Why now? Can't I just have one more chance to make it work? I know if you let me things will be different. I can change, we can make this work"
"This is just the way it has to be," she replies. "I've spent four wonderful years with you, and I still love you too, but this is just the way it has to be. It's time for both of us to move on."
"I don't want to move on," I would reply. "I want to be here with you forever. This is where my friends are. This is where my life is. This is my home! Why do you have to kick me out like this? Please just let me stay."
"No, Andrew. It's time for you to go. You came here just a sprout, and we've grown together. But now it's time for us to part ways. It's time for both of us to find new loves and to let others shape us. It's time for you to go now.

And so it was that I sat on the porch and chain-smoked Parliaments; holding on to what was left and trying to postpone the inevitable; Trying to put off packing up my car for the last time, making the inevitable trip past the library, past chapman, past Miller (where my Mount Union experience began), and out the main entrance onto state street; past Sheetz, which was a parking lot when I started here, just down the street from the new apartments under construction (a hard reminder that Mount Union will live on long after me). My four years there were just a connection in the larger picture, just a brief flash that happens between past and future, but one which I will remember forever.

I would argue that Mount Union found me. I didn't do college visits. I didn't do college tours. I applied to a random school and when I was accepted, I went there. My going to MUC was an accident, but in the end, Mount Union made me. And therefore, Mount Union will always be a big part of my personal identity.

So, as I unpack my memories and rebox them to take with me to DC this weekend, I just want to pause for a moment and say thank you. Thank you, Mount Union, for the memories. I couldn't have asked for more from a college experience, and mine was one that I will not soon forget. I'll see you again soon, I'm sure.