This weekend was Homecoming weekend at Bishop's, my old undergraduate University. I didn't go back for it. In fact, I've only been back once in the whole 15 years since I graduated from the lovely place. But I was thinking about Bishop's this weekend, and so I thought I would post a piece I wrote three years ago, when I did go back to revisit the old haunts. Here it is:
"Going “home” for Homecoming after twelve years of being away is a strange, wonderful, and somewhat surreal experience. At first, it is as if nothing has changed. You walk into the Lion amidst a sea of faces that are strangely familiar, like relatives at a family reunion. Maybe it takes a few seconds longer to recognize the people behind the faces; but immediately, you know this group. On second glance, as you begin the typical “where-are-you-now-and-what-are-you-doing” discussion, you come to see that, in fact, everything has changed. These people have also moved on. They are not the cute guy from the Plex or the girl from your drama class anymore, but people who, like you, have jobs and families and lives that have little to do with Bishop’s anymore.
Of course, there are the handful of people who you really came to see; the ones who you “experienced” university with in various ways, and who you really want to connect with, to laugh with, to remember with, or maybe get some kind of closure with. And then the remembering begins. You remember the times you were an idiot; you remember the times you were inspired; you remember the times you stayed up all night laughing or studying or getting some action. You remember the food fights and the parties at the Pink House and long nights at the Lion and of course the football. You remember your favourite profs and the conversations you had as you wrestled with the big and little questions that helped you become the person you are today (though of course you didn’t know it at the time). You remember the smell of Dewies cafeteria and the sound of the train blowing its horn by the golf course and the feeling of walking through the Quad for the first and the last time.
You remember the friends who aren’t there with you now but who were with you then, and you smile as you think about them, and the role they played in making those three or four (or five) years what they were. You remember the bad times, too – the times you failed or got dumped or lost a game or lost yourself. If you look hard enough, you can almost see the person you were, walking through the Sub or sitting in a classroom or kissing outside the Pub after closing.
As you sift through these memories (as a three year-old sifts through sand to find shells at the beach), you find that after all this time, it is easy to let go of the memories you don’t need anymore, and gently hold on to just the beautiful ones. You don’t succumb to the nostalgia of it all, or become overly sentimental about it, but rather see those memories through the foggy lens of time; not as they were, but as you were.
Then all of a sudden, the Gambler is being played (not once, of course, but twice) and you feel a stirring inside you that you recognize most of all; and before you know it, Joey and Buddy are up on their chairs and you are 20 again; singing and laughing without a care in the world. And your soul is smiling because in that moment, as you look around at your old friends, you understand why you came back “home”; why you flew across the country to be here right now. You came back to (re)visit the person that you were, back then, and to (re)discover that you did belong here, once upon a time. That this was your place, your home; and in some small way, it always will be.
And you realize that, in fact, nothing has changed and everything has changed, and perhaps this is simply the nature and beauty of a small, close-knit University that perches proudly on the banks of the mighty Massawippi River; and perhaps this is also simply the nature, and beauty, of life itself. And for this – this simple yet insightful glimpse into the past (and present) – I am so thankful to have gone “home”.
