When I was in college, my friends and I had a mini-tradition of sorts that we made every attempt to honor. At the close of each summer, when the nights were slightly cooler and the first days of class loomed nearby, we would wait for the new crop of freshman to arrive on campus, all wide-eyed and apprehensive as every class before them had been. Since Xavier was such a small school, we always lived near enough to still feel the pulse of the campus, even during the summer months when everything turned to a ghost town.
One night in particular held our attention each time August rolled around. As tradition has it, at the end of the first day of freshman orientation the new students gather on the soccer field for an evening of corny icebreakers and get-to-know-you games, exchanging awkward smiles as currency for mercy and understanding. As a participant, it is a gut-wrenching few hours under very bright lights. But as a spectator, it became a magical evening of social fireworks spread across the backdrop of the mild summer skies of the Ohio valley.
And so it became that each August we would mark our calendars, the ones in our heads or for those more organized, on actual paper. We would meander down to the field after dinner to find a spot on the bleachers or on a grassy hill, stretch out and light our pipes, letting the Cavendish plumes drift towards the treetops. Our intentions were never to mock, as one might expect. Instead, I think each year this was a simple exercise in reflection, a live performance of a memory that we all collectively shared, that we all managed to muddle through. Game Night was possibly the last true rite of passage that I’ve had in life. Or perhaps one so brightly lit and shared by so many.
Even now, as the calendar days slip by and the taxing grip of humidity lessens by each sunset, I still get chills thinking about those late summer nights in Cincinnati. As I pass incoming freshman on the campus here, their uneasiness is almost palpable, accompanied by a certain excitement at the unknown. It is a timeless and universal quality. I miss these days when life seemed uncertain and hopeful, when the changing weather echoed back the sentiments of the heart.
I am a nostalgic simpleton, no doubt about that. But maybe this is more about capturing the vitality of youth and less about pipe smoke and sunsets.
