Reflections on Undergrad, Part I

I had a dream last night in which I was talking to a good friend from high school about the collegiate environment. There were two reflections on my time at Gonzaga that were rather interesting, at least, in my view.

1.) College is an artifical, man-made world. Nowhere else will you interact with just your peer for four years, nowhere else are you so obscenely free of responsibility, nowhere else can you spend most of your time paying money rather than earning it. I grant that it is a useful environment to achieve education and have the leisure time necessary to learn but it seems that it could use a serious makeover in order to provide a more real environment.

2.) The college learning experience is invaluable, if it is done properly. I am finishing my college experience with a great desire to continue in the flow of semesters as I learn more and more about everything. High school and college reinforced this lifelong pursuit for me. Many of my friends, and this is not a bad thing, just an interesting one to me, are so ready to be completely done with school. They love learning as well but the college experience had the effect of "burning" them out. I can see that as well, especially since they didn't have the opportunity to study with some really passionate professors about subjects that set your heart on fire. They didn't get to experience Fr. Slatter at 8am unfolding the ancient Roman world through the beautiful works of Ovid and Horace. They didn't get to experience a rich, vibrant sense of achieving insight into insight and tapping one's unlimited desire to know with Dr. Mike Stebbins. They didn't get to experience Dr. McClelland explaining our emotionality and the varied patterns of the human mind.

I'm glad for all of my friends in what they are going out to do, traveling, jobs, further study. Indeed, I hope to live vicariously through many of them through their correspondence, but I am ecstatic about the future and the route that I am to follow. I love you all! Pax vobiscum et amor semper.