Rewind and Fastforward

The fourth column, this column addresses the strange feeling of returning to campus as an alumni for Homecoming Weekend.

Last week, I felt my life rewind and fast-forward. I walked down Ho Plaza, ate a pizza bagel in CTB and chatted in Libe Café as if I never left. On Saturday night, I navigated through crowds of young alumni and students in Collegetown. In my head, the lyrics of a famous television theme song began to play, and I realized why so many of us had returned.

We sought to once again experience the familiarity of our years as students. “Just walking down College Ave. felt like senior year,” shared Jen Rosenbaum ’06. “It was reassuring to know that, regardless of where I lived, I was able to return to the ‘bubble’ of Cornell and pick up right where I’d left off.” As Krystyn Tendy ’05, MPA ’06 drove along Route 79 back to Cornell, one of her friends asked if anyone felt they were heading home. “And I couldn’t have agreed more ... Once you get back, you really get to see just how special a place it is,” she said.

At home in Ithaca, the weekend seemed more about the memorable places and faces than the homecoming game. With the strange realization of having no papers to write or meetings to attend, our only time constraint was fitting our four years as a student into one weekend. We visited Wegmans, the gorges and, of course, crowded the bars. “I was glad to go back to the Palms, and play my usual four songs on the jukebox — Toto’s “Africa,” Meatloaf’s “I Would Do Anything For Love,” Journey’s “Don’t Stop Believin’,” and Sinatra’s “New York New York,” said Dan Schudroff ’05, who also ate at Shortstop Deli, the order acronyms for which he had not forgotten — PMP’s (Poor Man’s Pizza) and WGC’s (Wet Garlic and Cheese). Once we stepped on campus, the friendships we established felt like they had not missed a beat. “My college roommates live in different cities now, so we used Homecoming as a great excuse to reconnect on our old stomping grounds” said Emily Posner ’04, who also met two of her Professors for brunch. Returning “home,” we appreciated Cornell more than ever and wished that our time had not passed as quickly.

With graduation, the social familiarity of college changed significantly. It was comforting to sit on the Arts Quad, knowing we could wave to at least one person walking by us. “After graduating, I was forced to only see their AIM screen names,” expressed Jon Bellante ’06, who is now living in Arkansas. Now, on a daily basis as we travel to work, there are no friends to walk with as we did while heading to class. With less than an hour for lunch, we no longer have one dining hall where we congregate. We have adjusted to not studying in the evening, but there is no replacement for the productive and procrastinating social scene of Olin and Uris libraries. For one weekend, we sought to experience college in the place it had begun and with the friends we made as students....

Continue reading the column, here: Rewind and Fastforward