maysblog

I’m starting to get sentimental.

Maybe this is a product of our family losing a loved one. Maybe this is a result of having to order my ring soon. Maybe it is because I will soon be leaving the country and I am beginning to realize and appreciate the comforts of home. Whatever it is, I have trouble admitting that it is coming to an end.

I took a walk across campus last night. As an upper level Business Major, I don’t get off West Campus much, however I do more than most due to my Dance minor status and Aggie Football job. But venturing in to the heart of main campus… that is a rarity.

Which is a shame; living in the Commons on Southside for two years, I had really come of age on main campus. Walking to class in the early mornings, being greeted by the “Batt Fish” dispersing newspapers to all the older cadets on the Quad. Other memories of studying in the sun between two of the outer columns in front of Evans Library. Or Fountain hopping in the H2O fountain outside the Chemistry building with my best friend and our very first college boyfriends (of whom we never speak of).

My walk last night was reminiscent of taking a bite into Mom’s dump cake after not eating it for a long while. A multitude of sensations and memories that are so familiar and yet somehow in the hustle and bustle you’ve forgotten. And that first bite brings it all back.

These experiences have all compounded on top of themselves to make me who I am. I have grown tired and weary of the familiar, but it is because this place and these people have prepared me to go out and face the world. Years ago, while I was riding along with my Dad a song came on the radio, Clint Black’s A Better Man.

What do you say when it’s over?
Don’t know if I should say anything at all
One day we’re rollin’ in the clover
Next thing you know we take the fall.

Still, I think about the years since I first met you
And the way it might have been without you here
I don’t know if words from me still upset you
But I’ve just gotta make this memory stand clear.

I know I’m leavin’ here a better man
For knowin’ you this way
Things I couldn’t do before, now I think I can
And I’m leavin here a better man.

He said that song (although about a woman) always made him think of Texas A&M. Then again, my Dad does wear his Aggie ring on his left ring finger over his wedding band, so in a sense, it is where his heart lies. I have always said that of all of the schools in the world, Texas A&M was the best place for me to not only get an undergraduate education, but to have an undergraduate experience.

Wherever I go, Whatever I do, I will be able to safely say I am a better woman because of Texas A&M.

For Niki