The Boys (and Girls) are Back in Town Again

(Sunday afternoon at Bongo Java, Joe sleeping in the stroller beside me.  Listening to Boston - "Third Stage" (1986) on Spotify)

Summer in our 'hood is officially over, as yesterday was move-in day for the kids at Belmont University.  I couldn't help but chuckle as Joe and I strolled across Belmont's campus.  Cars were lined up nose to tail, as parents waited to drop their children (and their stuff, lots and lots of stuff) off at one of the dorms.  Campus police officers were everywhere, along with student volunteers, directing traffic, answering questions and generally trying to appear helpful.  It's a ritual that repeats itself every August.

Even funnier were the looks on the parents' and kids' faces, as they walked around campus together.  The parents appeared to be a little anxious, a little sad and very confused (lost).  The kids appeared to be anxious, too - anxious to have their parents leave campus and go home as quickly as possible.  Later, in groups, the kids talked a little louder than normal, filled with the false bravado all freshmen use to mask their insecurities and fears at living away from home for the first time.

I was reminded of September 1984, when my mother and our next door neighbor, Warren Gilley, drove me (and my stuff, lots and lots of stuff) to Knoxville, Tennessee, so I could begin my freshman year of college.  Mr. Gilley, who died a few years ago, was like a second father to me.  My mother told me she cried all the way back to Cookeville, after they dropped me off at Reese Hall and drove back to Nashville.

My roommate and close friend from high school, Mike Corley, had already arrived and moved his stuff into our room on the ground floor (west) - RWO.  I vividly remember unpacking my gear, sitting down on my single bed and looking over at him, sitting on his single bed.  Channeling "Revenge of the Nerds," I said, "well, Gilbert, we're here."  Mike immediately responded with the "nerd laugh," just like  in the movie.  We laughed together in our dorm room, the first of many, many times we would laugh together in our dorm room during our freshman year of college.

That night, a bunch of my friends from home went out together.  While I don't remember the entire night, I do remember walking to Buddy's Bar-B-Q on the east end of the Strip, where we had dinner and drank pitchers of beers.  Who was there?  I remember Mike Corley, Rip Pewett and Mike Matteson, for sure. I suspect Bart Pemberton and Jeff Jackovich were there, too.  We ate, drank beer and laughed a lot, glorying in the our independence and secure in the knowledge that college and everything that goes with it was right there in front of us.  All we had to do was go get it.

And we did.  We got every bit of it over the next 4-5 years.  We got girls, parties, hangovers, football games, road trips, lifelong friends, classes, fraternities, intramural sports, cafeteria food, fast food, music, bars, broken hearts, fights and laughter (lots of laughter).  We made enough memories to last a lifetime.

I hope the Belmont freshmen get all that and more the next 4 years.  I really do.