Homecoming at MUW April 2008

I took a stroll down Memory Lane over the weekend. It was Homecoming at MUW. The whole family went with me. Erin Michelle went because she just likes to go; Ariel went because she was meeting up her new friends to play some racquet ball and Scott went along for the ride because he wanted to see where our oldest daughter would be living and attending school in the fall. It was great to line up with my former classmates of the 70's and join all the other alums from 1930 through 2007 and march into the auditorium that we all graduated in. The girls and Scott, as well as other alum's family members, saw a huge group of women and a few smart men that had a camaraderie you don't see in too many colleges. I can remember my first year at the W and it was Homecoming weekend. I could not for the life of me see how there could be a homecoming without a football game. After my four years of study at that school I understood. Homecoming wasn't about a football game, it was about getting back together with all of your old buddies and keeping the friendships alive.

Ariel took off after our picnic lunch to meet up with her new friends at the Stark Recreation Center to learn to play racquet ball. Scott and Erin and I went to tour the Culinary Arts Department where Erin has shown an interest in studying. Since she was 4 years old, she has always said that she wanted to be a chef. But lately she is thinking early childhood education. She is now trying to figure out how to do both. After some wonderful desserts and tea in the Culinary Arts Department, we ventured to the Fine Arts Department, my old stomping grounds, to see the graduating senior's art exhibition. One of my 'old' professors, Mr. Nawrocki was there. I discovered he wasn't much older than me. In fact, my freshman year was his first year of teaching. He is a lot more chatty now than he was then. He did remember me. Not because I was a standout in his particular discipline though. It was more along the lines of, I was one of the Art Majors that was on probation one year because, in our Figure Drawing course we were, GASP! SHOCK!, drawing nudes. Well, how else do you learn how to draw the human body if you don't do nudes? I can tell you it was quite the scandal in 1972. For two long years we were to only draw figures in bathing suits. At least that is what the administration saw. We kept the nudes under wraps, pun intended. Nawrocki and I laughed as we recounted the story to the ones that were in the gallery listening to us.

My college days saw me start to school going to Mississippi State College for Women in 1971 and then the name changed in 1974 and I graduated from Mississippi University for Women. It is quite likely that the same type of thing will happen to my daughter Ariel. She will start this fall to MUW and since they now admit men (since 1982!) another name change is looming on the horizon. When Erin Michelle gets there in 3 years, she will probably start in with the new name.

The campus is still the same yet it has seen some changes. The Fine Arts Department was damaged by a tornado 8 years ago and it is finally being restored and will reopen October 31 of this year. Ariel will be majoring in Theatre, so she really will be roaming in my footsteps because, Fine Arts also has encompasses the Performing Arts and is taught in the same building now. As she begins making her memories, mine are going to increase too.

My darling little niece Bella is making sweet memories for my sister Lisa. Bella has a cute way of saying things that I have dubbed 'Bella-isms'. Last week she was saying "I'll be there in a jippy!". She also was reading a book and one of the characters in the book was a detective but she kept saying '"tective". The De just couldn't come out. She is a mischievous little girl too. They were sitting out under the big oak tree in their yard having a picnic and Lisa noticed a lime green glow in the tail pipe of her car. As she investigated, lo and behold, it was a bright green plastic Easter Egg that little Bella had shoved in there. When questioned about it, Bella thoughtfully said 'uh huh, I did it.' Johnny tried to get it out but it was just too far in there to reach so he told Lisa and Bella to stand back while he started the car. They did not know what to expect. As the engine started and ran for a very little while, the egg started quivering and it turned around and all of a sudden, POW! out the pipe it shot. Bella dissolved into a fit of laughter at the sight of that flying lime green Easter egg. I think that sight will live a long time in her memory and one day she will walk down memory lane with her Mom and they will enjoy the laughter as they re-live that particular Sunday afternoon, sitting under the oak tree at the top of the hill.