January 1, 2008 10:00 PM
I’ll be home…
For Christmas, I always knew that I would be flying back. That’s not the case for all of the American scholars studying in Britain this year. My Mercersburg classmate Julia will be meeting her parents--both of whom work for the Academy--and her sister--who is studying at Kalamazoo College--in Italy for the holidays. But I couldn’t stay away from south-central Pennsylvania for an entire school year.
I flew back about a week ago, staying overnight in London and meeting another classmate, Matt Kessler, who was spending his first semester of college there. The trip went well, until the Customs officials had to double-check to make sure that rabbit terrine was admissible. It was, and is, in case you were wondering, so I did make it home; I also made it to campus on Monday… and Tuesday… and Wednesday.
Now I had been warned that things would be different, that it wasn’t ever going to be the same as it was during my four amazing years there. I’m not sure that “warned” is the right word. I was quite pleased to find much of Mercersburg unchanged, but I was even more pleased with that which has changed. There are new faces, new schedules, new facilities, and new opportunities. Those who were only juniors last year are now much more mature lower-middlers. Those who were the anxious upper-middlers have grown into their roles as seniors and leaders of the school; and they are starting to hear back--often positively-- from very good colleges and universities.
Mr. Kantaros’ AP Comparative Government and Politics classes were still running, although each of the students now has their own subscription to The Economist to contextualize much of what they read in their texts. Stony Batter was still working hard on their latest production. Model United Nations was still preparing for their next conference. And Mr. Applebaum was still seated at Table 26 in the Dining Hall.
On the other hand, there were some happy surprises as well: some 10th graders had just returned from the Middle East, which certainly didn’t happen during my time there; several underclassmen made callbacks for Declamation tryouts; the Writing Center and Math and Foreign Languages Departments had moved. But when I passed others “07s” in the Dining Hall or Library, it would always take us a second to realize that we didn’t go there anymore. Despite the locks on the dorms and the missing faculty of yesteryear it was still Mercersburg Academy, where we spent four years of our lives, learning and growing as students and people. It was still that home away from home that I knew I would miss as I stood in front of my class at Graduation last year, telling them so.
I know that it will become more and more different as each year goes by, but as of December 2007, my alma mater is still facing those wild storm waves of years bravely and ably. I am proud.
Posted by at January 1, 2008 10:00 PM