3/4

Not explicitly sports-related but a tribute to one more year of college passed and the people in any realm that make it worth it...


Yesterday, I met someone from OU's Class of 1970. He was walking around Perkins Hall, reminiscing. He had lived there...in the 1960s. 40 years later, a lot has changed on campus, in the world. But the funny thing is, as much as things change, they also stay the same. The carpet is dingier, walls chipped, ceiling worn but his room 104 is still there. The same wooden wall units are there. And though a new set of fresh faces enter these halls, this campus each year, one even more significant things holds true...memories are made.

Each year, we come in with dreams, dreams that evolve over the course of our time here. People argue over the difference between evolution and creation all the time. But really, we create the foundation for our own self-evolution. We evolve into the person our surroundings create for us. 

Dreams are something we all know about. It's a two-pronged word. They're our subconscious musings when darkness betakes the day. They're our wildest hopes that we wish on the night's luckiest star will come true. And these two conceptions of the word share a lot in common.

When we enter into sleep, it's a world of the unknown. There lies your wildest dreams but also worst nightmares. What you get, you never know, nor can you control. 

We jump into each year with a world of unknowns, preconceptions, points of stress that occupy us before the sandman takes us away to sleepy time. Once you enter, anything is possible. Sometimes you don't want dreams to end. Others you wake up with a cold chill. Sometimes it's the greatest moments of your day, some so simple, carefree, that you don't want to end. Others are those nightmares, the ones that leave you apprehensive, unsure. 

It's a long way away from 1970 now. But what held true then still holds true today. Meeting that man who will finally now get to walk, 40 years later (there was no commencement ceremony because of the Kent State riots), I realized that as much as things change they do stay the same. We still have dreams. We still have apprehension. We still make memories that live on for decades in these same confines. 

And still, when you look up into the night sky, you see a bunch of stars, marvel at their wonder. All of you are those stars that provide light in the darkness, guidance through hard times, glimmers of hope that you sometimes take for granted.

These brights spots light up our lives. And they take their reign while we fall into sleep. These stars fuel our dreams. Make them come true. And each one is so very important. You all are those stars, all part of a constellation so wondrous to behold.