Goodnight and Go....

To be honest, I've only kind of lamented the fact that I'm not going back to Wooster this fall. Let's be honest...it's awesome, not having I.S. staring me down all of the time, and it's awesome, not having classes, homework, and papers.

But then I realized, mostly from facebook statuses, that right now, like, tonight, the first night of bandcamp, and the coming week, is about the best week ever at the College of Wooster. Being free from class but on campus..it's just wonderful. And it's so nice to get back after a long or boring or busy or hard summer. I've had all of those...heck, I've had all of those this summer...but I don't get that fresh beginning this time. I remember those feelings...the newness of a new room, the optimism of new classes, the excitement of NSO...I definitely miss them. Okay, so NSO, while it may or may not come into my life this year, definitely isn't leaving my life permanently...even so, right now, at this moment...I just miss that hopefulness.

On the whole, I only kind of miss Wooster, and I know I'll never miss the work. But I'll always miss things like those first couple of packed out nights at Common Grounds, and I'll miss the feelings of community, both small and campus wide. I'm sure other forms of community await me...I'm sure my life is not just going to go downhill from here...but even so, I'll always remember those times fondly. I don't know if it was Wooster or just college, but I never thought I could love a place for all it is as much as I love and miss Wooster right now...but I'm glad I miss it, because for a long time, I wasn't sure I would miss anything but the people. I think I miss the people most, definitely, but I'm glad I get to miss to place too, and I cannot wait to visit.

I was about to start ranking my four years in college, from worst to best or vice versa...but then I realized I couldn't do that. Maybe I will be able to someday, but right now, I just can't distill them down enough.

Freshman year was great because it was a time for new things...but it was hard a lot too, in the newness. I never quite regained the sort of friends I had the beginning of that year, but thankfully, I never had to lose friends quite like I did by the end again either.

Sophomore year was interesting...it was good, it was I.S. free, and it was the best of my two common grounds years, I think (it's so much better, not living in Gable...and when the guys specifically don't live in Gable). First semester was at times brililant and at times impossible...I had a very exciting, very short-lived, and probably very wrong relationship to start it off...then started falling into the longest relationship of my life by the end of it, but the fact that she, Meg, didn't go to Wooster, probably made Sophomore year, specifically second semester, one of the hardest spans of time in my life. But it was the "InterVarsity Year" if there ever was one.... Fall Conference, Urbana, MAC, Urban Plunge, China....very full, and ultimately, very awesome. Second semester also featured one of my least favorite classes ever...Chaucer...which would have been amazing if my advisor hadn't been on sabbatical that year...it was the semester that I started studying film though, and that proved to be humongous in my life...and I took one of my favorite classes ever: The Ancient Novel...well, and I guess Comparative Film was my favorite class ever...so that could have been the best semester as far as classes go...even though Chaucer was so bad.

Coming off of China made junior year weird...it wasn't bad, and I had the best roommate I would ever have in college, but even so, the year was strange. Living in Common Grounds got old (although, looking back, I do think I wish I had stuck out for the third year), but it really wasn't bad. French Film was incredible....it was the year of It Could Be U though...and, while that was good, it was hard and I might still be a little exhausted from it all (kidding, I think). I think my relationship with Meg met its apex when I left for China and she went to SLT, so I think there was an added and unnamed stress about the year that I did not want to acknowledge. I honestly don't remember junior year all that well, as a year...but it was a good year...Junior I.S. was far easier than it should have been I think.

Senior year was good...because it was senior year. It was hard. Very hard. Things didn't go anywhere near as well in Gault Manor as I had hoped (mostly for roommate incompatibilities)...classes just got boring, and my least favorite class at Wooster was on my favorite author (James Joyce). The Price of Life basically was my first semester, and really, it was a good semester...actually, as a year, save for much of my personal life, it was a great year. Classes were mostly great, I.S. was fun (and easy, comparatively....just a ton of work mostly), I definitely grew with God and grew as an evangelist specifically. I feel like I'm still kind of riding on waves from second semester, wherein I became really good friends with people I'll rarely see now that I've graduated...great time to make friends, second semester of your senior year is. I guess really, starting toward the end of first semester, basically, when I broke up with Meg if not a bit before or even a bit later (the price of life kind of blurs it all, to be honest), to no fault of anyone but perhaps myself if anyone, I definitely started feeling isolated in my personal life. I still definitely had friends, and great friends at that...but I kind of stopped connecting with anyone on a deep level....it just happened. I think it was something I always did with Meg before anyone else, then, in losing her, I just kind of shut off for awhile...and I hope I'm not there anymore, but I definitely feel like I am sometimes...mostly though, probably because I'm actually physically shut off from most of the world most of the time now...anyway, second semester was weird and good and bad and just everything....the day before graduation was glorious and one of the hardest days of my life. I was rejected by a girl that I still wouldn't be surprised to marry in four or five years, were it not for an as to yet irretrievable falling for a girl that decided we shouldn't talk then, (which is still going on to this day, as a side note)....so my second semester, personally, was a total emotional roller coaster and train wreck...

And right now, life is very hard....Next to all my communication with the outside world seems to be for funding, and about 75-80% of that communication ends in some form of rejection....

I could definitely let myself be filled with despair right now.

But I won't, and that's mostly because God won't.

And that's the abbreviated lifestory I've got for you, for the last 4 years of my life.

-Zack

"Lead me now, I understand, faith is both the prison and the open hand"
-Vienna Teng