Vassar Days in the 1980s, Part One, Two and Three all here but pace yo'self

This good news about Vassar College in Poughkeepsie in NY being in the NY Times for providing great aid to folks in need and promoting diversity was music to my ears.  I was happy to attend Vassar College (which was co ed by 1970) with a lot of aid back in the 1980s.  The news of more colleges aiming to be inclusive warms my heart as its a dream I have held for a long time, even since the 1980s when I realized Vassar and others were seeking to recruit capable African American students to attend in larger numbers.

Wonderful students showed up and encouraged each other and more besides.One of my dear friend who was a new such recruit and dated a talented cadet from West Point sadly was broadsided as a passenger and lived for years without mobility or speech though she could communicate with blinks. The love I felt for her and when I found a way to visit her opened my heart to the deeper side of caring and friendship for me as a college student with a world of opportunities and needs calling out to our generation with the former often highlighted when doors of privilege opened up

When I think of the rich experiences and friendships Vassar afforded me I appreciate their generosity even more..and that's on top of feeling blessed this week when  taking programs from NYC Meditation this week to get centered and appreciate the mind-heart connection, taking time to light a candle and take walks and reflect on many concerns on our world, including the loss of life due to a terrorist attack in Brussels with 31 fatalities..something that speaks to remembering each person for a day in a month of 31 days..so echoing the reminder to value each day and month we are given with gratitude and allow healing best as we can of old hurts and haunts..

The next generations thank you, Vassar and the whole MA/NY CT area benefits in many ways from plays, free concerts and events,and much more..Why not take a stroll on campus and make Vassar part of your world in more direct way?

In addition to the fab academics,I enjoyed growing as a dancer and friend to many, helping run the 3-day camp out called The Before School Conference a couple of years after loving it as a freshman.

In 1981,I met at least 50 people I remembered well into the first year. Small classes and dorms rounded out that sense of community, which carried over to the apartment options (and the new pool they put in while I was there..

.I took two terms off to extend the experience,but initially to reflect on life after a friend John who was a talented senior going into teaching, passed from depression which shook the community back then yet was reflected upon in a large memorial service and then an annual art show of Children's art work that still happens...)

After a lovely singer named Lisa passed from a car accident, her singing group dedicated songs in her memory...those kinds of memorial efforts were new to me, and yet factored into ideas for memorials for our own teen son Kaelan in 2009 (see post Remembering Kaelan).

I used to think going to a good college would protect one from the dangers of the world, and overall it does help people do that be being focused,monitored and inspired...but the inner game is one we need to understand much better from sleep and mental health to nutrition and social and spiritual supports.

Then there are the realities of being on the road. And while I almost got hit by a car when I was crossing Hooker Ave at the end of Raymond my sophomore year after my car had spun around on a sharp corner in Amenia on RT 343, I took two months off travelling safely with a friend in a station wagon across the country, mostly staying with friends and family and seeing many national parks.

I became a bit if a campus activist and a year after John's passing, I organized Vassar Voices for a weekend of Feb 3rd which echoed an all campus conversation after John had passed and to help build a sense of community.I organized puzza parties in all dorms to get people weighing in on what they liked and what could make Vassar even better.

Then got all the music groups to perform in the Chapel at 8pm Sunday night, and while 75 singers were there, not many others showed up until there happened to be a blackout on campus, nothing normal, and yet the Chapel had lights, so we got our Crowd.

I thanked God for that and enjoyed being part of the church services there too with Allison Stokes and Catholic groups.I gave a talk during a graduation service, thinking there would only be a few families,but found I was speaking to hundreds when I got up.

I almost froze after seeing Michael McCarthy, our esteemed philosophy professor whose class almost made me think of leaving my first semester( which some felt likely would be the case since not too many went from low income and maybe I got in since I was from a big family..and one of labor not snooty book learning types..)

But I made it through my presocratic philosophers and braved taking Ethics which hugely informed my life. I reflected on forgiving someone who had not asked for forgiveness as being an important ethic even if it did not make logical sense...it resonated with my heart and soul ad the way to survive not only my first unfair breakup (the kind where they are cheating on you and you're the last to know and even some other miserable incomprehensible stuff...).

Yet even that prepared me for much bigger battles of the heart and mind with others,in court and facing living apart from ones I love due to wrongdoing not only be a few people but Entire Systems...

Again the formula to forgive in advance of the much deserved yet likely withheld apologies meant survival in the midst insanity which got worse with the loss of our teen son before it got anywhere near more calm and comprehensible.

At that packed service I shared insights about each life being precious and capable of great things once one trusts and has a vision of moves they'd like to make.

Like wanting to dance after practicing balance at the ballet barre, one Needs to have faith and freedom to turn around on one foot as in a pirouette, to leap off the ground from one foot to the other.

I had danced in the moonlight in a strong breeze one night after facing the end of a close relationship...and when I tested face down in a field, I hugged the earth...

I was connecting with this underbelly, journal
ling side of life...asking questions and wrestling with the human condition and even physical elements of life to find some answers, to feel life mafe sense...and to not fall into despair or complacency.

When someone said we had less competition when someone not only dropped out but died even by their own hand,or someone seemed to be deficient do it was not such a bad loss.

..I felt the people with such views were worse off than those who died...This was the real pitfall of life, not the despairing or tragic accident but the 'walking dead' who had so little concern for the lives and well being of others.

Another line that cut like an arrow from the past and even held by many was the promotion of abortion for any woman who did not seem like a fit it financially stable parent.This truly tragic 'last resort' being advocated to unburden our system with no awareness if what is spent on military, on corporate funding and giving away of natural resources and a prison complex and much more seems grossly out of proportion and irrational as well as cruel.