Cheers to the memory makers

It is five in the morning and I am finally settling down to write this column. I have struggled with this piece. It is far and away the toughest of all to write because it is a farewell. And goodbyes are difficult, to say the least.

I want to be profound, but sincere and real. I want my final words to have resolution yet avoid sounding like a speech. I want to capture all of my experiences, but they are as incomplete as my memories from Penn.

Stuck between recognition of the value of my future versus the comfort of my present, I have struggled to reconcile my graduation with any consistent emotion. I relish dreams of the future, but as one friend reminded me: "We are leaving all that is comforting and true, and that is sad enough."

And it is within the haze of articulating my emotions and conflictions that I hope you relate with me. For being a senior is analogous to summing it up in 650 words: it is impossible.

For starters, I am sad to leave Penn. I was only here for a total of three years. And I admit now that there were experiences and people I should have engaged long before I realized that my West Philadelphia sun was setting.

Yet I am ready to move on. I have always assumed that the reason I came to Penn was so that the next 22 years would be better than the first 22. Sure, we will have responsibility and accountability on a different plane. But we will have the ability to make our dreams into realities, and that is certainly worth the tradeoff.

But in my final hours, I have realized that it is the people of our class who have made this year memorable. I have made new friends, whom I should have met a long while before these nights. I met a great non-senior (you know who you are) who piqued my interest to say the least. I hung out with some other folks who partied with an iron will (they told me to leave my column blank, or write about Henry Miller, or just rely on Jack Daniels, which I did).

I downed pitchers of beer with a friend who argued that truth is more important than imagination (and I happen to agree with him, if only I could capture truth). And I ate dinner with others who reminded me that the dynamics of our friendships will forever be altered by our relationships; and that is fine.

At this point, I need to submit a disclaimer, in the words of H.L. Mencken, "We are here and it is now. Further than that, all human experience is moonshine."

I have found comfort from the fact that I have realized that our collective identity is moot. As we leave more divergent that as we arrived, we are an example that the keys to success do not lie in clothing, or small talk, or popularity or our personable charm -- that there are as many models to achievement and experience as there are people that surround us. We should all appreciate the diversity that our futures represent as a sign of the gifts of privilege, hard work and environment.

In the midst of the final days of my senior remiss, I have found comfort in realizing that I am not alone in this mixed bag of conflicting diatribe versus praise. If graduation and the end of college are about finality and a one-sentence conclusion, then we're all in the wrong business.

I can only thank my friends -- Jeff, Lisa, Alex, Simone, Enrique, Florrie, Maria, Binya, Erin, Joe, Benjamin and so many others -- who reminded me every day of the breadth of talent, initiative, diversity and importance of people that are tantamount to happiness.

Looking forward, I hope I can remember to greet people with the same wide-eyed enthusiasm and openness that defined my first and last weeks at Penn.

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