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OPINION

The questioner

College can be alienating and scary. It can make you feel a new type of alone. It's a learning curve that makes a person grow up faster than anything else.
College can be alienating and scary. It can make you feel a new type of alone. It's a learning curve that makes a person grow up faster than anything else.

He was just a normal kid from the suburbs of North Carolina. Now, he’s 400 miles away from his home, and he’s all by himself.

Well, not all by himself. He has new friends and new habits, but one thing remains the same: his religious beliefs.

Until this evening.

Here he is, at 2 a.m., the night sky shining above, as he eats bagels and discusses the world the way he sees it.

His brilliant smile flashes about his face, presenting no indication of fear, no indication of sadness even though that’s what he’s hiding.

This past year has brought much excitement, but also many difficult challenges back home, which are revealed in the darkness of the evening.

His exuberant personality shines throughout the room as he reminisces on the past year, questioning how certain events came to be.

He becomes more somber.

“Why do these things happen to me? What do I believe? Is there really a God?”

These thoughts well up in him like a sickness, filling him with pain and doubt, and causing him to lose his appetite as he set down his bagel.

As he questions his Jewish beliefs and how they conflict with Christianity, he realizes that he is now able to think and choose on his own.

The moon and the stars in the night sky stay still, but the man does not.

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He realizes he does not need to be tied down to any set of ideals. He wonders if what he has known to be true was really true.

This talk with his friends has shown him that he can change, and if college has taught him anything on this late night, it is that he is no longer a child, but he is an independent, decision-making adult.

spalviat@miamioh.edu 

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