Friday, May 31, 2013

Back to School!




Last weekend was my college reunion.

As is always possible in New England, the weather is not always lovely and, for reunion weekend, it was horrid...cold and rainy just about all the time. As the weekend progressed, so did the mud. Since several of our dinners and receptions were in outdoor tents on grass, it was truly a mess.

All the same, I had a great time.

All activities went on, despite the weather. Even Campus Dance was held although the dance floor was soaked, as were the tables, chairs, and tablecloths!!




Campus looked good and much the same.






Stayed in the dorms, which we not exactly luxurious, but convenient to everything else I was doing.






It's been 5 years since I was last in Providence and it was good to be back...saw old friends, made new ones, walked miles and miles.

I got to spend time with Babette, my roommate of four years, as well as visit with many others.








I attended one interesting Forum on Advertainment. The panelists were from much younger reunion classes, 1993 and 2003.

 

One of our class members arranged special docent tours of the Rhode Island School of Design (RISD)  Museum.  In my undergraduate days, I spent quite a bit of time enjoying this extraordinary museum which is just down the hill from our campus. In fact, some of my art and architecture classes were at RISD.




Going to a small university offered me the opportunity to build friendships and bonds with my professors.  Over all the years, I've remained in close contact with one professor in particular, George Borts.  He has just retired after 63 years of teaching Economics at Brown.  Here we are at one of my class dinners during reunion weekend.




At commencement, the reunion classes get to march in the procession, ahead of the graduates and the faculty...always a thrill.


As the younger classes marched down the hill, I couldn't help but notice that the student body at Brown is much more diverse than it was in my day, refreshingly so!!!



The final excitement was that Ben Affleck received an honorary degree, his first college degree as he never completed Harvard.



And, on the subject of Harvard, this is a tee shirt that the Brown Bookstore sells.