A few weeks before PTV, I received an email asking if I would be interested in writing a column from the perspective of an incoming freshman.
If I didn’t say yes, I wouldn’t be writing this right now.
Now I have been procrastinating writing my last column for The VN, because finally doing so makes it all so real.
This is it; these are my last few weeks at UDM.
A little over four years ago, I was trying anything to avoid coming to UDM and today I would be happy with just one more day on campus.
It is hard to put into words how much UDM means to me and how difficult it will be to close this chapter.
There are many ways that I could go about this: I could offer some sort-of advice for soon-to-be graduates. After all, you would think that you would have some wisdom to give with a college degree, but my super awesome Yoda powers haven’t clicked in yet.
Or I could just cut to the chase and write this farewell column, but where is the uniqueness in that?
You only get one chance to write a final column and it better be good, so good that people have some sort of emotion reading it.
For anyone who knows me, I write letters.
There are times where saying something is not enough – when your thoughts and emotions are better processed through writing.
So I am going to go about this as one huge thank you note.
It is odd to write a thank you note to a school, and people reading this may think that I have finally lost it.
I have six term papers due this semester, so that assumption is very likely, but I don’t think it is weird at all.
My time at UDM has been full of so many wonderful memories and all of those memories have certain people who helped make them so wonderful and they deserve every bit of thanks.
To the professors who have been there for all of us students, thank you!
You truly exemplify what it means to be Jesuit and to shape men and women for others.
For the professors who are on the opposite end of the spectrum, thank you to you as well.
You help make your students stronger individuals who can take on anything that the world throws at them.
Everyone has that one professor who they know they can go to with anything and Prof. Stanton is mine.
Prof. Stanton, I could write a million columns and thank you notes for everything that you have done over the years, but it would still not be enough.
All I can say is thank you for allowing me to be, as you put it, “stubborn and headstrong in the best way possible.”
You helped take my dreams for the future as well as some of my crazy ideas for the paper and helped make them a reality and I can’t tell you how grateful I am for that.
I also cannot say enough about my amazing staff and friends.
They allow me to stare at them blankly when they use sports references that I will never understand and the same happens to them when I talk about the connections between reality TV shows.
They are a small group of hard workers and they will make you proud next fall when you pick up the first issue of the year.
The hardest part about writing a column is not finding the topic. The hardest part is ending it because that is where you leave the reader – thinking, you hope, about what you just created.
During my many treks back and forth to campus, I have made many a playlist to make the drive go faster.
One lyric from a song from a certain Starkid Production basically sums up how it feels to leave school.
“I don't want to see you go, but it’s not forever and even if it was you know that I would never let it get me down! 'Cause you’re the part of me that makes me better wherever I go. So I will try not to cry, because no one needs to say goodbye.”
UDM truly made me better and I will forever be grateful for that.
Jackson is VN editor-in-chief
