Life at an Empty College Campus

By W. Jay Bowdoin on November 21, 2017

While the majority of students find their way home for Thanksgiving, there’s always a handful that don’t. This year I served as one of those students, at least for a little while.

About what the quad looks like right now. Notice the lack of students.
Photo via Pixabay

My parents live overseas, and I had plans to fly out to Colorado to ski later in the week, so I stayed put while the rest of campus made their long-awaited exit. Usually I’d be one of them, leaving campus to get home and watch TV with family.

Staying was unusual, but not as unusual as the empty campus that I’ve called home for the last few days. You never really know a place until you’re standing in the middle of it, feeling like you’re the last person alive.

I still find myself more privileged than the majority of others who stayed behind. My college let all of us out for a whole week at Thanksgiving, so there’s plenty of time to be lonely. I get to leave; as far as I know, many of the others do not.

The campus is just large enough for us to miss each other. Going into this week, I always imagined how fun it might be if I were to run into my fellow hold-outs. Maybe we’d have one of those soul -hanging adventures like they do in “The Breakfast Club.” Maybe we’d just talk.

Either way I wish I could find one of them out here. It’s not so bad staying behind, I just wish I knew why the others were still here. Is it family troubles? Are they from another country?

In the end though, I’m quite content with the silence. In fact, I think everyone should spend a holiday on campus at least once. It’s a great time for introspection. You never know who you really are until you’re forced to spend a couple days with yourself. It gives you a great idea of what it must be like for other people.

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