Day 2: Saturday - Alumni Weekend

We have to get to campus at a reasonable hour, so we're up in time for the hotel's continental breakfast (these two days in Philly are the days we're up that early). Breakfast is mediocre, but hey, it's free and more importantly, fast. We still have to pick up the rental car.

Swarthmore is gorgeous even on a rainy day - large grassy areas, trees, a big rose garden (grads wear a rose from the garden on their commencement gown) and buildings that stilltheir thier history - stone walls, dim wall lighting, small rooms with old doors and antique knobs.



After the parade of the reunion classes and a stint in the auditorium for speeches, awards and the like, it's off to Sharples dining hall for lunch. I ask, but my sweetie doesn't know why it's called Sharples. Probably after some philanthropist, rather than say, some obscure reference to Mel of Mel's Diner from the show Alice (I nominate the latter to be indoctrinated into campus lore).

I digress.

We head over to Lang. Our first stop is a Balinese music workshop put on by one of his former instructors. The tiny room is crammed with instruments with people wedged between them. We manage to squeeze into a small space against the wall. After some basic instruction in timing and form, each group of instruments start playing one at a time until everyone is playing together. Even the littlest kids do well, although there's (bless him) one kid playing the largest of the three gongs that just can't keep time to save himself. I nudge my sweetie over to play the large gong during the second round, so that I can (selfishly) hear it without the distraction. It's grand.

We catch up and chat to a couple of his music instructors, then hit a meeting put on by the Class of '66 (radicals!) for discussing issues that concern them today (the political agenda, the image and direction of the democratic party, the government's privacy and rights violations, the threat against a free internet, etc). We are the youngest people there, sitting on the floor sorta out of the way. Another person is there to escape the depressing talk of his wife's friends, who are talking about everyone who has died (yeah, I'd leave that too). The meeting closes with everyone standing and singing (as a shock to no one) We Shall Overcome, and we use that opportunity to slip away to our next stop.

I grab coffee (oh sweet caffeine, how I miss thee) on the way to a volunteer all-alumni performance of Mozart's Requiem. Here's how it works: the director, ensemble and chorus show up, rehearse for 90 minutes and then put on the performance. So the choir is short a bass soloist (one of the baritones bravely rises to the occasion), and the ensemble could do with a few more players to bolster their end a bit, but for just throwing it together, it's pretty amazing. Is there anything these damn Swatties can't do?

We tour the dorms, which I'm told are distributed via lottery. We run into one of the alums outside one of the coveted dorm buildings (individual rooms, close to classes) who not only lets us inside, but by sheer coincidence, happens to be staying in his old dorm room for the weekend. I peer inside. I give him give him the "you had to win this?" look. The whole area is smaller than my bedroom. Wow. Good thing they're not known for spending much time in their closets - ahem, I mean rooms.

Dinner is under the tent outside Sharples, it's catered with an open bar of wine and beer (yay!). We spend most of dinner gabbing - college, careers, friends and families. Everyone I meet is really nice and down-to-earth. We leave about 9:30 because I'm beat. Besides, all that's left at the bar are a few Bud Lights.

We pass a Wawa's on the way back through town. I do a double-take.

Me: Whoa!
Him: What?
Me: What's a Wawa's?
Him: (laughing) It's like a Plaid Pantry or 7-11.
Me: But...Wawa's?
Him: I know, it's kinda a silly name.
Me: Kinda?

It's not even that funny, yet I snicker like seventh-grader in sex-ed class when someone rattles the name off in an otherwise perfectly ordinary conversation. I'm sure you get used to it.

Tomorrow: Run the Crum. Philly Cheesesteaks. Crash course in American Revolutionary history. Sprain both ankles. No sleep 'til Brooklyn! Chipshop. Rain.