This weekend was Homecoming at Furman, and it was an anniversary for Laura and I. We first met the Friday evening of Homecoming twenty years ago. Back then, Homecoming was held in mid-October rather than the first of November, so the actual date was October 16. To commemorate, we did our traditional walk down the mall at Furman, watching the various groups construct their “floats” (actually, they don’t float at all, but are static displays.)
Once, long ago, I ran into my classmates out on the mall as we strolled along. This happens only rarely now. More commonly, Laura will encounter her former students. As I’ve said here before, I only have four years of Furman classmates. Laura has many more years of students that she has taught. I also noticed a huge number of strollers, as young alumni proudly showed off their progeny.
As usual, we rode some of the carnival rides. The swings are our favorite, and are a nice comfortable little excursion. I couldn’t get Laura to go with me on one ride – something that spun around very quickly. I got on it, and it was probably one of the most unpleasant things I’ve ever done. There was nothing to hold you in, and I felt like I was going to fly out at any minute. It wasn’t exactly scary – just uncomfortable.
It looked like they had replace the live band with a DJ. With no live entertainment, and since we’ve turned into sleepy old fogies, we headed on home to let the young folks finish their floats.