A Park and a Campus

Last Sunday and Monday, I drove to Ohio to be with my Bestest Friend for her brother's funeral. It was sad and he was young and I don't have much to say about it. However, there were two highlights that I want to share so they are not lost to time.

1) Lakeview Park in Lorain, Ohio

On Monday morning, Bestest Friend had to be at the funeral home early. I took her giant teenage son and went to Lakeview Park, which is right on the shores of Lake Erie for a half hour before we met her over there. Now, I'm not sure what this teenager's idea of a good time is, but taking his mom's friend to a park where she gleefully exclaimed over the water! the art! the roses (not in bloom)! and made small talk with people who were combing the beach for lake glass was maaaaaybe not in his Top One Hundred, but he did it gracefully.

The water was cold and we were going to a church mass after this, so while we did walk on the sand for a bit, mostly I was there for the views that this park was named after.

No one asked me, but I think the beaches on the Great Lakes are as spectacular as any beach I've ever been on in the Atlantic Ocean. (You Californians have us beat, I admit. Your sandy beaches are to die for.)

I made this poor boy pose with me for a shadow photo and while he was rolling his eyes, he was doing it as politely as possible.

This is one of the art pieces at the park. This fish is filled with plastic bottles and there's a lot of information on plaques and signs about microplastics in sea life surrounding it. It's hauntingly beautiful. 

Thumbs way up to this park.

2) Bowling Green State University

When we were at the viewing, I saw a woman I went to college with who I hadn't seen in over twenty years! Hi, Jackie! (She's not reading this.) Anyway, we were discussing how much the campus of our alma mater had changed and I said that I hadn't been there in more than a decade. I was driving back home on a Monday and BG was less than fifty miles out of my way and the bookstore would be open! I was definitely going to BG. (Yes, I did forget all about my "ethical fashion" nonsense when I spent hundreds of dollars at the bookstore.)

Sarah recently went to her undergrad alma mater and wrote about how everything was made for Instagram these days and I sort of believed her, but not really because the campus where I work doesn't have much (note: talk to the folks in marketing about this). But then I went to Bowling Green. DUUUUUDE. Old campus looks the same, the libraries look the same, but everything else is different. And everything is made for Instagram. The student union is new, the Administration Building has been torn down and now there's a fountain there!

There's a brand new business school (of course), new murals, and none of the dorms where I lived still stand. There's a new hockey stadium, the alumni center looks new, and there was some sort of sports building, but I could not figure out what it was for. 

It was 90 degrees and humid and while I was in good spirits, pretty soon I looked like this:

Sweaty and red-faced and my hair slowly becoming pasta. But it's JEROME LIBRARY, where I spent approximately a zillion hours between the years of 1997 and 2001.

BGSU!!

I'm a big fan of the registered trademark symbol at the lower right. Hilarious.

If a couple kisses by the seal under the moonlight, they will be happily married. We call those couples Falcon Flames. 

Me, old lady alumna, stopping young undergrad woman: Excuse me, what are these drones for?

Young undergrad woman: To deliver food to your dorm? (Not said, but inferred: you idiot.)

I'm pretty sure this is uninteresting to anyone but maybe Bestest Friend and Jackie who will never read this, but I'm also very happy with the marketing around BG.

A public university for the public good. YEEEEESSS!!!

And then I drove home. Which is a drive best not talked about.

*********************

Do you ever go back to your alma mater? Do you have all the wearable gear for it?