Wednesday, February 20, 2013

On Springtime

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Three minutes ago I was trying to figure out just how to get away from South Bend, which is ironic considering what I’m about to write but not so unbelievable considering the conditions at the time.  For the past week, in every spare minute I’ve had (and in some minutes that really shouldn’t have been considered “spare”) I’ve been refreshing Indians.com and @MLBastian’s twitter feed in order to keep myself as up to date as I possibly can on the Tribe’s progress in Spring Training.  It’s been the most exciting and productive offseason in recent memory, and I’ve been counting down the days (40!) until they open the season in Toronto.  The fact that they’re in beautiful Arizona with its sunshine and mountain backdrops while I’m in South Bend with its sleet and haze has only made me want to mentally move from here to there that much more.

That’s how we get back to me wanting to leave South Bend.  I went to map out the distance from South Bend to Goodyear, AZ, but before I could find anything out (1840 miles, 27 hours according to the speed limits) the picture below popped up to remind me where I am.


When I saw that picture I got a feeling not unlike the one that you get when you see a girl you’re into flirting with another guy.  Gravity loses a grip on your stomach, your shoulders fall, and you’d give anything to just be able to turn and look away but you know it’s pretty much useless to even try.  There’s a time bomb in your pocket and no matter what you do or say you know that eventually you’re going to lose them.  On this cold, windy, snowy-but-not-pretty-snow day in South Bend that picture showed me the warm-weather Notre Dame that's going to appear in a few weeks, and while I love everything about Notre Dame, that's the Notre Dame that I love best, and that's the Notre Dame that I'm going to miss.

Notre Dame is special in the springtime more than any other time of the year.  Springtime is when basketball games move outdoors, organized events slow down and free time builds out, and futons move onto the quad just in time for Sundress Day.  Springtime is when the afternoon sun hits the stained glass of Alumni Chapel perfectly, warms the balconies enough for a rooftop happy hour, and then slips over the top of the Rock in the prettiest sunset in the world.

Beat that.
Springtime is when you spend more time with your friends because you know you won't see them in months, it's when you stop spending so much time studying, either because you don't care or because you have the class pattern down, it's when you walk just a little slower to lectures because it's that nice out.  Springtime is when reading moves from library tables to lakeside benches, it's when Fridays and Saturdays become one long various-shades-of-drunk bonding session, and when you start to hear the bagpipes on the breeze in the late afternoon. Springtime is when shirts turn to tanks, it's when you trade cab rides for group walks, and it's when God washes over campus in the form of cool evening humidity.  Springtime is when Notre Dame comes out in full force to really ensure that you miss it all summer.  I've always loved it, except this time the summer away that follows South Quad Spring won't turn back into Football Fall.

Starting three months from now, South Bend won't be home ever again.  There will be springs wherever I go and I don't know what they will be like, but whatever they are, they won't bring what's coming in the next few weeks, and I hate knowing that, but at the same time, I've been blessed with the experience of springtime here that only a few get to know.  So while I'm going to have to part ways with it eventually, and while that feeling in my stomach might come back, I still can't wait for it to come.