He was well liked by many people.  Funny at times.  Confident.  I wanted to be friends with him. His problem?  He would be condescending toward toward me if I were to make an unfunny joke or made a remark that he found annoying that or inaccurate. It’s been 30 years on and that’s what I remember about him.

During this time he was a church youth chaperone and sometime camp counselor at his own church – you know – trying to build up kids by being positive toward them.

Fast forward 20 years and he’s got his doctorate in education and is a principal at an elementary school making 6 figures.

With him unconditional love taught by Christian principles is actually conditional love in his own mind.  He chooses who he wants to be nice to.  Surely he had to take yearly refresher trainings on bullying during his line of work. And I’m sure he’s had to deal bullies at the elementary school he is in charge of.

Does he realize he was a jerk in his 20s?  Maybe.  I found out through a mutual friend that at a small get-together my name was brought up he shied away embarrassed or even ashamed to hear about it.

That doctorate on his wall isn’t worth the paper its printed on if he never applies it to himself.  He needs to own up to his own past mistakes.  Apologize.  Repent.

I attend a church whose leadership, and by default the laypeople strongly encourage everyone else to attend / support Freed-Hardeman University. No doubt it is a good school that trains teenagers into Christian young men and women.

I have often wondered how my life would have changed if I had chosen to go to Freed-Hardeman University in lieu of my alma mater Lipscomb University. Obviously the friendships I made at Lipscomb would have been null and void….and by default any activities done with these people would not have occurred. This includes 3 trips to Texas (2 to Houston; 1 to San Antonio); a groomsmen in my wedding; a ski trip and various retreats.

I often wonder if I would have been offered a different job, perhaps closer to west Tennessee. And if so would I have continued to volunteer at a particular church camp, and have met my wife. That is one of the hardest things to consider, as I love my wife with all my heart and consider God’s providence that brought us together. Lipscomb *might* have played a factor, keeping me close to home and by default close to church camp.

It is complex to consider past life choices and the effect they have on future choices. Am I happy with what Lipscomb has become? Not particularly. Do I feel bad about my choice of college? Somewhat? Should I feel bad? Probably not. Freed is pushed, sometimes as the only option for a Christian young person. I wish this wasn’t the case and that other moral life choices were validated.

In any case it is a moot point to consider what life would have become. I need to live for the here and now, and the future.

With my wife in a teachers’ enrichment session at my old alma mater, I was free to walk around the school for 4 hours. What I found is that you probably shouldn’t go back to your old school.

The buildings on the outside were the same or similar. Inside it had gotten a more modern look. I didn’t know where anything was anymore and it was almost as if the buildings had a fake facade over them. I certainly don’t expect colleges to stay the same for the 20 years following my attendance, but the drastic changes were almost too much. All my memories seemed to vanish the minute I opened the doors to what was the history department – turned nursing school.

I’m pretty sure the traditional classroom is few and far between. No more are the desks and podium. Now its some type of boardroom table to spur discussion. I’m certain I probably would not do well in college if I were to go back. I’m too far removed from learning and not up to the 21st century new ways of learning. In my day laptops being brought to class would be unheard of. Now it seems to be the norm.

At times I felt like an uneasy visitor. Opening up unlocked doors to university buildings and dorms. Who was minding the store? “No, wait I’m an alumnus!” I would shout out should anyone question my presence. And no one did. Not once. Did I blend in? Or were visitors on a Saturday to an otherwise deserted campus the norm? I checked and it wasn’t fall break. It’s just that Lipscomb is a Monday – Friday campus only with everyone leaving on the weekend….or else sleeping in.

And so here I was, wishing I had not gone back. It’s good ever so often. But not today. I found out some things about the university that grieves me that I will not go into.

So friends, when it is time to go back to your old college or high school, don’t go. You can’t relive it. Those days are past. Just think back with fond memories and view old photos of them. Just don’t go back expecting to relive those days.

College is a time when friends are physically close to you. Across the hall, in the same room. Seemingly never before would friendship be as close as it was then.
I dreamt last night that I was back in college finishing my degree. I was sharing a house with 3 of my closer friends from college. Past dreams have focused on my inability to complete my class requirements. In this dream I was actually looking forward to college.
My freshmen and sophomore college years were some of the best years of my life. I’ve been out of college for 12 years now, yet I look back at those years positively for the most part.
My college friends have since scattered and went back to their own hometowns or wherever their jobs, career, spouse, or God took them. My high school friends have moved away. I’m left alone as one of the few left back in my hometown.
In a sense I believe my friendships have narrowed, not through anyone’s fault. It would be more in a sense of physical distance. I have friends across the country in various states. We are still good friends, but it is difficult to continue on a close friendship with the distance is so far away.
Also in a sense it is difficult for me to gain new friends, as I have found that I rarely have much in common with other thirtysomethings. I do need friends right now, but I’m unable or unwilling to go about gaining new friends.

I ran across this article in Wikipedia and thought I’d comment on it.
What is the Brigham Young University Testing center?
A center at BYU for the sole purpose of administering tests to students.
Good things about this type of center:

• Valueable class time is not wasted on a test. The professor doesn’t have to schedule lectured around test scheduling and therefore can continue with the course of study
• Students have plenty of time to take a test. Many times I have had to rush to get done with a test by the time the allotted time is up. There is no time pressure to take a test

Negative things about this type of center:

• Potential for long lines (as the article describes). However there is a web cam available for those who’d like to see how long the line is before taking their test.
• Neutral environment. Many people tend to achieve higher scores on tests when they take it in the room which they learned the material. It was not uncommon during my college experience to visit the classroom afterhours to try to review new material. Sometimes you tend to associate items in the room with items which are on the tests. Having a testing center is somewhat of a neutral environment, which might mean students have increased potential to score lower than in the environment in which they learned the material. However this neutral environment might help measure how well the student has learned the material, and can recite it in any environment.
  There is also a slight potential for a student to have a bad experience in the testing center and therefore associate the center with failure. This of course is merely a psycholocial concern and cannot be alleviated unless the student gains control of their fears themselves.

I think a testing center could potentially be a good idea. I would have liked to have had the option at Lipscomb.

Lipscomb University tries to put checks on cheating.
In the print edition, the sub-headline read “47% at Church of Christ School admitted to cheating in survey.” I think the sub-headline puts a negative spin on the church itself, as if we’re a bunch of hypocrites.
During my experiences at Lipscomb, I never knowlingly cheated. I was very serious about doing my own work. And I never actually saw anyone cheat, such as whispering during tests and such. It could have been done easily, especially when the professor left the room during the test (they usually did). I kept to myself and tried to do my own work and didn’t worry about what others were doing.
The article goes into many other things (temptations) which I didn’t not have to face during my college years. Such as text messages in cell phones during tests. I was in college from ’94-97 when cell phones still weren’t as popular. Not everyone had them, and therefore not many people at the luxury of text messaging.
I think we as a society, and as a church, have lost many of our morals. Cheating is such a large part of life nowadays. Integrity is out the window. It is such a shame, because I feel like we could be so much better.

In the Spring of 1993, I made the decision to go to Lipscomb University. The other university I considered was Freed-Hardeman. It was my sister’s alma mater. Throughout this whole weekend I was confronted by asking myself whether or not I made the right decision.
Freed’s Good Points:

• Strong spirituality nearer toward my point of view. And nearer toward my church’s point of view. Whereas Lipscomb’s more liberal stance on issues worried me at times.
• High caliber of students. That’s not to say that Lipscomb had a lower quality of students. Its just that when I was there this weekend, the people I met seemed sincere about trying to be friendly. And everyone seemed to know each other. Its a 1400 student school. Lipscomb was friendly. But somehow I got the feeling that some were just doing it for lipservice at times.

The short list above is not meant to be a slam on Freed. I just don’t know the school that well.
Lipscomb’s Strong Points:

• Nearby. It was only 30 minutes from my home. This was familiar to me. Home was just a short drive away. Then again, that might have been a liability. Distance could have meant eventual independence. Freed’s remoteness might have been its downfall.
• I knew people who went there. There were about half a dozen people from my high school going there. Making friends wouldn’t be as difficult when you already knew them. Sadly the friends who I started out with at Lipscomb are distant, both geographically and socially to me right now.
• Good quality academic programs in my desired major. I entered Lipscomb desiring to major in Political Science, which later changed to Government when I discovered Poli Sci was heavy on the nondescript philosophical point of view. Lipscomb was better geared toward Government majors being in the state capitol.
• And along the same point above. Good computer programs. Good computer equipment. Computer labs in every dorm (this was 1993 when the internet was just getting big). Email addresses for students. Freed had none of that. Freed might have had a few computer labs in the libary. Freed didn’t have its own webpage until 1997. Had I gone to Freed, I might not have discovered the internet until my senior year (1997). Had I gone to Freed, I might have chosen a totally different field of study, and I might have gone into a different job market. History teacher? Lobbyist?
• Diversity to some extent. Of course you’re comparing apples to oranges. Lipscomb had somewhat of a more diverse student body compared to Freed. However both schools have somewhat of a carbon copied student body compared to Vanderbilt. College is meant to be a place where you can experience different views. Some places are more difficult to experience diversity.

I’m not here to try to rethink or regret decisions made 11 years ago. I am merely contemplating how life might have been if I had chosen a different road.

Here’s an interesting article about Steve Flatt’s nephew playing basketball for Lipscomb’s rival, Belmont.
Sonn Wages a Personal Battle

High Rise dormatory is Lipscomb’s biggest dorm. 8 floors. I was on the 2nd floor my freshmen year. Right next to the lobby. Grand Central station. With the TV blarring from the lobby, it was a wonder I got any sleep.
At Lipscomb they have a switchboard where they would direct calls from the main number. During night time hours the calls would get forwarded to the front desk of High Rise dorm. It was the job of the front desk attendants to answer the phone and direct the calls accordingly. I always wondered what kind of response the guys of high rise gave to after hours callers. Surely there couldn’t have been that many calls.
I always felt sorry for those front desk attendants. I’d leave for my 7:40AM class and find them sleeping on the couch in the lobby. What people will do for extra income. Supposedly it is subsidized by Federal govt grants.
Then there was the intercom system in high rise. During my freshmen year it was barely used. But in latter years it seemed to be used alot for fickle situations. Usually it was people waiting in the front lobby….they’d get on the intercom and say “Hey Joe, we’re waiting downstairs,” which would go out to the entire dorm. Yeah it was funny the first time. But as it dragged on, seemingly very frequently, it got to be just lame. Maybe I was just getting older and more serious about my studies, and I began to grow tired of juvenile behavior.
I was in High Rise for all 4 years of my college career. Started out on the 2nd floor. Then the 5th floor my sophomore and junior years. Then the 6th floor my senior year. I always wanted to find 3 other friends to share a suite with. 2 rooms together. But I never could find friends who had the same study habits that I had.

When I was at Lipscomb I lived on the 2nd floor of High Rise dormitory during my Freshmen year. It was convenient in that you didn’t have to climb stairs the whole time, however it did have its drawbacks. My room was right next door to the dorm’s computer lab, and very near the lobby area. Late night blaring televisions seemed to be the norm or sorts.
Then there were the car alarms. They’d go off ever so often. You could easily hear them from cars parked beside the dorm. One alarm in particular I remember to this day. It was on a red Chevy with Nebraska tags. If there was ever so much of a slight breeze, the car alarm would go off, which usually meant it went off at 2AM during rainstorms. It got bad enough that I thumbed through the dorm’s directory to see if there were anyone from Nebraska staying there. I never got around to doing anything about it. Maybe I should have left a note.
Speaking of notes, I did get a note on my car once. I had parked in this somewhat small parking space near Sewell Hall (another men’s dorm). The next time I drove my car I found a note on the windshield. It had Mickey Mouse giving me an obscene gesture stating something about me parking too close to their car. Ok whatever. The mere fact that someone would take the time to photocopy these notes and having them available in their car for distribution makes me wonder how much of a life this person had.