OCR Text |
Show Graduation stirs memories of . . , p.g. blab By MARCELLA WALKER A memory came back last Friday as I stood with thousands of others and watched the graduates file into the Marriott Center at BYU. Garbed in their black and white, they reminded me of another graduation day, just 27 short years ago. That other graduation day was in the Smith Fieldhouse, however, and I was one of the many graduates dressed in black and white. I hadn't even intended on going to BYU. Everyone in Ogden, almost, went to Utah State and my mom had graduated from there and it seemed a good place to go. But first, there was a stint at Weber College. It was only a junior college then but it was lots of fun. -. After that first year at Weber, I was knee-deep into activities at the school. I was elected secretary of my social club for the next year. I was writing the Campus Chatterbox column for the Ogden Standard Examiner and I had made some of the best friends in the world. I never dreamed as that freshman year at Weber ended that I would not be attending there in the fall. Through a quirk of fate, that seemed destined to me, I visited BYU that summer with a very good friend. I had never been to the BYU campus before and it was a case of instantaneous love. I fell in love with the place on sight. A visit with the chairman of the Journalism Department convinced methat I should be a student there. Especially after he offered me a scholarship housing would have received a cancellation in the mail. They did. I moved into a condemned building with five other bewildered girls, four of whom were from Canada. We had to wait one quarter for the new Heritage Halls to be finished so we could move in. My sophomore year at BYU was interesting. My closest roommate was from South Carolina and had a drawl so thick you could have cut it with a knife. We became close friends to protect ourselves from the Canadians and that friendship has lasted all these years. My junior year at BYU was the best and most fun year of my school life. I had the funnest roommates, we did the craziest things, and studies were relegated to last place. What a ball! During the summer between my junior and senior year I worked as a froster room clerk for Birds-Eye Frozen Foods in Woodburn, Ore. At the end of the summer I traveled with my aunt and uncle to California and back to Utah. I decided, upon the encouragement en-couragement of some of my ex-roommates, ex-roommates, to sit out a year of school. By the time you have reached your senior year you are so tired of school that a break seemed like heaven. I traveled back to California to Inglewood, just outside of L.A., to live with old roomies and seek my fortune in the big city. Three weeks later I found myself back in Provo, moving im and dingy basement apartm my roommate from Woodbu itk who had become engaged"'0 summer and had decided come back to school "V1 engagement broken, she too " herself back in Provo. ' ' H I finished up my education n year, 1957-58, at BYU and 2 place in the processional Z by one into the fieldhouse to i seat with over 1,000 others . " their degree that day in June mS They didn't have convW then. The graduation exerel the Fieldhouse that day were sat there, trying hard to lis(en J' speakers, I remembered .! summer day, three years hoi when a young 19-year-old girl? ' first seen the BYU campus a fallen in love with it. The cyc complete. One of my favorite places in nv world is the BYU campus iJJ go there, walk around and look a u , old sights and the new sights e the Cougareat, and attend all f ball games. llle Last Friday brought backlog memories, as I watched mv 1 daughter, dressed in black a! white, accept her diploma i! completion of four years of stu And, she did it even though she t married and even though she was a mother. She was one of three siri graduating in Computer Science I hope my mother was as proudof me on that June day 27 years ago I was of Mie last Friday. and a job in his office. How could my parents turn down such an offer? My parents went into shock. What about my scholarship at Weber? What about Utah State? What about my friends? My friends couldn't believe it. They were sure I'd flipped a cog or two. I was undeterred, however, and went ahead with my plans. The time neared for registration at Weber. The scholarship had not yet arrived from BYU. I began to panic. The day I was to register at Weber, the scholarship came. Mom and I began making plans to travel to Provo to look for an apartment. As now, it was difficult to find an apartment at that late date. Off-campus Off-campus housing at BYU had nothing. Maybe if we came back in the afternoon the On-campus |