Hello From Somewhere

Hello from Indiana.

Or is that Ohio? Or Kentucky?

No matter. TigerBlog flew out yesterday for these parts, where he has two stops to make. The first is the NCAA women's rowing championships, which begin today outside of Cincinnati in Bethel, Ohio, which isn't too far from the Kentucky border.

In fact, most of the teams are actually staying in Kentucky for the event, which runs through Sunday.

Once that ends, TB will be off to Indianapolis, where he will participate in the NCAA men's lacrosse rules committee meetings. The drive from Bethel to Indianapolis is less than two hours, or at least that's what Google Maps has to say. 

Why Indianapolis? It's the headquarters of the NCAA. 

TB's first trip to Indianapolis was back in 1996. Does he even need to tell you why? 

If he does, that was the site of the Princeton-UCLA game in the NCAA men's basketball tournament, at the old RCA Dome, which no longer stands. It was during that trip that TB first went to the famed steakhouse St. Elmo's; he's happy to see that there is a stop there on the agenda for the meetings.

That trip to St. Elmo's, by the way, ended when he pulled out his old Princeton credit card. Since the team had just beaten UCLA, pretty much anything that connected you to Princeton earned you instant first class treatment, with a bit of awe mixed in as well. It was a fun time.

The first thing TB did when he saw the meeting times was to look to see if the Indiana Fever had a home game while he was there. As it turns out, the answer to that is no. 

He also checked out the possibility of going to see a Cubs game at Wrigley Field, someplace he's never been. That was before he realized that it was more than four hours from Indianapolis to Chicago, which would be like driving from Princeton to Cornell for a non-Princeton event.

Actually, there is a bit of a Princeton connection to the Cubs weekend series. The team is hosting the Reds, whose play-by-play man on television is former Tiger basketball announcer John Sadak.

Oh well. He'll go to Wrigley one of these days.

Back in Princeton, the vibe on campus is the strangest one it gets all year. 

Just one week ago, Reunions were in full bloom. How many people attended? 

According to princeton.edu, the number was somewhere around 25,000. That's an extraordinary number of people, all of whom were singing and dancing well into the early hours.

This is also from princeton.edu:

Alumni have returned to Old Nassau from as far as Australia and Thailand — many with families in tow —  to spend time with classmates, visit old stomping grounds, participate in panel discussions and community service projects, and enjoy a host of live music, events and lectures.

Among the major classes present are the Class of 1974, the grandparent class of this year’s graduates, celebrating its 50th reunion; the Class of 1999, the parent class, celebrating its 25th; the Class of 2014, celebrating its 10th reunion; and the Class of 1959, marking its 65th.

The sprint from Reunions (and the Gary Walters PVC Award Banquet) through the prom, Class Day and finally Commencement is an overwhelming one. There are people everywhere. There is noise everywhere. There is laughter everywhere.

And then, in a blink, it's over. Graduation comes and goes. Everyone packs up and goes home. 

Suddenly, the campus goes from vibrant to deserted, just like that. 

As TB walked around the campus this week, he saw the remains of what had just been there — tents that still stood with no people in them, garbage that was being picked up, orange and black balloons, a handful of recent graduates in class jacket who were posing for the last pictures outside of Nassau Hall. 

What was missing was noise. It becomes eerily quiet, eerily quickly. As TB said, it's a strange dynamic.

 Princeton in the summer is different than most schools, since there are no summer classes. There will just be a handful of students around, and a lot of camps and conferences. 

TB walked into Jadwin from the parking garage with women's basketball assistant coach Lauren Battista the other morning. They talked about the summer recruiting schedule and how hectic it can get. 

Eventually, TB reminded her that next season will be here in a blink. Or, at the very least, something resembling a blink, and the campus will return to its busy self.

For now, it's off to the rowing in Ohio and the meetings back in Indianapolis. 

Have a great weekend.