I'm part of this place now

I'm writing from a perspective slightly different from most people here, but at the same time I'm far from unique. I'm not a graduating senior, nor a parent of one. I'm one of the people who stay behind, and I've been one of them for a long time. I came to IU from northern Indiana as a student in 1971, and stayed here as an employee, in the Center of the Universe (as my friend Evan calls it) or the Belly of the Beast (as I sometimes call it). \n For a long time I could often pass as a student, but now that I'm 50, it seldom happens. Not that it matters -- I never tried to pass, but I was often mistaken for a student, even into my late 30s. It can be fun to take the stuffing out of some arrogant right-winger, waving around his degree as though it could validate his misconceptions, and then let him find out he's been bested by a janitor. \nFun, but not essential to the experience. I don't really feel out of date, because it seems that every style of the past three decades can still be found on campus, coexisting more or less peacefully with the others. Hippies, headbangers, punks, yuppies, Goths, nerds, even 1950s-style ducktails and flattops: IU is a sort of time warp where all eras are brought together. Sometimes they even mingle. I can't estimate how many thousands of students I've known, greeted, yelled at, befriended, danced with, discussed literature or music or politics or religion with, and said goodbye to. Some of the goodbyes haven't been permanent, though. \nThere's Daphne, who's now an English professor in New York; Hans, who took his MBA into international business and lives with his new family in Montreal; Robert, who's finishing his Ph.D. at Columbia University; Carmen, who wrote Star Trek novels and now designs Web sites; Jackie, who started out in philosophy, moved to political science, and is now a professor in Minnesota; Soo, who came here to study English and now works for one of the biggest corporations in South Korea. \nThese are just a few of the people I've met at IU and managed to stay in touch with; I hesitate to single them out because I don't want to seem to slight the ones I haven't mentioned. The point is, thanks to these and other friends from IU I feel connected to places all over the world, places I haven't been to yet.\nOn my first trip to San Francisco, four years ago, I saw a familiar-looking man who turned out to be an IU acquaintance from 20 years ago, now living there. We didn't exchange numbers or anything, didn't try to re-establish contact, but the next day I ran into him again, on the other side of the city. And during a visit to Toronto more recently, I thought I recognized a voice that turned out to belong to an old friend from the '70s -- but it turned out that he didn't live there. Like me, he was playing tourist from the States, and by chance our paths crossed in a Toronto bookstore. It's a small world, and people from IU can be found scattered all over it.\nA remarkable number of people come back, too, if only to visit. Bloomington seems to be a hard place to leave. After my second year in Bloomington even I left once, but returned after a year and put down roots. If I couldn't be happy here, I decided, I couldn't be happy anywhere; and sure enough, I've been happy here, meeting some of the others who come and go, just watching the others.\nFor many years, I felt restless at the end of each spring semester, watching the residence halls empty out. Something in me believed I should be leaving too. I don't seem to feel that restlessness anymore -- well, maybe a twinge now and then. Maybe I'm too settled here now, in danger of turning into a statue like the new memorial to Herman B Wells near the Rose Well House. Well, worse things could happen. Come, sit beside me, study, bask in the sun, tweak my brass nose. I'm part of this place now.