From High to Low

This month, and the last week or two in particular, have been a bit of a rollercoaster for me. I’ll start with the fun and the good, and then get to the not-so-fun news. (This post is definitely on the long side.)
Back on Thursday the 2nd I went to New York City to watch the NIT Championship Game between Penn State and Baylor. I didn’t know how many fan buses there would be to take fans from PSU to NYC, but I figured there would be more than the 16 that went for the NIT semifinal game. And were there ever! For the NIT Championship, there were 36 buses full of white-clad Penn State students that made the trip to Manhattan! Thirty-six! They ran out of buses to rent! It cost just $20 to get a student ticket to the game and a fan bus ticket — a steal of a deal! (Penn State heavily subsidized the fan buses, to encourage as many people to go as possible in order to support the basketball team and make a good impression on viewers for the support that PSU gives.)
The buses left from the BJC at noon, so I rescheduled my advisor meeting from 1:30pm to 8:15am — what sacrifices I was willing to make, haha. None of the other meteo grad students or Christian Grads decided to come, but Chris, one of the meteo undergrads (who’ll be staying here for grad school next year) decided to take the bus out too. The trip was pretty much smooth sailing until we hit the long approach to the Lincoln Tunnel at rush hour. From then on we were crawling, through the tunnel, through midtown Manhattan, and around to the other side of the Madison Square Garden where the bus drop-off was. It was so frustrating being literally a stone’s throw from MSG for 25 minutes before being allowed to get off the bus, especially as city buses next to us were letting off their passengers right in the middle of traffic! Ahhh, Manhattan.
After having been to a game at Madison Square Garden, I can see why so many people say that every sports fan absolutely has to go see a game at MSG. All the seating was in a single bowl, rather than a separate lower and upper deck like at many other arenas. That, combined with the fairly low ceiling, made for quite a cozy atmosphere (it was hard to believe it had a capacity of 19,000, it felt far smaller). The low ceiling also makes it a very noisy building when fans are cheering. I really noticed this about a half hour before the game, when there were maybe only few hundred Penn State fans who had filtered in, and it was so loud when we did one of the Penn State cheers. By the time the game started, around half of MSG was filled, and all but a few hundred of those were Penn State fans. It truly was a fun and raucous atmosphere! Penn State trailed Baylor 29-25 at halftime, but roared back in the second half to win 69-63! It was so great to see Jamelle Cornley and this team go out with a championship (even if it was “just” the NIT). I stayed to watch each member of the team and coaching staff cut down the netsHopefully this post-season run has begun to change the culture of Penn State basketball into a winning one. Even with the long bus ride back after the game, I was so glad I went to have that experience!
The very next night (Friday the 3rd) Alex was planning to drive out from Valparaiso to State College. In the evening Alex decided to hold off and wait until morning to make the drive. There was too much that he had to take care of, and so it was already getting late (far too late to start a 9-hr drive), and he was worried about falling asleep. A wise decision on his part. So instead he made the drive out on Saturday the 4th, and got here in early evening, just in time for a little dinner before going to worship team rehearsal at E-Free. After that we went to Hollemans to watch the Final Four and hang out with a bunch of people. Everyone was glad to see him. 🙂
On Sunday morning we played on the music team for both services, and he absolutely loved that he got a chance to re-connect with so many people at E-Free. Truthfully, it was an encouragement to me to see and hear just how many people were praying for him, and how much a part of this community he became after being here just a few weeks over the summer. We really do have a very loving and friendly church body at E-Free. We had lunch after church at Faccia Luna with Kerrie, Mindi & Ashley G., and then did some homework both before and after PSCG Bible study Sunday night, with me working primarily on my individual project for my forecasting class, which I chose to do on the southern Minnesota tornado outbreak of 29 March 1998 (the outbreak that hit Comfrey & Gustavus/Saint Peter, most notably). We were actually helping each other a fair bit on that, because Alex was also doing a project for his mesoscale class on that event too.
Monday the 6th was his big day, meeting with several faculty members in the department to try to put a more positive face on his grad school application, in the hopes that he’d get an offer from Penn State. Alex thought that basically all the interviews/meetings went really well, about as well as they could’ve gone. He was really happy and pleased with how everything went. So while we knew from Eugene that there were still a bunch of people from the first round of offers that had yet to make their decision, and that even then there was no guarantee that he’d be given an offer if they had to make a second round, we felt pretty optimistic. Things were looking up. We knew that at that point, Alex had done basically everything he could do, and that it was entirely in God’s hands from that point on, for whether Alex would get an offer from Penn State or other schools. That knowledge was simultaneously relaxing and nerve-wracking.
We both did more homework Monday night (it’s amazing how much more productive I can be when I’m around someone else who needs to do lots of homework!), and then Alex started the drive back to Valpo on Tuesday morning. Maybe I sound like a broken record at this point, but it was absolutely wonderful to see him again, and to hang out with him a bunch. We got a sneak peek of what it’d be like to be roommates too, and we were really excited about him likely moving out here right after his graduation in mid-May. He even rearranged the furniture that Tim had left behind in his bedroom, making himself feel right at home. 🙂
And then on Good Friday, Alex got an offer with full support from the University of Michigan! He had a phone interview with them in early March, but then hadn’t heard anything from them until he got the offer. It was really exciting that he got into Michigan, as they’re a very good school with a good atmospheric science program. At that point, we at least knew that Alex would be going to a good place for grad school, with the offer from Michigan in hand and what we thought was at least a decent chance at seeing an offer from Penn State eventually. Alex was absolutely thrilled that he’d at least get to make a choice of where to go to grad school (at the end of March he got an offer from the University of Houston), and I was (and am!) very happy for him.
Another really cool thing happened on Easter weekend, on Saturday the 11th — I was blessed with the opportunity to see my friends James & Ali from Australia!! My parents had called me earlier in the week, when Ali’s parents Bruce & Joan (also from Australia) were visiting them, to let me know that James & Ali were in Bethlehem, PA, visiting some other friends/family, and what their number was (they were all in the States because Ali’s sister got married in Michigan). It worked out for them to swing through State College on the 9th, on their way to Rochester, NY. I took them out for lunch at Otto’s, and then of course took them to see the Lion Shrine and to the Creamery for some ice cream, before they had to be on their way again. Even though their visit was only about 2-3 hours, it was absolutely wonderful. James & Ali lived just a half hour drive from Monash when I studied abroad in Australia, and I did a bunch of stuff with them, including surf fishing at Waratah Bay, going to Woolamai Beach and the Nobbies on Phillip Island, and other sightseeing around the Melbourne area. They even hooked me up with a discounted rental car for when my parents came down to visit, and arranged for me/us to stay with James’s family up in suburban Sydney. They also took care of me a bit when I was sick with bronchitis, and I was able to upload a bunch of pictures to my blog when I’d go visit them (rather than blowing through my tiny internet quota in the res hall at Monash or paying a bunch of money at an internet cafe in Melbourne). Basically, they gave me a home away from home, and were wonderful examples of how to exhibit Christ’s love. Anyway, it was quite the unexpected visit, and I’m really looking forward to seeing them again (probably next year in Australia).
Right after James & Ali left, I got some worrisome news. Eugene emailed Alex to let him know that the acceptance rate had suddenly skyrocketed, with five people in a row all accepting the offers by Penn State. Things were suddenly not looking nearly as optimistic for Alex’s chances of getting in here, though we were both still hopeful.
Then on Monday the 13th, I got an email from Alex late afternoon — forwarding a note from Eugene that contained bad news for Alex. Six in a row had at that point accepted their offers from PSU, bringing the total to 15 (the department’s target number of students for next year’s class), with eight still unknown. Eugene and the grad admission committee had no choice but to shut down all recruiting of new students, which meant that there was not going to be a second round of offers going out at all, and that Alex would therefore not be getting an offer from Penn State.
🙁
We were both stunned and bitterly disappointed. We didn’t really know even what to say to each other. It was hard to accept. In just a little over 48 hours, Alex’s chances of getting an offer from PSU went from pretty optimistic (or so we thought) to bleak as could be. If he had gotten an offer, there was a good chance that Alex was going to move out here as soon as mid-May. We had both been looking forward to being roommates sooooo much, that for those hopes to be dashed so suddenly left us reeling a bit. While he was at least as disappointed as me, I think I took it harder than Alex did (emotionally speaking), both because he had the excitement of the Michigan offer to counterbalance the disappointment of no offer from Penn State (I had no such positive thing to counter the disappointment), and because he was so busy with assignments, projects and tests that he really didn’t have the time to sit back and think about it. There were just so many things that happened in the last several months, that we both sincerely felt like God was leading Alex toward Penn State, so I was definitely asking God why He wasn’t actually leading him here. Monday night and Tuesday were pretty rough for me, with the initial shock of the news.
Ash took me out for a beer Tuesday night to talk about things, and I was able to talk to Alex for a little bit after that. Since then I’ve been doing much better, even though I’m still obviously disappointed (I probably will be for quite some time). It doesn’t do anyone any good to keep being sad and completely bummed out about it, and lately I’ve been choosing to make the best of the situation (especially after talking to Alex about it). I mean, God is in complete control, and He knew all along that Alex was not going to get an offer from Penn State. Therefore, it’s an even greater blessing that Alex got an offer from Michigan. As far as a worst-case scenario goes (Alex not getting into Penn State), Michigan is about as good as it can possibly get, with how great a school they are. (He hasn’t officially accepted their offer yet, he’s waiting to make an official decision until he can visit UM.) It’s also only a 6.5-hour drive from State College to Ann Arbor (it’s 9 from State College to Valparaiso), so that’s a short enough drive that a weekend visit is manageable. Basically, it won’t be much different from this year, except it’ll be easier to visit each other (still won’t be the same as sharing an apartment, though… :-\ ). It’s also only an extra 70 miles for me to swing up through Ann Arbor on my way home to Wisconsin, so I expect we’ll be able to carpool back up to MN/WI for Thanksgiving and Christmas and whatnot. We’ll make the best of the situation, and I’m looking forward to seeing Alex in his new environment in Ann Arbor. In time hopefully it’ll become clear why God apparently intends for Alex to be at Michigan and not Penn State. With all the great things that we can envision Alex doing here at Penn State, being an active member of the community both at E-Free and in PSCG, I can only hope and pray that God has even greater things in store for Alex at Michigan, and that He’ll use Alex in an even more powerful way to further His kingdom’s purposes in Ann Arbor.