I had a great time with Alex late last week! I’m so glad it worked out that I was able to drive over to Valparaiso for a couple days during his senior week! With this visit, it turned out that I visited Alex at Valpo at the beginning, middle and end of his senior year. It’s neat that it worked out like that. And this was his second move-out in a row that I was able to help him with too (last August I helped him unload and clean his State College apartment). I didn’t mind helping him go get boxes, tape them together or get them loaded. I just enjoy hanging out with him so much, no matter whether we’re doing something “fun” or mundane.
We did do plenty of fun things too though. On Thursday evening Alex & I went out to a good Mexican restaurant in Valpo for dinner (definitely can’t get good Mexican like that in State College!). Then we joined several of his friends from his meteo department (several of whom I remembered from the AMS conference in Phoenix in January) for a couple games of bowling (Alex & I went 1-1 against each other, after I pulled out a spare-strike in the final frame of the second game to rescue a win). After bowling we all went out to Pass Times for some drinks, the same place Alex & I went when I visited in December (we were impressed the waitress remembered us too, with our order of onion rings with southwest sauce, long islands, and taking our picture, so that was neat too). And once again it was a very fun evening!
It rained quite literally all day long at Valpo on Friday, so we weren’t able to do anything outside like we’d hoped to. So we stayed inside pretty much all day, but did venture to a piano (of course) so that Alex could play the pieces he learned this semester. We also played a bunch of ping pong. And I do mean a bunch — 18 games worth over two stints! Amazingly neither of us were getting bored with it either (obviously not, since we played 18 games!), 
and we were pretty evenly matched because we tied at 9 games apiece. In the evening we went to a graduation open house for another friend of his for a bit, before he had to be on duty back in the dorm for the last time as an RA. And for his last-ever time doing rounds, he busted out his unicycle, and I had to run to keep up with him most of the time. Pretty cool. 🙂 Alex has quite a unique set of talents, that’s for sure!
Also, Alex officially accepted his offer from the University of Michigan on Friday right before we went to lunch. We both thought it was fitting that we were together when he made his final decision, considering we’re best friends and how much I’ve been advising and helping him all along the way since last summer. I obviously still wish it would’ve worked out for him to get an offer and come to Penn State, but it seems pretty clear that God is leading him to Michigan for grad school. I’m excited for Alex that he has such a good opportunity at UM, and that he likes Michigan so much that he was able to choose them and be excited about going there, rather than looking at it as a second choice or anything like that. He also found out on Thursday that he’ll be able to do research for Michigan this summer (starting next week!), up at UM-Bart Station (northern lower peninsula, up near the Mackinac Straits)! I haven’t ever been to that part of Michigan before, and I’m looking forward to visiting him up there once or twice this summer. 🙂
On Saturday morning after grabbing breakfast at Valpo’s new student union/dining hall (which reminds me a lot of the sweet cafeteria/dining hall at Gustavus), we went over to the chapel. You see, Alex & I were hoping to be able to climb up to the roof of the chapel, which is something Alex wanted to do once before he graduated. We would’ve done it on Friday, but since it was raining we figured the roof would be too slick. Unfortunately someone was practicing organ when we were there Saturday morning, which meant getting up to the roof unnoticed would’ve been highly unlikely, considering we would’ve had to climb up to a ladder in amongst the organ pipes to get up to a catwalk and crawl space that leads to a skylight. 🙂 I’d been looking forward to doing that, so I was a bit disappointed when it became clear we weren’t going to be able to. So instead of going on that little adventure, we satisfied ourselves with admiring the chapel, taking photos all over.
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Alex also was able to find the remote control for the bell tower, and he asked which of the pre-programmed songs I’d like to hear. I chose “Immortal, Invisible” because it was Aaron’s favorite hymn:
(Apologies that the microphones picked up so much of the breeze.) The Chapel of the Resurrection is enormous and beautiful — it’s the largest on-campus chapel in the world. (My mom went to Valpo for two years, and the chapel’s huge stained-glass windows were installed while she was there.) Alex gave me & Ash a tour back in September when we visited, but it was cool to see it again. And this time by going in the middle of the day we didn’t even have to “break in” through a hidden back door either, haha. 😉
Not long after our wanderings around the chapel it was time for us to part ways, for me to start the long drive back to PA and for Alex to meet a friend for a round of golf before his family arrived in town. I would’ve stuck around for his graduation ceremony on Sunday, but his brother Patrick was already going to be staying with him in his dorm on Saturday and Sunday nights, and it’s a tight squeeze to fit two extra people in a dorm room. 😉 Graduation day is so hectic anyway, and we were able to spend more time together by my coming for a couple days before commencement. I was so glad to get a chance to hang out with my best friend even for a little bit during his senior week, to celebrate his graduation and his grad school decision — the 9-hour drive each way was totally worth it to me! I’m already really looking forward to the next time we can hang out again!