Boy, is it good to be back. There's nothing quite like the beginning of the semester. Whether it is returning from a long, hot summer, or a shortened winter break, the fruits of the semester are always freshest in the beginning.
It's not to say that from here on out it only gets worse; that would be much too gloomy. But it is to say that things will, inevitably as they must, get harder. Our beginnings will become an afterthought, with homework, examinations and class work taking much of the plot.
The tests have yet to be given; the homework is barely a thought. By the time this article is published, many of us still won't have all our books, much less our schedule of what we'll be taught.
This is the time when the parties are grand, the excitement of new beginnings spread across Tempe's land. This is the time when we are all happy to be back, we're all meeting up again, that is a fact.
From the east coast to the west, and of course in between, students all returned for school this great spring.
The kegs were all full with that delicious and glorious gold, and we drank till we can't recount.
Boy, is it good to be back.
The girls were all here, causing us to all peer, walking around glamorously as though they had nothing to fear, and boy, did I realize how good it is to be back.
The weather was crisp, yet it felt more intense, so we wore great big jackets and large sweatshirts, of course, seemingly mocking our peers to the north.
Everything was rolled that those drug dealers sold, and boy, oh boy, was it good to be home.
The bikers swarmed the pavement, and so the skateboarders too, as people walked aimlessly, in between and through.
The parties rejuvenate; the bars erupt, as all of us college guys made this past month away up.
Football was over, the final chapter we speak not, yet now in surprise, we look at how our basketball team has fought.
The MU is now open giving food to us all; we flock there to eat, socialize, seemingly called.
Boy, is it good to be back.
But then the lines are still horrible, the parking still a disgrace, classes are so full, it makes you sick to your face. Tuition went up (and yes, that is f'ed up), enrollment did too; our ratios went down; making even the happiest person frown.
Boy, is it good to be back?
But in the end, it wasn't about that, it wasn't the beer or the sports or even the girls that mattered, it was that we were all back, with friends and our pack.
And with a week already past, we realize that this always moves so fast, so as we have come to work we have also learned to play, because here at ASU, school constitutes a very small part of our day.
And even though school has begun, with tests and so much that needs to be done, there is no one complaining, because everyone is saying…
Boy, is it good to be back.
Got thoughts on Josh's semester debut? Send them along to jspivack@asu.edu.
