Not big man on campus, but something else

Well, I’ve enjoyed this reminiscing about our time at John Carroll University and just what it has represented to us, to each of us and to the two of us together.

You know, we’ve talked about our time together in the Carroll News and our shared experience at John Carroll University for many, many times over the years.

And it is such a joy to know that you are only 25 minutes away and that we can get together for coffee or lunch or even take a weekend trip to go hiking in the mountains of North Carolina.

For the record, I do want to say something about Anton Zeicher, which is that, yeah, I’ve known you in the context as a student at John Carroll and then also as a professional communicator at Duke University.

And I’ve had similar positive experience regarding you both on campus as a student, John Carroll as a student, and in the Duke community.

And that is, I will run into people.

So we were both in both communities at the same time.

I will run into people, people that I haven’t met yet.

And one of the things they will say to me is, well, do you know Anton Zeicher?

He’s this great guy who just seems to know everybody.

And that part of your personality, it was certainly true at John Carroll at the time.

And I mean that in a positive, that you are a connector, a network person, and that continues.

And I think about the fourth time it happened at Duke where I was meeting some new person in a different department, different section, and you say to them, you know, I hope you’re transitioning well.

It’s a large institution.

It can be difficult to learn.

I can think of at least three instances in which this person, and these people don’t know each other, they said to me, well, I met this guy named Anton, and I really feel like he offered to be very helpful.

And I was like, if he’s the example of the people at Duke, I think I’ll be fine.

So it’s true.

I mean, I think that is a great credit to you.

And certainly at John Carroll, if somebody said, there’s this guy, he’s an RA, he’s got a shock of long blonde hair, wears bib overalls every once in a while.

That was a character, wasn’t it?

Is that what you’re saying?

They’re like, I know exactly who you’re talking about.

So it’s the opposite of, and the positive opposite, it’s not big man on campus.

It’s just this person who’s there.

So yeah, like I said, I’m lucky.

For me, it was the school, the college was a very positive experience and brought a lot of things out of it.

I mean, I still have a t-shirt.

I wear it occasionally when I wear the shirt out, and this is in the research triangle area.

Like there will be people who, if they didn’t go there or their brother or something or sister went there, then they’ll be like, oh, I remember when I was a kid living in the suburbs of Pittsburgh, Buffalo, Cleveland, Chicago, Indianapolis.

There was a kid on my street.

He went there.

Yeah, yes.

Or my lawyer or my doctor went there.

Yeah, yeah.

It’s a remarkable campus community university.

And I think what we’re both saying and have been saying over 40 minutes now is how grateful we are for that experience and all the people that helped us through those four years and who have remained in our lives ever since.

That’s for sure.