College Peers or Heroes?

As I compose this blog entry, I am also listening to/kind of watching the ASU baseball World Series game. When I was a child, I loved watching ASU sports every moment I could. The athletes I would watch or hear on the radio were my heroes, as a boy they seemed like superheroes achving the unbelievable. I watched Bill Frieder coach the SunDevils to monstrous wins and devestating defeats, I was at the edge of my seat when ASU almost won the national champtionship only to lose in the Rose Bowl, I loved listening to the play by play on the radio while I tried to emmulate the actions I heard.

I was deteremined that I would become an ASU SunDevil, graduate at the top of my class, join a faterity, play one of the sports, date and marry a cheerleader. When I got accepted in ASU, I was estatic. My dream was coming true and I couldn't wait for classes to begin. I had similar emotions like when I was a younger boy eagerly awaiting for Christmas to arrive.

I'm a senior right now, in fact earlier in the day, I applied for graduation which means my undergrad life as a SunDevil is coming to an end as I will walk in December. I didn't play any college sports, the fraterity life no longer appeals to me, I have not met a cheerleader that I would consider marriage with and my gpa is average. Yet, while watching the SunDevils try and get a win from Texas, I feel very connected to my fellow SunDevils. They have walked the same halls that I have, pulled all nighters in the library and some, their college lives are coming to an end too. Instead of looking at these peers as celebrities who are distant from me, I see them as peers, who experience the same joy and pain that I have faced.

I think that being a college student during the same time as these guys helps put a heavy dose of reality into my thinking. It makes these athletes seem more human than superman which makes me cheer them on more passionately and geninuely as I see them as people, who hit the snooze button, dislike Scantron tests and are not too different from you and me.