Nightime Wanderings

I really enjoy walking around campus after dark. It usually occurs when I walk back to my dorm from my friends' apartment at night. (For simplicities sake, I'm going to refer to my usual group of friends as the Scoobies, which I do realize is derivative of Buffy, but it does sort of apply.) There are eight or nine of us, we're all decently close, and everyone except for me lives in the same building on the edge of campus. I also live on the edge of campus, but it happens to be the complete opposite edge, so I end up walking back to the West Bank after dark at least a couple of times a week, which may not be the safest plan of action. Both of my parents have warned me against this, as have several of my friends, most notably, [Type A, Likes Baseball], who just tonight told me not to get killed, which is pretty sound advice in a way. [Totally a Cat] and [Awkward Turtle] have walked with me a couple of times, and then gone all the way back, but I feel bad making them walk all the way to West Bank and back at 3 am.

I also just prefer walking alone. It's so peaceful at night, when everything is quiet and still, yet, no matter how late it is, there are always signs of life on campus. Rather than going directly back, I like to detour up to the Mall, which really isn't that much out of my way, because Northrop Mall at night is one of the most peaceful and beautiful things in the city. The old, solid science buildings framing the trees lining the grassy way up to Northrop, stand tall and dark at one end, and Coffman at the other, invitingly lit, reminding the denizens of the science and math buildings that there is still fun to be had in this place of learning. At least that's what it makes me think of.

At night, the Mall is still and quiet, with hardly anyone around, which is in sharp contrast to the daytime, when people are everywhere. This makes it dynamic in a way that serene places rarely are, which, in a way, makes me appreciate it even more.

Tonight, I thought campus was particularly pretty when I walked home. It was misting when I left the Scoobies', so the lights glittered off the sidewalk and grass, making everything shimmer and smell like just after it rains, but without the actual rain, which is always a plus. The Minneapolis skyline was all lit up as I walked across the bridge, and the river was dark and calm below me. It's moments like that that I realize how glad I am to be at the U, to have friends, to be productive, and to be able to walk across the river at night and just appreciate the city that I live in.