A Plush Temptress Called Notre Dame

What are your attachments? What do they keep you from doing? Becoming?

As part of my goodbye to the States, I spent the last two weeks in the Midwest—the farmer-ful stretch from Bloomington to Chicago where I unexpectedly grew from a 12-year-old to an LA-bound collegiate. Bridesmaiding for a high school friend merited the trip in the first place, but I turned it into a sixteen day whirlwind tour of the people and places of my past (and possibly my future).

One day trip was to South Bend, Indiana to visit Notre Dame, the university where I almost spent four years. I had made frequent trips there as an undergrad in preparation for going. Being back was lovely and unsettling. It was so…me. And not at all. The students talked of nights at the local bars, cute boys and hot chicks, chemistry homework and dorm wars. My host/friend Elizabeth took me to their Hogwarts dining hall, where you pay $10 for an all-you-can-eat meal. I stuffed my face with veggie stir fry and frozen yogurt and took a bag of granola and three applies for later. We toured the bookstore, the golden-domed administration building, and the shiny law school.

I want.

People my age with similar upbringings. A future in academia. A big name university. Manicured lawns. A comfy dorm/apartment bed in a donated building to which you’re almost too tired to return after a day cramming at the 14-story library. Chances are, if you’re reading this post, you remember those ahhhh college days. And if your experience was anything like mine, you miss them terribly.

I want again (and probably will get). But I don’t want it in the sense that I want Nicaragua.

The spirituality of St. Ignatius—the big daddy of Jesuit Volunteer Corps--differentiates between fleeting wants and deep desires. The former may make you feel good, but they don’t fill you up for long. The latter, which don’t feel good all the time, form the bridge between your God-given abilities and the needs of the world. Prevalent examples of the former in my life are lust, food, dangly earrings, and a posh grad school. The most prevalent example of the latter is JVC.

Here’s where I have to be extra careful. I don’t mean to say that going to Notre Dame (which probably won’t happen to me—I’d like to further my studies in a global city—London, perhaps??) means you are giving in to a superficial craving. That’s about as absurd as saying that God hates me for using a laptop computer or plastic water bottle (alas—I bought one. I’m at an airport, in my own defense). But for me, in the moments where I took a wide-eyed tour of the campus where I could have been, I realized that no matter how hard it was (is) to be able to let go of comfort and prestige, that is what I need right now. So that I don’t run toward those things, solely for the sake of wanting them, not for the sake of using them to the fullest.

I hope that blog title double-taked you, and that you never again picture the Virgin Mary draped in diamonds and wearing horns. I am in no way attempting to offend the university to which this post principally refers. I am, instead, calling attention to my own attachment to what has become a beckoning Hilton hotel, which I pass with a wistful smile, outside the window of the speeding Red Line to becoming myself. Destination: Nicaragua. Someday I’ll hop back on the Red Line and exit at the Hilton stop for an extended stay. I will view it, I pray, with a wiser gaze, ready to use my comfortable economic and social privileges as a stepping stone for the world, rather than for myself.