Robert Cassady ’11 spent the fall semester studying in Rome.
Here’s his final blog entry from his time there:
Before I came to Italy, and for a good amount of the time that I was here, I considered myself to be perfectly happy with being a child of the Midwest. Coming from a fairly large city in northern Indiana, I enjoyed the slower pace and simpler way of life. I was also comfortable with the idea of one day returning to South Bend.
Yet, now I feel sort of mixed up inside.
My parents visited me two weeks ago in Rome. After a whirlwind of a week with many tours, food, and laughs, they left me in Rome by myself once more with finals looming. This was the first moment when I really started to miss being at home with all of my family. But it was an odd feeling, because it is hard to miss the snows of Indiana when you are exploring St. John Lateran or the Roman Forum on a pretty warm Roman day.
I am ready to come home, but I find it difficult to imagine how I am going to live without the blessings of Rome as a constant companion. Simply put, almost everything in Rome is beautiful, from urban neighborhoods to Bernini’s angels. One cannot even ride the bus or walk to a produce stand to buy an apple without meeting gorgeous architecture or some beautiful statue.
What will life be like back home in Indiana? I think it will be even more wonderful than my time spent here in Rome. For although the buildings might be less spectacular (and certainly much, much younger) and the art less present and amazing, my life will be full of things even more meaningful. Being in the Midwest is mostly about family. In that family, I include Wabash. I long to see the scarlet halls and to discuss the questions of humanity.
Just as the beauty of Rome helps to answer those questions, so, too, do my professors and colleagues. I may not have done Indiana justice in this essay, but I hope to when I return and, perhaps, spend the rest of my life there (with many trips back to Rome, of course).
