EVERYONE I KNOW HAS AN “I didn’t want to go to Wabash story.” And they were right to be skeptical. Most weren’t sure that they wanted to hang out with only men for four years. Others hesitated to commit four years to a town in which going to Walmart is considered a treat. All of my classmates would tell you that at one point, they never thought they would end up here. Yet we all got sucked in.
And though I felt the same at one point, my story is different. Most Wabash students have not seen their lives take such a drastic turn midway through their college experience.
THE FRIDAY NIGHT THAT I CAME HOME for Spring Break my sophomore year, my parents sat me down to tell me that my grandmother had lung cancer. My dad’s eyes welled up with tears I had never seen other than during the post-game hug after a big loss in a football game—tears that were often sadness mixed with pride. But these were different.
My grandfather, not typically an emotional man, needed all the help he could get. In a span of just weeks, he went from believing that the only woman he had ever loved would outlast him to knowing that she didn’t have much time left. It was up to me to be strong for him, and to provide support for both of them—up to me, because my grandparents live only four miles away from Wabash.
So I spent the summer with my grandparents that year while I interned in Indianapolis. But as the summer drew to a close, things started to change. While I was back at home in late July, we got a call telling us that things had taken a turn for the worse. Within three weeks, she was gone.
My grandfather was a mess. We all were. As I entered the room the first time after she died, he looked up at me with tears in his eyes and said, “It’s just you and me now.”
But, as he and I would soon learn, it was not just us. In fact, as the summer drew to a close and the leaves began to fall, we began to have more support around us than ever before.
FOOTBALL GAMES AT WABASH became a sort of family reunion. Each game became a way for us all to flee from the pain, if only for one day. For my grandfather, the weekends became a momentary reprieve from heartache. My family would arrive at Grandpa’s house on Friday night and stay through Sunday. They would tailgate for hours before the game, and as I dealt with my grief on the field for a few hours each weekend, my family dealt with theirs by watching me from the stands.
“Grandpa lived for Wabash football after we lost Mom,” my Aunt Ronda tells me. “Every day when I talked with him on the phone, one of us would end up tearful. But before we got to that point, we were able to talk football stats.” I had no idea that my playing football could mean so much to any one person, let alone my entire family.
I can’t even explain how much having family around helped Grandpa and me get through that time. He couldn’t even mention her without crying—and when he did, I followed suit. But those momentary flare-ups of sadness could always be offset by the sun-drenched Saturdays spent with loved ones.
BEFORE THAT FALL, I didn’t know why I had chosen Wabash over other schools. DePauw and Franklin were interested, but after I visited Wabash for the first time, I never gave them a second thought. My father believes “it was God’s plan for you to play for Wabash. It was important to Grandpa to have family close by in those months after Grandma passed away, and you playing for Wabash allowed that to happen.”
I think he’s right. I had unknowingly chosen Wabash for a very specific reason: to bring our family together. Had I attended a school that wasn’t located seven minutes away from my grandparents, my family would not have been able to gather every weekend to provide my grandfather support during his time of need. Would my grandpa have been able to make it through his sadness without the weekly support from his family? Probably. He’s a strong man. But would my family be as close as we are right now? No way.
Wabash became a part of who I am today, and I can’t imagine myself having gone anywhere else. I learned a lot, made good friends, but most importantly, I helped my family get through a difficult time. Wabash helped us during our time of need, and it will always hold a special place in my heart, in my grandfather’s, and in the heart of every single person in my family.