I’ve never been that involved at Saint Louis University. I paid $35 to join the Wilder-ness Adven-ture Club freshman year, which was pretty badass, but I never went spelunking or rock climbing or adventuring.

But I still have one week left to get involved … right?

I was set on the pre-med track freshman year, and that was going well. However, my solid, 2.0 GPA first semester didn’t exactly forecast another successful eight years in school. I screwed around and took some core-requirement classes to figure out what major I would actually attend classes in and enjoy.

Meanwhile, I moved off-campus and joined a bowling league-anti-campus-involvement mistakes No. 1 and No. 2. I had a sort of college experience at my rental house on The Hill with my friend from Creve Coeur, but only to the extent that we had keggers. I left campus as quickly as possible to go home and watch TV or hang out with 20-somethings at the bowling alley. Then, my roommate and I started working there.

At this upper-class bowling alley-if such a thing exists-we were a crazy family, albeit a trashy one. The good ol’ boys who showed up on Thursday nights were my father’s age, but that didn’t stop them from saying inappropriate things to me. But who could be offended by that, when our own boss, a 60-year-old bowling king, literally stuck his tongue in my ear one time? The crazy pin-setter even told me he would drink my roommate’s bathwater. It was ridiculous, to sum it up.

But we had fun, my roommate, myself and the handful of confused, part-time students and wanderers who worked with us, all of whom were probably also part-time alcoholics.

On SLU’s campus, I felt out of place, and I really couldn’t find a calling. The bowling alley was like an alter-ego life; I started to have dreams about the good ol’ boys bitching about beer-bucket prices.

Then, I found a few mentors. Hal Bush, Ph.D., jack of all English-related trades, and Avis Meyer, Ph.D., god of copy-editing and things media-related. English classes really seemed to fit for me; I not only enjoyed the things we read, but I could write an awesome term paper with both arms tied behind my back. I loved correcting people’s mistakes, so I decided I’d like to combine the two and work at a publishing house as an editor one day.

I moved back to my hometown in Illinois with my boyfriend and stumbled into my job here at The University News at the beginning of senior year. The smart kids were pretty intimidating at first, and I didn’t know anything about this “involvement” thing, so it was strange. I decided to get in close with the Editor-in-Chief and suck up a little. We started going on smoke breaks, i.e. I smoked, she coughed, we talked.

I realized she would not join in the trade I had envisioned, which would be some sort of compliment-for-laziness agreement. (Though you do look pretty today, Katie, and I can’t come to some meetings this week.)

The kids at the paper were somewhat less trashy than the 28-year-old smoking, gin-drinking bowling waitress I had become-somewhat-but we found a balance. I actually found some level of involvement, although I’ve never been able to take off my scarlet “C,” for commuter. Things are much calmer in Illinois, and I think I couldn’t have made it to bond with the Hump’s regulars if I wanted to.

I probably missed out on some things these four years that I should have experienced. But what I did go through was anything but usual, which is saying something . I think. I definitely grew up on a few levels, and I found inspiration to do something out there in the actual world, which I’m hoping is some mix of bowling alleys and newspapers, Missouri and Humphrey’s. I’ll try to get a little more involved in the next part.

Jamie Robinson is a senior in the College of Arts and Sciences.