Editorial

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by Liz Fleming '77 I've been thinking about change lately. It may be the time of life I've reached. With one son heading off to high school and another to junior high, I've been feeling a little off-kilter. Wasn't it just last year that I was in high school myself? It sure feels that way sometimes. The weather is changing too. Fall is definitely in the air. It seems only a few days ago that I rooted my shorts and t-shirts out of the back of the cupboard and soon it will be time to tuck them all away again. Change ... can't we ever keep up? It's simply human nature to resist change. I'm sure it has to do with the laws of physics that I paid so little attention to in my science class days. Why didn't we learn something about objects at rest tending to remain at rest? I think that we as alumni are resistant to the very suggestion of change when it concerns Trent. When we think about our University, we tend to focus on the moment in time when we loved it best and reject the very idea that it might not always remain the same. But Trent, like any other vital educational institution, is forever changing. It's the nature of the beast. As much as we would like to believe that we could return to our residence rooms to find that missing sweat sock, the reality is that our rooms and our colleges are now vibrating to the sounds of new music, other lives and other ideas. Students are changing, the campus is growing and Trent is evolving. And, that, as the syrupy Martha Stewart would say, is a good thing. As hard as it is to accept change, we must remember that if Trent stood still it would cease to be. We must grow to survive and growth necessitates change. The years that lie immediately ahead will bring a much needed infusion of new students as a result of the double cohort year and Trent must be ready to receive them and provide them with an updated version of the wonderful experience we all had. And what is our job as alumni? To accept as gracefully as possible the inevitable changes that occur, to offer our suggestions for ways in which the essence of Trent can be preserved without stifling growth, and to support our University and its students as they make their way into the future. Bob Dylan knew ... the times they are a'changin'.