Louis: Discover familiarity in the unfamiliar

Reading President Eichner's guest column last week, I greatly valued what he had to say about the myriad experiences available at Ottawa. In particular, his words about stepping outside our comfort zones to experience growth hits home with me.

I might extend his sentiment with a few of my own observations. Ottawa, I've discovered, is a deeply rewarding place filled with passionate and venerable people. Sure, I've only been here a year, but I've come to fully personalize Eichner's comments.

To the new students: take solace knowing that you are not the only ones occasionally feeling like a fish-out-of-water. Homesickness can grip you in ways you wouldn't normally expect. Having a place and a space to call your own-to feel like home-is an intense desire within each of us. Coming to college, it's natural to miss your room, your family, your favorite restaurants and city landmarks. And you should miss them-it's what you know and love.

Luckily, Ottawa cultivates an ethic incorporating all aspects of personhood: academic, athletic, spiritual, etc. So each and every member of the OU community can also find a place/space here in which to feel at home.

I experienced this first hand after moving to Ottawa from New York City last year. After years of hustle and bustle, of all-night delis, of hot, sticky subway commutes, of tourists asking me to take pictures of them- or to get out of their pictures-or to give them directions to places of which they wanted to take pictures, the contrast I experienced when moving to this dusty little hamlet in eastern Kansas is intense.

But if there's anything I've learned in my short time here, it's that more often than not things that remind me of home are accessible here. I may not be able to get a king-sized egg salad sandwich at 3 a.m., but I excel in Ottawa's nurturing community of compassion. Hmmm… if you think about it, a nurturing community is a pretty good definition of ‘home.' Whether through the Adawe Life Center, a club, a sport or the life-long friends you are bound to meet, there are immersive places here.

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